Unless men embrace their role in eliminating gender bias and barriers, organizations and institutions will never leverage the value that women bring to the workplace.
“Most positions of power are still held by men,” says Colleen Ammerman, director of the Harvard Business School Gender Initiative and co-author of the new book, Glass Half-Broken: Shattering the Barriers That Still Hold Women Back at Work. “They have lots of opportunity to change the structures themselves.”
The authors of Glass Half-Broken weave academic research with practical advice for inclusive business leadership, while also attempting to raise awareness about gender inequality for early- and mid-career professionals as well as women at the senior executive level.
Although significant progress has been made over the past 50 years, women still hold only a fraction of leadership positions and board seats at major companies, and the gender pay gap persists. While young women are aware of these systemic problems, the more nuanced forms of sexism that persist today often take them by surprise, say Ammerman and co-author Boris Groysberg, the Richard P. Chapman Professor of Business Administration at HBS.
It happens very quickly ... It's really within that first year that they start to say, ‘This doesn't feel quite right.'
“It happens very quickly,” says Groysberg, reflecting on interviews with college students and young professionals conducted for the book. “It's really within that first year that they start to say, ‘This doesn't feel quite right. It doesn't seem like I'm getting the same amount of support and attention. I don't think I'm being treated the same.’”
Even in the best circumstances, many women interpret setbacks as personal failings rather than structural barriers, which harms their self-confidence. Add in a devastating pandemic that has forced many mothers to scale back professional duties to support children at home, and deeply embedded stereotypes about women as caregivers and men as breadwinners start to resurface with more intensity.
“When your child runs in during your Zoom call,” says Ammerman, “that's perceived very differently than when your male colleague’s child runs in during his Zoom call. I think it just produces an enormous amount of stress.”
Steps toward gender equality
In Glass Half-Broken, Ammerman and Groysberg recommend a series of best practices along seven critical dimensions to organizations that want to work toward parity, not for cosmetic reasons, but to improve performance and value:
Attraction and recruitment. Actively seek candidates outside managers’ networks, and assess the language used to describe jobs and the company.
Hiring. Educate managers about the gender biases that influence hiring decisions. Companies should also anonymize resumes, diversify interview panels, and evaluate candidates as a group against a set of defined criteria.
Integration. Create opportunities for people to work toward shared goals with people who are different from them. Discourage exclusionary social activities, and make sure that teams don’t treat women as outliers or extraneous.
Development. Assess how managers assign training and development opportunities, and ensure they use objective criteria. Increase women’s access to mentors and sponsors.
Performance assessment. Educate managers about gender biases that can influence evaluation decisions. Assess the criteria managers use to rate performance, and eliminate ambiguous, vague, and malleable standards.
Promotion and compensation. Set clear and transparent parameters for salary offers and raises. Review the outcomes of promotion and compensation decisions by race, gender, and other identity characteristics.
Retention. Track attrition and tenure by gender. Combat flexibility stigma by focusing on measurable aspects of performance, and don’t turn a blind eye to high performers who harass.
Despite these efforts, the authors stress that success is unlikely unless the people leading these initiatives truly commit to long-term improvement.
Equality as a competitive advantage
Looking forward, Ammerman and Groysberg envision a class of “glass-shattering organizations” that will become employers of choice for women, giving these companies an edge as they harness the value of diverse teams. Companies that take the lead in gender parity will position themselves to draw even the most discerning women in senior management.
Either you’re the kind of company that's in the lead on this ... or you’re the kind of company that is left behind.
“Either you’re the kind of company that's in the lead on this, and that will become a self-perpetuating advantage, or you’re the kind of company that is left behind, and you’re going to set yourself back in terms of talent drain,” Ammerman says. “I don’t think there’s going to be much middle ground.”
In the meantime, men in leadership positions must prioritize gender equality to facilitate lasting progress, especially after the setbacks caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Groysberg says. As a gender scholar and a father, Groysberg longs for a world in which his two daughters can follow their ambitions, without a ceiling that limits their potential.
On a practical level, Ammerman and Groysberg hope Glass Half-Broken helps women understand what they’re up against in today’s work world and acts as a resource they can recommend to their male colleagues. If enough people assume responsibility for making the changes that research shows can reduce inequities, they say, the results will benefit organizations and individuals in the long run.
“There's no reason that gender needs to be an engine of inequality,” Ammerman says. “It's totally possible for us to have institutions that are not organized that way and that don't perpetuate disadvantage. It’s our choice. It's whether we want to do the work to make those changes.”
About the Author
Kristen Senz is the growth editor at Harvard Business School Working Knowledge.
[Image: Pexels/Daniel Watson]
What steps are your organizations taking toward gender parity?
Share your insights in the comments below.
Book Excerpt## Inclusive Managers Effectively Leverage Diverse Perspectives
By Colleen Ammerman and Boris Groysberg
Gender inclusion means more than making women feel welcome. If you’re not soliciting and using their knowledge and expertise, you’re not truly including them in the actual work of your team. In our survey of women executives, one consistent characteristic of non-inclusive managers, both male and female, was an unwillingness or inability to listen to and take advantage of others’ views and insights.
Superficial recognition that doesn’t allow women to fully contribute won’t placate employees who feel their voices are unheard. Indeed, lip service can be all the more frustrating, as expressed by one woman working in the health care industry: “I recently reported to someone I always thought was inclusive, but in hindsight he was not. He put women in top roles, but they did not get an equal voice. Many times, I was told what decisions were rather than being asked to make the decision or provide input.” This experience is echoed by a legal professional: “The CEO had an inner circle where all decisions got made, and despite the fact that I reported to him, I was not part of that in- formal decision-making body. I was the only female on the executive team, and he made a point of including me in public events but not where information was shared and the decisions got made.”
By seeking out and valuing perspectives grounded in employee’s different experiences, you can deepen engagement.
Not only does this sort of inclusion in name only demoralize employees, but it also deprives teams of the benefits of diversity. By seeking out and valuing perspectives grounded in employee’s different experiences, you can deepen engagement and are also likely to gain insights that contribute to better work culture and performance. If you are leading a diverse team, you might be inclined to minimize differences in hopes of fostering unity and connection. But research has shown that trying to play down differences actually backfires: it creates a sense of isolation. When team culture focuses on going along to get along, offering a contrary opinion becomes a risky prospect. While it makes sense to align priorities and foster a shared ethos among employees, it is crucial that managers welcome contributions and perspectives that challenge the status quo.
One case in point happened at coworking space The Wing. In 2020 CEO Audrey Gelman had to address criticism that the company, despite a feminist mission, had inadequately addressed concerns among the women of color on its staff and failed to live up to its equity and inclusion rhetoric. Writing in Fast Company, she explained that by failing to listen to employees, Wing had missed important information about problems that worsened as they went unaddressed and ultimately damaged the company’s reputation: “Rather than creating a healthy feedback loop and addressing with urgency the issues that members and employees identified, we prioritized business growth over cultural growth. There comes a time when your employees and customers know your business better than you do and when slowing down to listen becomes the smartest (and most strategic) thing you can do.”
The inclusive managers we heard about in our survey made employees feel heard and respected. They solicited input from across the organizational hierarchy and focused on what was best for the team rather than listening only to a few voices and maneuvering to enhance their own standing. “Midcareer, I had a boss in Hong Kong who was quite inclusive and progressive. He was ... bringing in more diverse staff both locally and as expats and engaging many levels of the team,” said one woman in our survey. One executive in consulting, who’d had dozens of managers over the course of more than thirty years, pithily summarized the key actions of her most inclusive managers: “Championed everyone on his team. [Was a] supporter, equally, of all on his team. Allowed each person to speak at meetings and solicited input from those that were quieter.” We heard about managers who made sure to bring in the voices of women or other staff who were in the minority, “call[ing] for the opinions of women or underrepresented minorities if their voices were more quiet.” Indeed, recent research has found that white men speak up the most and exert the most influence on group deliberation, even when white women or people of color in the group have more expertise. Making a proactive effort to tap into the knowledge of others, as these managers did, can disrupt that pattern and help you leverage the power of the entire team.
Reprinted by permission of Harvard Business Review Press. Excerpted from Glass Half Broken: Shattering the Barriers That Still Hold Women Back by Colleen Ammerman and Boris Groysberg. Copyright 2021 Colleen Ammerman and Boris Groysberg. All rights reserved.
