Why There Are More Male Managers Than Females

An essay exploring why there are more male managers than females would delve into the societal expectations and biases that perpetuate gender inequality in the workplace. Despite research suggesting that women are more effective managers than men, they continue to be underrepresented in leadership positions. This is due to factors such as gender stereotypes, a lack of female role models, and a lack of policies that support work-life balance. The essay could also examine the potential benefits of having more female managers, such as improved workplace diversity and a more inclusive work environment. Additionally, the essay could offer solutions for addressing the gender imbalance in management, such as implementing diversity and inclusion programs, increasing access to mentorship and leadership development opportunities for women, and advocating for policies that support work-life balance for all employees.

Right at the start of this report, I’d like to highlight the limitations from even partially using gender expectations as a litmus test for future performance. How western society expects women to act has less to do with female anatomy or hormones and more to do with cultural norms and mores. As I explain how woman make better managers, I’ll illustrate which expectations are derived from culture and which are derived from neurobiology. The first thing to do is to clearly define a manager’s role, after all ideal managers have unique traits which make them so effective in their positions. A manager’s role essentially focuses on creating goals based on their organization’s strategic objectives, developing complimentary team objectives, organizing and motivating their team to accomplish those goals, assessing progress on the goals, and training their team to better achieve those goals.

Identifying the roles of the manager helps us distinguish this position from similar positions such as entrepreneurs. This is not to say that men make better entrepreneurs than women or vice versa; they are simply different roles with different skillsets. For instance, an entrepreneur may not be drawn to the repetitive goal-oriented tasks inherent in management. Likewise, the risk-tolerance found with entrepreneurship may be unappetizing to a skilled manager.

Different sources identify managerial traits in similar ways. Forbes defines the seven quantities that make great managers as: identification with company culture, good decision-making skills, positivity, focus, empathy, honesty, and accountability. A similar but more extensive look at managerial qualities was conducted by researchers at the University of Tennessee. These researchers identified five big and four narrow managerial traits. The big traits were openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and emotional stability. The narrow traits were assertiveness, optimism, work drive, and customer service orientation. These nine traits identified by the University of Tennessee are the benchmarks that I’ll be using to reason that women make better managers than men. However, before that I want to look at the cultural and neurobiological elements that go into male and female genders. It is utterly critical to remember that ‘woman’ and ‘man’ refer to gender identities.

The western cultural form of ‘womanliness’ is really what we’re examining. It is for brevity’s sake that we examine this from a Western and American perspective. However, this serves to highlight an important cultural distinction. Much of what it means to be a woman is linked to the cultural framework in which you live. Gender roles for biological females in the United States are different than what you’d find in some groups in Nigeria or amongst the Maori to name but a few. This is only noted to reinforce that cultural distinctions exist and not to turn this into an anthropology paper. Although American culture is improving, we still have problems with stereotyping. As the Pete Segeer song laments, “And they all get put into boxes, and they all come out just the same. ” Planned Parenthood notes that the stereotypical womanly personality traits include being accommodating and emotional. Psychology Today looks beyond gender stereotypes, identifying some aspects of womanliness that are scientifically founded. In a (somewhat controversial) article by Dr. Peggy Drexler we see that women and men are about equally ambitious, women have a higher level of comfort with emotions, they also work harder when internally conflicted or under heavy levels of stress. The report also went on to point out how women tend to be multitaskers and have larger networks of friends. Whether you agree with these generalizations or not, it reinforces certain traits of what we expect from women in this culture. We teach young girls to act in a certain manner through what they see in media and advertisements and as a society we expect women to have certain traits as adults. As I’ll examine shortly, many of these traits are consistent with the key managerial competencies identified by the University of Tennessee. Up to this point, this paper has been focusing on the cultural differences between men and women.

Now I think it important to briefly tackle what it classically has meant to be manly. The aptly named website, The Art of Manliness, defines the seven vital characteristics of a man as: physically strong, functional providers, sexual independent, emotionally detached, intellectually driven, leaders. These characteristics are very consistent with what you see in media. Turning to neurobiology we can identify many studies pointing to differences in how male and female brains handle the hormones and neurotransmitters of stress. In one particularly interesting study the biological and cultural expectations of gender played a role in women being more susceptible to developing PTSD7. This writer feels that illustrates a certain double-edged sword. An increased emotional E. Q. comes with a cost with the cost of that part of the brain being more susceptible to breaking down. Looking at just about any creature in the animal kingdom you’ll quickly observe differences between the males and females of the species. Stanford medicine set out to formally examine these differences and started looking at differences in the brains of human males and females. To summarize, they found that males had smaller corpus callosums (the part of the brain that relays information between the two hemispheres), a reduced ability to recall emotionally charged memories, a smaller (and different functioning) hippocampus (the part of the brain that controls memory), an increased tendency for alcoholism / drug dependence, better ability to juggle tasks in their working memory, and a better ability to visualize objects - among many other differences8.

At this point I feel we have enough information to turn our focus back on the managerial traits identified by the University of Tennessee and see which align best with women. The first three traits to examine are agreeableness, conscientiousness, and emotional stability. We could associate agreeableness with being a team player, working well as a group leader, and being mindful of other’s emotions. Conscientiousness is a second key function and associated with being mindful of the organization’s rules, orderliness, and the execution of an organization’s agenda. Finally, emotional stability was found to be the most elevated of all the big five traits. It relates to our ability to handle stressors both within and outside of work. I’d argue that the first three major traits are much better aligned for women than men. Whereas socially men are expected to have an independent, brash, and sometimes even volatile leadership style, women are expected be better at working in a group, thoughtful, and emotionally insightful. The neurobiology illustrated at Stanford Medicine also indicates that women should be better at these two managerial traits. This may also be connected to how even at two to three months, infant girls start recognizing and responding to faces.

There are two more major managerial traits identified as being important by the University of Tennessee researchers – Extraversion and Openness (to new experiences). Initially both traits seemed more aligned with masculinity. Men are expected to be outgoing and fearless, whereas women are expected to be reserved and mild. However, upon further examination this writer wonders if being outgoing and fearless are the same as the extraversion and openness identified as being valuable to management? Upon further inspection, it seems that women are, once again, more aligned to these major managerial traits. Extraversion is not the same as being outgoing or demanding, rather it refers to one’s ability to effectively interact with others. A demanding and brash boss may be outgoing, and people may identify them as extraverted. Yet, they would not have as effective interpersonal skills as someone who is able to both listen and be heard in a manner that is emotionally sensitive and respects other parties. Finally, openness (to new experiences) isn’t the same as leaping first and looking second. The University of Tennessee mapped this to “Seeking input, creative thinking, and cultural appreciation. ” This makes five out of five traits that correspond better to women. The four minor traits of managers were assertiveness, customer service orientation, work drive, and optimism. It is only in the minor traits that men distinguish themselves over women. I want to focus on two of these minor traits in particular – assertiveness and work drive. The most assertive managers that this writer has ever known are women. However, assertiveness is not necessarily a trait associated with women. In fact, Stanford medicine demonstrated that men have a larger amygdala and one which imprinted emotional events less well.

An apt conclusion might be to say that men are less likely to remember negative emotional experiences with the same raw visceral emotion that women can. This may be an advantage in scenarios that calls for one to be assertive, but a disadvantage when a softer touch is needed. Work drive is another area where research shows men come out over women. In the case of the University of Tennessee’s research, work drive mapped to “achievement orientation”. None of the research this writer found indicates that men or women are more driven then the other. Rather, a very interesting study showed that women are less satisfied then men with promotions to manager! In fact, they found a decrease in job satisfaction with higher level promotions.