Top 5 Mistakes Male Leaders Make When Thinking About Gender Equality
Gill Whitty-Collins, the author of WHY MEN WIN AT WORK, keynote speaker & Consultant
Gill Whitty-Collins spent 26 years with Procter & Gamble (P&G), running leading global brands such as Olay, Always and Pantene.
Gill thrived in the highly competitive business environment and her success in business saw her move swiftly up the career ladder to Marketing Director, General Manager and finally Senior Vice President.
This was when she started to see the impact of gender diversity issues on women and their careers, and saw that it is affecting and defeating talented women everywhere.
As a consultant, keynote speaker, board member and executive coach, she now works to drive gender equality and diversity as a key lever to build stronger businesses and stronger societies. Her book ‘Why Men Win At Work’ is now available in paperback.
I caught up with her recently for a stimulating discussion on the mistakes male leaders make when thinking about gender inequality.
Afdhel Aziz: Gill, welcome. Please tell us about your journey to becoming aware of the systemic gender inequality you encountered in the corporate world?
Gill Whitty-Collins: I wasn’t always the gender equality warrior I am now! Thanks to my parents and the mixed comprehensive school I went to, I was brought up to believe that I was the equal of any boy or man – and I didn’t even question that for a very long time. For over 20 years into my career at P&G in fact, where I flourished and worked my way up the ladder to the Senior Vice President level. And then I saw it. For the first time in my career, in my life actually, I found myself in a male dominant culture and in Board and Executive meetings that were 80% men. I acutely felt the impact this was having on me and, importantly, on the other few (highly competent) women there. The men simply were not listening to or engaging with the women in the same way they were with the men. My reaction was that I found this absolutely fascinating and wanted to understand what was happening and why, so I started reading every book and article on gender inequality I could get my hands on. That’s when I realized the extent of the issue, that it wasn’t me, or the women around me, or my company: this was happening to women everywhere, in every organization, in every country in the world. And the result is that when you look at the senior levels of any organization, whether it’s in business, sport, politics, whatever, you will see that the people in the leadership roles are over 90% men.
But what really fascinated me was - why? Why do men win at work? Why does this happen when we know that equality and diversity drive stronger performance and results? Why does this happen when most men are good, decent, well-intended and don’t wake up in the morning and ask themselves ‘how can I build the patriarchy today?’
WHY MEN WIN AT WORK by Gill Whitty-Collins, available on Amazon now
I discovered that there is actually a simple answer: men win at work because the people who make the decisions about who is going to get the big promotion or job believe that the man is the best performer. But we know that can’t be right over 90% of the time, because we know that women are 50% of the population and equally intelligent and competent, with equally strong leadership skills: so, looking at it simplistically, let’s say the man is the best candidate 50% of the time, not 90%.
So, the real question then is, why do we believe men are better performers than women, even when they are not? That’s what WHY MEN WIN AT WORK is about.
I wrote it because I believe that if we really peel the layers of the onion and understand at a deep level why something is happening, only then can we fix it.
Aziz: Thank you for sharing that! A lot of attention has been paid to the #Metoo movement which tackled overt sexual harassment and violence towards women. Do you believe that what you are tackling is much deeper and more invisible in nature as an issue?
Whitty-Collins: The #Metoo movement has been extremely important in shining a light on these overt, ‘bottom of the pyramid’ (as I call them) gender equality issues. It is appalling to know that women, or anyone for that matter, have been sexually harassed in their work and pressured into sex. Dealing with this and the dangerous, criminal men who do it, or who are violent toward women, has to be the first priority. This is however, thankfully, only a small minority of men and one of the unintended consequences of the focus on this movement is that it has given men who aren’t guilty of this hideous stuff the opportunity to feel complacent and to feel they can disengage from the gender equality discussion: so, they say, ‘Not me’ and we risk losing them from the conversation. By focusing (rightly) on the bottom of the pyramid stuff, we are diverted and distracted from having the ‘top of the gender diversity pyramid’ discussions we desperately need to have about the less obvious, invisible, unconscious, unintended things that good, decent men are doing that are preventing equality and holding women back. Most men are, thankfully, not Weinstein or Epsteins, but no man is above contributing to gender inequality.
Aziz: Let’s talk about the five mistakes now. What are they, in your view?
Whitty-Collins:
#1 Believing that gender equality as something which will naturally happen, that we are making progress and with time it will right itself, so we don’t need to focus on it or make interventions.
It is easy to fall into the trap of seeing a few high-profile women appointed to leadership roles and believing that the gender inequality issue is fixed, or on track to be. Sometimes it can feel like there are many other, bigger, more urgent priorities to focus on. But the reality is that we are not making real progress on gender equality. When we look beneath the surface at the data, we see that only 7% of CEOs are women, only 9% of Heads of State, only 25% of members of government. And we won’t see progress by waiting for this to right itself naturally, because there are so many invisible, unconscious forces in play that make it a self-fulfilling prophecy that we continue to choose men over women for key leadership roles.
In my book WHY MEN WIN AT WORK I explore these forces: the invisible power of culture, the competence vs confidence equation (which we see especially in the meeting room), the umbrella theory and many more. They are powerful, not least because they are invisible, unconscious and largely unintended, so they need to be understood and addressed intentionally.
#2 Thinking the burden of the work to change should be on female leaders - when it actually is on male leaders to change it.
It is impossible to change a culture if you are not part of the dominant culture, so in a male dominant culture it is the men who need to recognize it and commit to changing it. A woman cannot change a male dominant culture, she can either try to fit into it (and thus dilute herself and her ability to contribute to and perform within it) or choose to leave it and find another culture where she feels she belongs.
The invisible power of culture is a key force that holds women back. If you feel you belong in and are included in a culture, you feel confident and relaxed, you can be yourself and perform. But if you feel you don’t belong, then you don’t feel relaxed and you do not perform at your best. So, if you look around you and see a male dominant team, you can be sure that you have a culture which is helping the men and holding women back, no matter how talented and competent they are. And only you and the other men in the group can change it.
#3 Setting the wrong targets - you shouldn’t just be aiming for 1 woman on your leadership team, you should be aiming for half of your leadership team to be women.
Women are 50% of the population and the data unequivocally shows that they are equally intelligent and competent and have equal leadership ability. So targeting 1 woman on your Board or Executive team is simply ‘tick the box’ tokenism and shows that you do not really understand or believe that equality and diversity drives stronger teams and better business performance. To target any less than 50% women on your team shows far too low an expectation of women and their capability to improve your organization and results.
#4 Not realizing the invisible impact of biology and anthropology on the dynamics between men and women in the workplace – especially in the meeting room.
Men and women may be equal, but this does not mean they are the same. There are biological differences, for example in the hormones which drive us. Oestrogen, the main female hormonal driver, encourages bonding, collaboration and creates an aversion to conflict. Testosterone, the main male hormonal driver, encourages aggression, hierarchy and power. The school years also play a role in how we develop, leaving many girls with ‘Perfectionist Syndrome’ and significantly less confidence than boys. Women and men also evolved an developed differently based on the roles we played in early society. While the men went out hunting for food, the women stayed in the community caring for the children and learnt the importance of not alienating the other women via collaboration and avoiding appearing above each other. Then we have the reality that men are generally physically stronger than women and, unfortunately, some women have experienced being on the wrong end of that and have an underlying fear of pushing men too far, even when they are not in any physical danger.
Let’s think about how all this plays out in the workplace, for example in the meeting room: the testosterone-fuelled, deep-voiced men with their confidence and aggression next to the less confident, potentially even slightly fearful women who are wary to push too hard to avoid alienating or provoking others. What we see and hear from the men may seem more like ‘classic’ leadership, but in reality may be no indication of where the real competence and ability is in the room.
#5 Men not realizing that they are as much a victim of gender inequality as women.
Too many men see gender equality is a women’s issue, something that they need to care about out of care and respect for women: they see it as charity, not business. The reality is that gender inequality is bad for everyone – my book is called WHY MEN WIN AT WORK but men aren’t winning really, in the end. They may have most of the big jobs in the world, but the data shows that their business or organization would be delivering better performance and results if it was led with equality and diversity in its teams. Driving gender equality should be a key business strategy and priority! More than this, more equality leads to better relationships in the family between partners and with the kids – many men tell me they would love to spend more time at home with their family but their ‘assigned role’ as breadwinning man makes it difficult or impossible (meanwhile women tell me they want to focus more on their career growth but their ‘assigned role’ as mum first holds them back). We are all losing here, not just women – gender equality would be a win for everyone.
Aziz: These are deeply insightful and thought-provoking, thank you Gill. What final advice do you have for male leaders looking to become champions of change on this topic?
Whitty-Collins: First, accept that this is an issue. You may feel that you see a lot of female leaders and that we are making progress, but the reality is that fewer than 10% of the leadership roles in business and society are held by women.
Second, there is nothing to fear from gender equality, in fact you win from it too. It delivers better business performance and results, because it brings diversity to your team which drives better input, ideas, innovation, decisions and plans. It will improve your relationship with your partner and your kids. It will strengthen our society. Gender equality isn’t about women, it is for everyone.
Third, always be aware that your perception of the performance of the people who work for you is not always accurate. There are many invisible, unconscious forces in play that influencing you to believe that men are better performers even when they are not: forces I explore in WHY MEN WIN AT WORK like the invisible power of culture, the competence vs confidence equation (found especially in the meeting room), the umbrella theory and many more. If you see that most of the big roles in your organization are held by men, then these forces are at work and you need to address them.
Fourth, gender equality won’t just happen naturally, there are too many invisible, unconscious forces and the self-fulfilling prophecy will keep on fulfilling itself unless we make significant and intentional manual interventions. Step 1 is to commit to 50% women at all levels of your organization, right to the top. If you find it hard to find the women, try harder – I promise you they are there.
Finally, be a ‘feMANist’ and proud of it. We need you. Women can talk about the gender equality with each other to infinity and beyond but they won’t change it without men. Only you can change it. You have over 90% of the leadership of the world, so you decide what happens and what doesn’t. You need to decide the world (and your business) would be better if you shared the leadership of it with women – and then make it happen.=
