What You Need to Know About Career Advancement: Understanding How to Engage Effectively in the Leadership Space Wendy Fox-Kirk, Weber State University Mary Anne Berzins, University of Utah

Group Activity Women Leaders in Higher Education are…………… The issues facing women leaders in higher education are……………

Outline Demographics Context Key Issues Some theory Leadership perceptions Strategies

Women in the Workplace Education Pay Access to senior positions Tendency of society to favor men Impact of career disruptions Ref: Pew Research Center: 10 Findings about Women in the Workplace: December 2013

Gender Representation in HE

Women University Presidents The American College President 2012 – Typical College/University President is a married, white male aged 61 with a doctorate in education – Women make up approx 26% of university/college presidents (up from 23% in 2006)

Context HE history – Church, train male clergy – Later train males for high office in government and professions – Jefferson fought for secularization – Ralph Waldo Emerson introduced an aristocracy of merit Public/private spheres – male/female Women’s move into the workforce public Moving cohort/critical mass theory – Equity and balance will result – Feminization of industries (pejorative)

Context Public Sphere - Male Highly paid & valued work Private Sphere - Female Unpaid & less valued

Key Issues Student population is majority female at all levels Female participation drops as position power increases Same globally except for Turkey 32% (Neale 2010) Justice/equity/fairness Poor talent management Diversity is relevant to organizational success

Failure of Moving Cohort Theory Currently, good legislation, in HE good policies Still leaky pipeline, glass ceiling, labyrinth Vertical and horizontal segregation Vertical Workload allocation – women get student experience, quality assurance (housekeeping), men get research and strategy

Theoretical Explanations Structure Structures & processes Societal, organizational Agency Women don’t have the ‘right’ stuff Preferential choice Hakim (2002, 2007) Post- Structuralist Central role for discourse Shapes and limits possibilities of identities and navigations Metcalfe & Woodhams 2012)

The Gendered Organization –Joan Acker (1990) Organizations are presented as gender neutral The worker/job role as abstract, disembodied Actually, implicitly male, free to devote time to work Presenteeism is highly valued Early/late meetings Socializing/networking late in evening Decision making often in social spaces which exclude women e.g. golf course Power and authority seen as the ‘natural’ domain for men

“Don’t Call Me Bossy” Sheryl Sandberg et al Impact of early “labeling” of girls’ leadership skills

Don’t Call Me Bossy!

Perceptions of Leadership Implicit personality theory and prototype theory Lord et al (1984, 2002) Gary Powell’s work on perceptions of leadership 40 + years of research, picture not much changed Leadership role norm = male Deviation from norm characteristics results in perception of poor fit for the role

Being ‘Other’ Otherness – any deviation from the norm on a single important characteristic e.g. female, non-white etc. Being (in)visible – group category highly visible, individualism invisible Leadership expectation & role congruity theory – when women adopt this, seen as deviant as a female, if they don’t adopt, seen as weak leader (Eagly & Karau 2002)

Wendy’s Research Very few women at the top but some do make it, why and how? Listen to the stories of women who have been successful Some explicit evidence of the gendered organization in terms of family/work life conflict Greatest issue appears to be one of social cognition through internalization of leadership perceptions : – gender modesty – not ready to take on leadership role – greater need for encouragement Also, social cognition in terms of unconscious bias in selection panels The role of agency i.e. choices being made, however, choice here is constrained not free Women focus on impression management techniques

Strategies for Success Work on internalized scripts – Candid self assessment Personal Professional Understand your own constraints Role modeling gender behavior gaps Create and leverage mentoring networks – Shift emphasis away from reliance on single mentors – Hold onto “great” single mentors Build resume as you go Be ruthless about what you spend your time on professionally Interview practice

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