Implicitly, men are already considered leaders to a greater extent than women are.
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Love to toss creative ideas in the brainstorming session at your workplace? If you are a women, beware, you are more likely to receive less credit than your male counterparts, new research revealed.
The findings showed that when it comes time to replace the team’s leader, these men are more likely to be nominated to do so.
Further, women are more likely to be snubbed when they share ideas on how to change the team for the better, they are not given any more respect than women who do not speak up at all, and thus are not seen as viable leadership options, the researchers said.
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“In sum, we find that when men speak up with ideas on how to change their team for the better they gain the respect of their teammates — since speaking up indicates knowledge of the task at hand and concern for the wellbeing of the team,” Kyle Emich, assistant professor at the University of Delaware in Newark, said in a statement.
Moreover, when most individuals imagine a leader, they are likely to expect that leader to be a man by default.
“This is the reason it is so easy for people — both men and women — to link men’s voices (speaking up) with leadership.
“Implicitly, men are already considered leaders to a greater extent than women are. The reason I mention this is that correcting the problem will take effort and the conscious attention to biases against women in the workplace,” he added.
Giving credit where credit is due can be as simple, Emich explained, “as acknowledging that who the idea came from: If a woman’s ideas have been floated around the room, you can acknowledge that by saying, ‘I think we all really like (name’s) idea'”.
Emich also recommends that professionals consider mentoring women in the workplace.
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