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M-F Leadership Styles, Effectiveness of

[This post originally appeared on 30 Sept 2008. If you'd like to see the comments it engendered on its first appearance, you can do so here.]

In my last post, Success Tip #140, I caught myself in an un-rare but un-intentional sexist moment. While discussing crisis leadership, I used typically male language and imagery—including the all-male football analogy!

By coincidence, the day after the post, my mail included Leadership and the Sexes: Using Gender Science to Create Success in Business, a book by Michael Gurian and Barbara Annis. The book is a marvel. The authors begin, "This book is about the practical application of information on male/female brain differences in every aspect of your corporate life, from workplace comfort to competitive edge to the corporate bottom line."

The most important phrase being, per me, "brain differences"—that is, the book is derivative of the new brain sciences, not anecdotal evidence. (The book is strongly endorsed by the author of another book I found of inestimable value, The Female Brain, by Louann Brizendine, M.D.)

The evidence is brain-science based, but a social-psychological experiment provides a nice snapshot of the findings. What follows is from a sidebar titled, "Gender Experiments Surprise Even the Experts":

"In the 1990s, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/CBC created a short film that recorded an experiment in leadership styles between women and men. CBC didn't tell the participants the objective of the work they would do that day; the director simply divided the male and female leaders into two teams, and gave those team leaders the same instructions: build an adventure camp. The teams were set up in a somewhat militaristic style at first, including team members wearing uniforms, but also with the caveat in place that the teams could alter their style and method as they wished as long as they met the outcome in time.

"Leader one immediately created a rank-and-file hierarchy and gave orders, even going so far as to assert authority by challenging members on whether they had polished their shoes.

"Leader two did not have the 'troops' line up and be inspected, but instead met with the other team members in a circle, asking 'How are we doing? Are we ready?' 'Anything else we should do?' 'Do you think they'll test us on whether we've polished our shoes?' Instead of giving orders, leader two was touching team members on the arm to reassure them.

"As part of the program, CBC arranged for corporate commentators to watch the teams prepare. Initially the commentators (mostly men) were not impressed by the leadership style of leader two; the second team wasn't 'under control,' members weren't lined up, and they 'lacked order' (or so it seemed). The commentators predicted that team two would not successfully complete the task. Yet when the project was completed, team two had built an impressive adventure camp as good as team one's, with some aspects that were judged as better.

"When debriefing their observations, the commentators noticed that when team one was building the structures for the camp, there had been discord regarding who was in charge and who had completed which job and who hadn't. Team one exhibited a lack of communication during the process of completion that created problems (for example, 'Wasn't someone else supposed to do this?').

"Team two, on the other hand, took longer to do certain things, but because of its emphasis on communication and collaboration during the enactment of the task (such as 'Let's try this' and 'What do you think about that?'), the team met the goal of building the adventure camp in its own positive way, and on time."

There is for me a profoundly important "bottom line" here. Not that one style is better than another, but that virtually every proclamation we make ought to be informed by gender differences. In my speeches, for example, I often find myself rambling on ad nauseam about the importance of relentless relationship building—a stunning insight for a male to make or take on board (I overstate ever so slightly), and boringly obvious beyond words to most of the female participants. I am not suggesting that every phrase be presented in two languages, but I am suggesting that the topic ought not be far beneath the surface. Based on my own experience, I will say that we (i.e., me) will not necessarily improve (as in, exhibit increased sensitivity) over time; hey, with the chips down last week, Joe Montana and the SF 49ers were my immediate benchmarks.

I urge you to read the book—there is a lot at stake, and an opportunity to achieve lasting competitive advantage. From an increasingly robust body of research, we know for sure (as sure as sure can ever be) that diverse teams—diversity on any and all dimensions—outperform homogenous teams. We equally have to know how to maximize the diversity advantage—the reward can be performance leaps, not just modest improvements.

Tom Peters posted this on 06/08/09.

Comments

How about two re-world teams.

The Obama Presidential campaign vs the Hillary Clinton Presidential Campaign?

Posted by dan at June 8, 2009 9:28 AM

Completely onboard re: diverse teams. My (anecdotal) experience in coaching other leaders is that female leaders struggle as much as men in relationship-building. Is it possible that a male-dominated workplace has socialized the innate differences out of females? Have we simply made it too hard and unsafe to be our authentic selves in most organizations - especially for women in leadership?

Posted by David Porter at June 8, 2009 9:30 AM

In my experience as a corporate trainer and one who is a keen observer, women typically build teams easier and are usually by far more social. But men too have built alliances since forever. Women may just build such differently.

With regards to the authencity of self in the workplace, I think most would agree that this is so for both men and women, but perhaps especially for women. The question is the cultural two-tier understanding of women personally and professionally which has all to do with cultural biases and also perhaps natural inclinations of the whole. Women have babies and go back to work but many that I know are divided and ache daily. Some would rather not go back to work until there kids get of age, but this a near impossibility while we keep up with the Joneses. Their husbands also insist upon their return to work ASAP too.

"Is it possible that a male-dominated workplace has socialized the innate differences out of females?"

This sounds like a profound question, David. I just wished I understood it. Could your re-phrase it please?

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 8, 2009 11:16 AM

"Based on my own experience, I will say that we (i.e., me) will not necessarily improve (as in, exhibit increased sensitivity) over time; hey, with the chips down last week, Joe Montana and the SF 49ers were my immediate benchmarks."

Obviously, it's time Tom was no longer a solo act.
You need a female team member onstage presenting with you.

Posted by dan at June 8, 2009 12:35 PM

OK, dan, your points are quickly becoming pointless as your apparent aim of soley denigrating is meaningless. You do not have such power, my friend. I have appreciated your aliases in various contexts. I'm appreciating them less now.

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 8, 2009 1:26 PM

It's not pointless to ask someone to to practice what they preach.

Posted by dan at June 8, 2009 2:16 PM

Oh, is that what you were doing, dan? Really?

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 8, 2009 3:00 PM

Judith: My question is akin to telling a 5-year old to only color within the lines. How much creativity is sapped by our desire for conformity and reductionist thinking applied to our kids? In workplaces that preach diversity (the tensions that arise naturally between any two or more people), but then never check who is in the mix (nor who should be) for discussion and decision-making, any natural connection to emotion may be crowded out, making it difficult for women to exercise their natural team-building skills.

Posted by David Porter at June 8, 2009 3:04 PM

Thanks, David, for the explanation. I think I got it: The fact that diverse people are put together in a work environment without the necessary tools or persons, including upper management, to engage in useful discussions and make informed decisions limit their effectiveness, especially women?

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 8, 2009 5:24 PM

Totally Agree David

As per my comments on the previous thread on this topic - I think we need to move beyond M/F.

1) I think it runs the risk of creating more tension through putting people in boxes

2) it provides no framework to move forward - to change behaviour

Personally I think working through an exercise like Myers Briggs is more useful to move a team forward than a debate about M/F. I am not saying MBTI is perfect but at least it moves to actual behaviours and can stimulate a deeper level of understanding and discussion.

Note I commenting on this purely from a team diversity perspective - I am sensitive to the issues around women, careers & children etc.

Posted by PaulH at June 10, 2009 2:15 AM

J: That is the essence of my comment. If women are, innately, team builders, and we create a work environment that does not allow for that behavior to flourish, we put the natural team builders at a disadvantage.

Paul: Agree with you that social styles, work styles (DISC) and personality indicators (MBTI) are useful tools in guiding effective team relationships. I have found, irrespective of gender, that the people with matching social, work and personality styles have more in common than same-gender team members with different styles do.

Final point: I have come to understand diversity as tensions that arise naturally between two or more people. This distinction helps me understand and appreciate the other person's world and better understand how to work with them in a more productive fashion. Gender, race, education are simply the tip of a much more interesting iceberg.

Posted by David Porter at June 10, 2009 7:28 AM

Got it, David! I also very much appreciate your final point. Thanks!

Regarding Myers Briggs, some years ago, well before the publication of her book, when I was still doing a bit of acting and modeling, my agent thought that I should meet his sister, Shoya Zichy, a brilliant professional in international private banking, executive coaching and author of "Women and the Leadership Q." Having become qualified to administer and interpret Myers-Briggs, she reduces it simply to four color codes. It's well-written and easily applicable with simple follow-through strategies for each type: The Golds, The Blues, The Reds, and The Greens.

As Shoya was writing the book I got to read a lot of it before publication which included interviews and discussions with women across a great many cross sectors, including Hillary Clinton, Catherine Hughes, Sonia Sotomayor, Abigail Disney, Christine Todd Whitman, Kaye Bailey Hutchinson, Alexandra Lebenthal, Wendy Wasserman, Sherry Barrat, and others. Her research is the foundation of Peter Tanous' bestselling book, "The Wealth of Equation."

Shoya's also multi-talented. She's a linguist and an exhibited extraordinary oil painter. Her New York apartment is virtually a museum.

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 10, 2009 9:57 AM

David - One other thought with regards to your final point. While I love your diversity definition there is also an element that goes beyond what is natural to what is cultural, which include longstanding biases, and how this matters and plays out in various environments.

The real beauty in your definition is that it reduces the labels and gets to human core interactions, as if one was to need a blood transfusion one does not ask the gender or race of the person providing the blood, but rather seek to resolve the problem and meet the need. But we who are walking about, many unhealthy laden with biases that prohibit forward movement, are often caught in the quagmire of labels and advances for some and disadvantages for other is the outcome.

But I must repeat: I love your diversity definition. The question would be how to embrace reality within it? By the way, one way is to simply do it. We have seen this with the election of Barack Obama.

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 10, 2009 11:06 AM

Always better to act our way to a new way of thinking than think our way to a new way of acting.

Posted by David Porter at June 10, 2009 1:50 PM

For what its worth I did a bit of ‘live research’ having read this posting. I was working today alongside four women with a range of ages from early 20’s to mid 50’s. They have widely differing backgrounds and a range of work experiences. In an open discussion between the five of us for about 15 minutes I asked if they would mind giving me their views about male/female bosses they had worked for. I kept quiet and listened – that was very difficult!

What came across was not so much the issue of ‘which gender’ but the issue of the ‘skills of the person’ who happens to be the boss.

They said they’d experienced good and bad bosses of both genders and one common feature was the unfairness of generalisation. In their experience they had come across excellent ‘soft’ caring, considerate males and ‘hard’ task driven females …. and vice versa.

This proves absolutely nothing of course and there is nothing original there - I simply thought I would share it. I love doing such unplanned, anecdotal, subjective live research because I think it helps keep me grounded. It forces me listen to others opinions based on THEIR experiences. That is great learning.

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A ‘good listening to’ is another way to describe such discussion.

Posted by Trevor Gay at June 10, 2009 2:12 PM

Bravo, David!

Posted by Judith Ellis at June 10, 2009 2:46 PM

Trevor, I've heard the same mix of opinions often, too. I will say (also anecdotally) that among women in such dialog, you rarely hear qualifying/categorizing words such as "men are..." and "women are..." Women, as you described, tend to talk about character traits, etc., with little reference to gender, race, etc. The opposite seems true of men. I used to be suspicious that the reason for that was that men tend to take a slightly more defensive posture in such discussions, subconsciously seeking to protect the male dominance in management, etc., while women did not.

My mind has largely changed from that opinion, and I now simply suspect that women (in general -- not always) tend to look at people, situations, problems, etc. on more of a case-by-case basis with much less categorization and stereotyping than men do.

Do I have my own highly detailed, scientific studies and analysis to prove this? No, I don't. But the more I hear and read about studies into the behavior and thinking processes of males vs. females, the more I suspect that my hypothesis could be proven.

Posted by Dan Gunter at June 10, 2009 8:19 PM

DG: Interesting point. We all have mental models that have been created over our lifetimes that shape how we define what happens to us in a moment. One question is whether those lenses develop differently in men vs. women, leading to a different, stereotyping outcome. Women, I am told, have a more highly developed corpus colossum connecting the left and right hemispheres of the brain which some say increases a women's ability to multitask. Since I multitask like a PC instead of a Mac, I hesitate to argue with that finding. The learning continues!

Posted by David Porter at June 11, 2009 8:06 AM

David, I concluded long ago that any human being who can hold down a job while carrying a baby in the womb until the third trimester of pregnancy is already stronger, tougher, and more resilient than I am. That pretty much much rules us guys out. As for multitasking, I don't know if genetic differences lead us to handle things in certain ways, or the other way around (having to handle certain things develops our "multitasking skills,") but I know that if I had to do all the work of getting kids to school, the grocery shopping, taking care of dinner, and holding down a job with the frequency a lot of women manage to do it, I'd either become one very good multitasker or suicidal. I certainly could not be a single dad and accomplish what I see a lot of single moms manage to handle.

Anecdotally, I think this one observation alone taught me a long time ago to appreciate the leadership skills and potential of females. If they can juggle as many things as they do without killing us husbands and the kids by sundown, they can sure handle dealing with a few tough work issues and difficult people in the process.

I will NEVER -- in any way, shape or fashion -- consider males to be superior to females. Different? Absolutely. But if anything, I humbly proclaim my belief that if we'd stop trying to be "the boss" so often we could actually learn a few things from them. Maybe a LOT of things.

Posted by Dan Gunter at June 11, 2009 2:37 PM

All variants are great when attracted / crafter / blended together, supplement each other, as part of a major strategic implementation. I have worked with lots of talented ladies just finely, as well with some gentlemen.

I had a huge experience managing an operation with 63 employees under my WATCH and before the BOARD AND OWNERS. I was the CEO back in 1989. Women, in many instances and in my case --respecting other experiences --, gave me (by the average) a much better and consistent outcome.

WHAT DID I DO? I strongly promoted the majority of the female talents upon and above the under-performing male talents of that time.

It was not just because they were ladies. Ladies and gentlemen are equally humans anyway. It was because, speaking of that precise instance within my professional experience, they had the MERITS (as per the conquered facts) so they got the better promotions.

I don't support males or females for the sake of gender. I will support hugely anyone with the merits. Therefore, I will never block anyone with said merit. Instead, I will support she and/or he to the maximum of my authority level.

I took a Sabbatical and selected a lady to be the permanent CEO of that operation. WHY? Because she was the most talented human as per a great review among females and males.

Posted by Andres Agostini (Andy) at June 13, 2009 5:42 AM

Thank you for the vindication.

I am reading about leadership now. () I could see myself using collaborative teambuilding and servant leadership. (For example, I have read Leadership Jazz and am now reading Geeks and Geezers.)

I also am trying to relearn asking questions. It is a skill that children have, such as my 13-year-old daughter, that is sometimes lost as we become adults. How does one know what is important unless one asks?

Is this why when a new idea is suggested, women are among the first to "get it"?

Posted by Juanita Chavez Moshier at July 21, 2009 10:23 PM

Juanita, I believe that there as a bit of a paradox that comes into play. In order to "get it" (a new idea) it helps to have a curious nature. It teaches you to think a bit more deeply about things from the outset. That sort of mindset causes you to listen more carefully from the start.

If you're willing to admit what you don't know, that's the first step toward greater knowledge.

Posted by Dan Gunter at July 22, 2009 8:00 AM