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Despite years of diversity initiatives, senior management teams remain overwhelmingly male. Now a growing number of women are coming around to the idea that real change starts in the boardroom.
September 22 -
Wells Fargo has seven women on its 16-member board, a 44% ratio that is twice that of the average top 25 bank. It got there, in large part, by looking beyond C-suites for qualified directors.
September 22 -
The statistics are dismal: Last year, just 16% of board seats at S&P 1500 companies were held by women, less than the percentage held by directors named John, Robert, James and William. But plenty of women are working to change that, including quite a few in our rankings.
September 22
The gender ratio in banking and finance has
Many banks have diversity and equity programs designed to address these gender imbalances and improve the recruitment and retention of women in traditionally masculine domains. Yet research I’ve conducted with my colleagues across a range of male-dominated fields suggests that these efforts may be ineffective unless more is done to counter the effect of negative gender stereotypes.
A large body of research has accumulated about the consequences of worrying that you are the target of negative stereotypes — a feeling termed stereotype threat. Most jobs involve being judged by peers, supervisors, or customers. Yet women face the additional concern of being judged as a stereotypical woman — for example, being perceived as sensitive, emotional, less committed to their careers, and generally lacking in leadership ability.
Stereotype threat is triggered by the awareness that others may evaluate you through the lens of negative stereotypes, regardless of whether you believe the stereotype to be true of yourself. Thus, although the vast majority of people experience evaluation apprehension when they know they are being judged, stereotype threat can result in additional concerns for women in the workplace.
My research across a dozen and thousands of employees has found that women who experience stereotype threat are less satisfied and committed to their jobs and are more inclined to quit. In a recent
In this study, we also investigated how stereotype threat impacts the recruitment of younger women to finance and banking. This is an important issue, as women who are well established in the field can provide inspiration and encouragement to other women considering it as their occupation.
Yet women who felt stereotyped at work reported being less likely to recommend finance and banking to young women who are choosing a career, thus diminishing their potential to positively influence the recruitment of other women to the field. These findings are particularly worrisome given that recruitment and retention of women into fields where they have been historically underrepresented is key to achieving the "critical mass" of women necessary to reduce perceptions of tokenism and the stereotyping and devaluing of women.
Gender stereotypes have persisted in spite of increased participation of women in the workforce and calls for diversity in management. Given the negative consequences of stereotype threat, organizations should consider strategies to help minimize it.
Our previous
The proportion of other women in a given setting has also been shown to affect feelings of stereotype threat. In another experiment, we found that just reminding female accountants of the low percentage of female partners in their firm caused them to experience increased stereotype threat. It seems that working in an organization where there is a significant imbalance in gender representation in the upper echelons may lead to stereotype threat for employees whose group is not well represented, particularly when this imbalance is brought to their attention.
In short, to address the negative consequences of stereotype threat for women in banking, organizations should work towards increasing the numbers of women in higher-level positions. Women in leadership positions serve as evidence that the organization supports women, thereby lessening the threat of gender stereotypes for other women who are trying to climb the career ladder. This strategy should also have the added benefit of aiding recruitment of women to the field.
Although our research highlights the difficulties inherent in being female in male-dominated fields, it also suggests the promise for the successful integration of such fields once a critical mass of women has been reached. Indeed, there is often a tipping point in male-dominated fields, in which rapid integration occurs after many years of slow progress.
Courtney von Hippel is a senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Queensland in Australia.