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It is not something that you or I might find particularly appealing: According to recent research, successful women managers are going places by becoming more masculine. This does not mean they are adopting gruff voices and wearing three-piece suits. Rather, it is their style that is changing.
Knowledge@Wharton reports that traditionally “men tend to be more task-oriented while women take on a more interpersonal style of leadership. Therefore, a masculine style tends toward assertive and task-based behaviour, while a feminine style is more relationship-oriented and democratic... men tend to take greater intellectual risks and have higher self esteem, whereas “women are coping” and tend to be more efficient when it comes to solving problems”.
Yet women ? perceived to be more emotional, empathetic, strong, intuitive and compassionate ? cannot don a male mantle easily. Men are perceived to be strong, arrogant, intelligent, ego-driven... In an organisation, if a woman displays arrogance, there is very often a negative reaction from her peers and subordinates. In a man, such behaviour can identify him as a go-getter.
It’s true that all this sounds a bit confusing. Is, say, aggression in a woman acceptable or not? If you are the CEO of an Indian company and have to interact with a woman in a US company at a fairly senior level, the chances are that you will be aghast. The aggression levels are probably greater than in males, because you have to be that way in a world with glass ceilings. “She’ll have you for breakfast,” says Shashi Rao, a Mumbai-based HR consultant. “Most women who make it to the top are as hard as nails. They display all the characteristics of a male CEO. Only, the iron fist is sometimes concealed in a velvet glove.”
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In India, most of the women at the helm have reached their positions because of who their fathers were; they come from business families and inherit companies. Professionals who have risen through the ranks are not too many. Going by the Western experience, one would expect women in an organisation such as ICICI Bank (where there are several women in high-level jobs) to be “manly”. Actually, they aren’t. “ICICI is not a typical example,” says Rao. “You get the transference of traits when there is one woman trying to hold her own against several men.”
What are the implications in all this for women who want to make it to the top? Rao says you cannot apply the lessons of the West to the Indian environment. Until the Eighties, most American men and women preferred male bosses. Today, a Gallup poll shows that 50 per cent don’t care either way. A dipstick study in India indicates that the preference for male bosses is still as high as 90 per cent. “In this environment,” says Rao. “adopting male traits will not pay any dividends. It is best to lie low and wait for the world to change.”
From the other side of the fence, male subordinates will have to learn to accept the inevitable. “You will realise that a woman is competing when you hear her being alluded to by male colleagues as that five-letter word starting with B,” says Rao.
If you are really dead against women, either as your peer or your boss, you can join a family-run business. Those will hold out for some more time yet.
Adds Rao: “All these groups claim to be professional. You will know what exactly they are when you count the number of women at the top level. Why, I visited a company last month which didn’t even have a loo for women executives.” Some arguments won’t wash with...