Gender Diversity in Leadership: Challenges and Strategies

This report discusses the challenges and strategies for achieving gender diversity in leadership positions. It highlights the impact of gender diversity on organizational performance and the need for equal opportunities. The report also explores various theories and research on gender diversity in leadership.

Running Head: MANAGEMNT
Management
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Introduction
Currently every single organization and individual are talking about women empowerment but
still, it seems just like thought in the minds of the business world. Still, it can be easily seen that
most of the corporate business are still men dominates. Very little percentage of women can be
seen in the leadership position (Gipson et al., 2017). It seems that still, business world is
following old tradition in which it was believed that men can take a better decision than women
and therefore deserve leadership position as compared to women. In such situation, it is very
important to bring focus of the world on this most important issue of diversity inequality in the
business world (Peachey et al., 2015). In fact, many social organization has started targeting
organization which discriminates individuals on the base of gender.
Research methodology
Most of the data which will be explored for this issue will be the secondary base because it will
help in generating a pool of information which can be later analyzed in order to achieve an
effective outcome. Secondary data will offer time and effort saving as compared to primary data
collection which will not offer maximum coverage area (Kenyon, Meixell & Westfall, 2016). In
this various literature review will be explored related to diversity in leadership explained by great
scholars.
Literature review
According to Gascoigne, Parry, and Buchanan, 2015, before the establishment of gender
diversity theory in leadership, it was believed that men can serve leadership position better than
women because they are a risk taker and can think out of box. While women were seen as a rule
follower and do not take risk related to any business decisions. In fact, most of the leadership
theories were developed around men and women were completely neglected. But after the
establishment of this gender diversity theory in 1990, it has been seen a huge storm of
feminization demand related to a leadership position in which women were perceived as best
option for effective and wellbeing position of the organization. In fact, they were seen as an
advantage in the strategic partnership pattern in the business world. Even transformational
leadership theory has also associated them with this storm of feminization by offering behaviour
leadership framework. But according to Pedrini, 2018, gender diversity theory of leadership is
not fully successful in convincing the business world that women deserve an equal chance on a
leadership position as men do. This is because female is still continuously facing a glass ceiling
in their career in the workplace related to the leadership position. They are still connected with
child-bearing and are not connected with the society male dominance which is being offered by
cultural framework by many organization on the global level. It seems that business society has
not still eliminated the curtain of gender stereotype in this modern business world.
According to Abendroth, Melzer and Kalev, 2017, before the birth of gender equality theory,
many theories such as sociological theories and capital theories, women were blamed for not
incompetent for effective work are often paid low as compared to men in the workplace. This
argument was supported by human capital in such a pattern that women and men are paid
differently because they invest their time and effort in a different pattern in their work career.

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According to sociological theory, men were perceived as breadwinner and has a lot of
responsibilities like supporting their dependent wife and family. While women are first
committed to their family and the company. Therefore both cannot be given an equal position of
leadership in the organization. In addition to this, society also supports higher education to men
as compared to women because still, they have not removed this gender stereotype from their
mind. But the evaluation of gender equality, women are as seen as an equal contributor in the
organization and their traditional image was completed change (Williams & Neely, 2015). In
fact, it was believed that women are having better negotiation skills as compared to men and
therefore they also deserved a leadership position in the organization. This theory also stresses
that female is able to manage her family husband and children effectively, then they are capable
enough to display effective management pattern in their particular workplace. At present, both
men and women receive same level of education and have equal contribution to the development
and growth of the community on the global platform.
(Sources: Statically data of women and men earning, 2013)
Finding and manager strategy
As per the study it has been observed that on an average business world believes in gender
equality but when it comes to the practical ground they believe that women are better in some
skill and attributes from men in some areas but this does not make them a better choice for the
leadership position (Carter, 2015). One of the main reason which they suggest that women are
not a risk taker and always try to play within the ground rules while men are a risk taker and try

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to find out new ways of doing things. Present business world is highly uncertain and is
continuous in need of innovation and in such situation men will be fit best for the leadership
position as compared to women.
(Source: IWPR analysis of American Community Survey micro data, 2014)
As per the study it has been seen that the team comprising equal gender members are generally
able to perform better than the team which is dominated by the male in terms of both revenue
and sales. But still many organizations have not followed this trend in their business operations
especially in higher positions.
Manager strategy
In this situation, one of the best options for manager is to introduce a new strategy in which
equal distribution of members in the entire department, especially C-level positions and work
team. This strategy cannot be efficient for companies which work in oil and gas industry. But it
will work better for the rest of the companies. This will help the company in improving its
financial performance because this balance will help in increasing the stock value of the
organization. In this women can take the position of fund head and can perform better than male
person (Wu & Cheng, 2016). In addition to this, this strategy will help to increasing the customer
base because in many companies female is having more population than main and this strategy
will motivate them to be part of this organization. As per the study without diverse gender staff,
it will not be easy to handle diverse customers regarding service. It will also help the
organization to resolve more complex problems which can arise in a business context because
the right balance of gender which offers a large number of suggestions which can generate a
large number of ideas (Salcedo, 2017). In addition to this, this strategy will also help in building
the right platform for the talented people who will be diverse in nature, help in cultivating the
positive environment in the organization in terms of diversity and recruiting right set of people
based on their talent and capability and not on the base of gender diversity.

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Conclusion
The business world has become very diverse but still it is not able to introduce this level of
diversity in terms of gender and still male is domination the key position in various top
organization. Many gender diverse theories have been established which has brought a storm of
feminization but still it is not able to make a great impression on the business world. Still, the
business world is struggling from equal opportunity for women when it comes to the leadership
position. There are few companies which feel that women leadership has equal contributing to
the growth and development of the business world.

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References
Abendroth, A. K., Melzer, S., Kalev, A., & Tomaskovic-Devey, D. (2017). Women at work:
Women’s access to power and the gender earnings gap. ILR Review, 70(1), 190-222.
Carter, J. (2015). Patriarchy and violence against women and girls. The Lancet, 385(9978), 40-
41.
Gascoigne, C., Parry, E., & Buchanan, D. (2015). Extreme work, gendered work? How extreme
jobs and the discourse of ‘personal choice’perpetuate gender
inequality. Organization, 22(4), 457-475.
Gipson, A. N., Pfaff, D. L., Mendelsohn, D. B., Catenacci, L. T., & Burke, W. W. (2017).
Women and leadership: Selection, development, leadership style, and performance. The
Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 53(1), 32-65.
Kenyon, G. N., Meixell, M. J., & Westfall, P. H. (2016). Production outsourcing and operational
performance: An empirical study using secondary data. International Journal of
Production Economics, 171, 336-349.
Peachey, J. W., Zhou, Y., Damon, Z. J., & Burton, L. J. (2015). Forty years of leadership
research in sport management: A review, synthesis, and conceptual framework. Journal
of Sport Management, 29(5), 570-587.
Pedrini, M. (2018). Exploring the effect of gender diversity in MFIs during turbulent
periods. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 29(16), 2455-2481.
Salcedo, E. S. (2017). Expanding the Role of the Philippine Commission on Human Rights for
the Protection of Gender Equality in the Workplace: Practical Lessons from
Canada. Asia-Pacific Journal on Human Rights and the Law, 18(1), 48-77.
Williams, C. L., & Neely, M. T. (2015). Gender and Work. Emerging Trends in the Social and
Behavioral Sciences: An Interdisciplinary, Searchable, and Linkable Resource, 1-14.
Wu, R., & Cheng, X. (2016). Gender equality in the workplace: the effect of gender equality on
productivity growth among the Chilean manufacturers. The Journal of Developing
Areas, 50(1), 257-274.

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Appendix

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