Advancing Female Corporate Leadership: A Comparative Analysis of Female Versus Male Leadership Behaviour in India

Abstract

This article investigates whether women managers possess any specific leadership attributes which will enable them to be promoted to leadership positions on merit grounds. It also examines whether women encounter barriers, which impede their progress to the top. Data for our study were collected from a sample of 372 managers in leadership positions across India, half of whom were women and the other half were men. The survey was done through the administration of a 21-item questionnaire developed by the authors. Through the application of decision tree analysis, logistic regression analysis and discriminant analysis, we arrived at findings that have reasonable predictive accuracy. Our results suggest that women managers in leadership positions are significantly more likely to get reticent team members to participate at meetings than their male counterparts. This is our principal finding. This is significant, given that contemporary leadership emphasizes inclusivity and distributed leadership. This is because, as our data shows, while women managers are as good as men, they additionally possess an attribute which makes them better suited than men as leaders. Another finding is that many women leaders differ from men in that they often struggle with work–life balance challenges. The suggestion is that companies could offer more options to women to achieve work–life balance. The third finding is that women leaders are perceived as more empathetic than men. The implication is that all of these constitute business arguments favouring organizational support for competent women managers advancing to leadership positions. Data are from India, focussing on Indian managerial leadership.

Keywords

Gender equity leadership and management skills empowerment and participation organizational behaviour

I. Introduction

Effective leadership attributes unique to female managers, when identified, make a case for advancing female leadership. For example, Trinidad and Normore (2005) have demonstrated that women are more empowerment-oriented. Such evidence underscores the need for gender diversity in organizations. Greater gender diversity in leadership positions is particularly called for in India, where only 3% of chief executive officers of National Stock Exchange (NSE)-listed companies are female (Verma & Basu, 2019).

Evidence which shows that women possess unique leadership characteristics can be used to support female advancement in corporations. This is of the essence in India, given the low percentage of female CEOs in NSE-listed companies. Such evidence can be used to counter glass ceilings and glass walls. An International Labour Organization (ILO) report on the subject states that ‘a watershed change from within the corporations is needed’. This would include policies that are inclusive and make it possible for competent female managers to achieve their full potential. It would also ensure that the unique abilities women bring to the workplace could be optimized. The literature suggests that, world-wide, there has been a shift in the direction of greater participation, empowerment and consensus-building at the workplace, which we will now briefly explore. This shift plays to the strengths of women.

We therefore begin by delineating this literature, in Section II. We then present a conceptual framework from which we derive the hypothesis that some attributes of effective leadership may be more prevalent among women than men and the research question was posed in Section III. We collected data from 186 female managers holding leadership positions and an equal number of men holding leadership positions through the administration of a questionnaire, described in Section IV. As the questionnaire elicited responses in binary form, we used decision tree analysis, followed by logistics regression and discriminant analysis, details of which are given in Section V. We discovered that women are better able than men to elicit participation at meetings, an attribute that promotes inclusive leadership. The pertinent discussion can be found in Section VI. This indicates that women can and should assume leadership positions in organizations. This and other conclusions we drew can be found in Section VII.

II. Theoretical Argumentation and Literature Survey

A recent definition of leadership describes it as ‘a process of social influence in which a person can enlist the aid and support of others in the accomplishment of a common task’(Chin, 2015, p. 200). Towards the end of the last century, researchers became interested in ‘close leadership’ (Shamir, 1995). Where close leadership exists, ‘followers’ trust in the leader is more likely to depend on the outcomes of direct interactions with the leader’ (Shamir, 1995, p.26). Such trust facilitates individualized consideration (House et al., 1991). Co-evolving with research about close leadership was an interest in participative leadership (Hollander, 1992). At the beginning of this century, research interest was evidenced in inclusive leadership (Tavris, 2001). This paved the way for interest in inclusive leadership’s positive impact on organizational performance.

Randel et al. (2017) has shown that inclusive leadership behaviour encourages organizational effectiveness. Why is this so? At the heart of inclusive leadership lie participative decision-making and inter-dependent behaviour (Raynor, 2008). Additionally, inclusive leadership imbues managers with a sense of psychological safety (Carmeli & Gittel, 2009), which is essential in high stress jobs like management. In a psychologically safe environment, employees are more likely to speak freely, including those who otherwise are reticent. Inclusive leadership is also positively correlated to employee engagement (Choi et al., 2015). Against this background, our study proposes that, generally, women are better able than men to facilitate participative decision-making. This is a business argument for advancing women in leadership.

The current trend of less hierarchy in organizations should prefer talent over gender (Klein, 2000). Yet, people almost always prefer male leaders to female leaders, regardless of talent (Eagly, 2007). Entrepreneurships run by men are found to attract sizeable investments, while women struggle to receive funding (Brush et al., 2014). And some research shows that men are more likely to voice their opinions in group situations (Badura et al., 2018), making facilitative leadership superfluous for them.

Our study is piquant when viewed in this context. A way out of this is for organizations to help women develop career paths for themselves despite these impediments. High-performance organizations help people manage their careers (Burns et al., 2012). One way they do this is by ensuring work–life balance, which is always a challenge for women. The lack of work–life balance often impacts career progress adversely (Lockwood, 2003). What is called for is ‘actionable knowledge’ (e.g., Keeliher et al., 2010). An actionable knowledge approach to promote organizational effectiveness is to identify the work resources which support work–life balance (e.g., Voydanoff, 2005). Voydanoff’s article is prescriptive, calling on organizations to provide work resources that facilitate work–life balance.

‘Women as leaders’ is a much-researched area in the West, with most investigators concluding that women are under-represented in senior leadership positions (Hannum et al., 2015; Smith & Suby-Long, 2019; Wade & Fiorentino, 2016). Under-representation in senior leadership positions is true in the Indian context as well, with Indian women holding just 3.2 % of company board chairs in 2017 (Gupta et al., 2006; Rawat & Sharma, 2019).

When successful women managers have been studied in India, it has been largely from the perspective of gender differences (Aziz, 2004; Rai, 2009; Singh, 1994; Srinivas et al., 2013). Our study is also from this perspective and shows that female corporate leaders in India possess a leadership attribute that is significantly lacking in their male counterparts.

Since traditional female caretaking attributes are not coveted for leadership positions, previous researchers have argued that women are viewed as less capable managerially than men, and, hence, they are less likely to obtain highly paid positions (Heilman, 2012). Times have changed now, and more people accept the ‘leadership with a difference’ offered by women (Paustian-Underdahl et al., 2014). Although these studies appear applicable to India, there is a paucity of literature regarding gender differences in leadership effectiveness in the Indian context.

Growing evidence that leadership is an important determinant of organizational outcomes leads us to believe that the current era in the corporate world may be a turning point for women leaders (Fletcher, 2004). Contemporary leadership places emphasis on uplifting workplace relationships, and leadership which enables such relationships (Cameron et al., 2003).

Considerable literature exists on how leaders, now, must expand their repertoire of skills to be able to connect with their employees (Breevaart et al., 2016). In this context, it is possible to make a business case for increasing the talent pool by grooming women as well as men for leadership positions (de Cabo et al., 2020). This is so because, women are predisposed to connecting with co-workers and creating an environment conducive to employee engagement (Alimo-Metcalfe, 2010; Baker, 2014; Powell, 2012; Powell & Butterfield, 2015; Rhee & Sigler, 2015). More evidence must be collected to demonstrate that this is the case.

Such evidence will provide a better rationale for developing career pathways for women managers with leadership potential, than merely providing quotas or resources. Van Veldhoven et al. (2020) have discussed how the provision of resources without valence can have a detrimental effect on employee development. Women managers may find that they are not considered for leadership positions at the top, simply because no career pathway has been developed for them to even be in the line of succession. Companies shrink their talent pool by not giving due consideration to the gender-specific leadership abilities of women.

III. Research Question and Overview of Study

Specifically, we investigated the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis: Effective leadership attributes are found among both men and women. Some attributes may be found more among women, while some attributes may be found more among men.

Leadership attributes that are proven to be more common among females than among males will provide a business argument for women to be developed as leaders, provided they possess all other leadership attributes that are considered necessary.

One way of promoting gender equality is by advancing business arguments that favour better representation of Indian women in senior management. Perhaps, there are leadership tasks where women perform better than men. If such tasks and functions exist, they should be discovered and highlighted. Then it might make sense for the business to nurture women for leadership positions. The objective would be to demonstrate and inform that women are better-suited in some ways than men, to lead corporations. The aim of this research, therefore, is to suggest that women managers possess attribute(s) which are integral to the leadership expectations of this millennium.

The research question we addressed is whether men and women differ in terms of the leadership attributes they possess. Do women possess leadership attributes which men do not? Our research identified a leadership attribute women possess, which men do not at the same level of proficiency. This finding bolsters arguments made for advancing women as corporate leaders.

We used decision tree analysis (Figure 1 gives the decision tree computer output). It enabled us to ascertain whether differences existed between men and women, regarding one or more leadership attributes. We found that a significant difference existed between men and women in their ability to elicit participation at meetings, with women emerging as more skilled.

The questionnaire used in the study comprised items that reflected attributes and behaviour found in practice. For example, the first item in the questionnaire was ‘do people describe you as a good listener?’

We examined whether the response given by males and females were significantly different. Was the preferred response of males for the question ‘do people describe you as a good listener?’ no, while that of females was yes? Was the difference significant? We investigated whether such a difference existed for all the 21 items of the questionnaire.

Responses to questions were binary in nature, viz., yes or no. The questionnaires were administered online, and each respondent had to spend only an average of 3 minutes 50 seconds answering the questionnaire. The respondents were required to login and respond anytime during a designated week. Binary-formatted questionnaires, which can be filled up fastly to mitigate the ‘challenge of recruiting respondents, increasing response rates and reducing respondent fatigue’ have had their advocates (Dolnicar et al., 2011, p. 231). These authors had referenced an earlier work (Grassi et al., 2007), which had shown that binary option questionnaires can be valid and robust. The Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MCSDS) also elicits binary responses in terms of true or false answers (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960).

The respondents showed interest in knowing the results. A copy of this article, once published, will be sent to NHRDN, which will then post it on their website.

IV. Research Methodology: Material and Methods

The materials used in our research were three in number: the questionnaire used in our survey, the sample of respondents to whom the questionnaire was administered and the statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS), which we used for analysing the data collected. The questionnaire: For our research, we collected survey data related to 21 items of leadership behaviour captured in a questionnaire (Figure 2). These items have been constructed after having a focus group discussion with six senior managers about what activities and behaviours contribute to effective leadership. We informed these senior managers that we wanted to gauge if men and women differed significantly in terms of how they performed tasks integral to leadership roles. The senior managers had identified 21 such tasks. As has been observed by Roberts, the items used in a questionnaire based on judgements are subjective. But the usual method is to use panels of experts to ensure that the judgements are based on informed and superior judgements (Roberts, 1976). This is what we attempted by using a panel of six senior managers. The questionnaire was also shown to select academicians for their view on how the items were articulated (not the content of the items, as this had been decided by experts).

The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for reliability, we computed for our questionnaire, indicated an acceptable level of 0.651. This implies that the items are adequately homogeneous. Additionally, we have reported one research study for each of the 21 items in our scale, underscoring the importance of that task for effective leadership (Figure 2). The questionnaire’s robustness was put forward on the basis of discriminant analysis.

We have selected these senior managers from a list given to us by the largest HRD organization in India, the National Human Resource Development Network (NHRDN). As these managers were based in different locations, the focus group discussion was conducted on Microsoft Team. These six senior managers comprised three men and three women from three different business contexts. One pair (one man and one woman) of senior managers was from the banking sector. A second pair of managers (one man and one woman) was from the FMCG sector. The third pair (one man and one woman) was from the hospitality sector.

We targeted both male and female managers who occupied middle management leadership positions. With the survey data, we hoped to identify distinctive leadership characteristics of women, if such characteristics existed. We then pilot-tested the survey questionnaire with a group of 30 management professors to check for validity.

A recent research effort surveyed both women and men to ascertain the efficacy of affirmative action in promoting gender equality (Scarborough et al., 2019). The items in their questionnaire have highlighted discrimination, for example,’ Women have worse jobs and income than men’ (Scarborough et al., 2019, p.14). We chose to word our questionnaire items in gender-neutral language. The questions had to be answered with either ‘yes’, or ‘no’, making the response process simple.

Table 1.

Questionnaire Administered to 372 Managers (50% male respondents; 50% female respondents)

Questionnaire
Questions	No. of Responses
Items	Females: Yes	Females: No	Males: Yes	Males: No
1. Do people describe you as a good listener?	162	7	144	25
2. Can you work with a colleague with whom you have just a professional relationship, but no friendship?	126	43	132	37
3. Do you participate in meetings on your own, without any prompting?	151	18	146	23
4. Do you elicit participation from colleagues who are reticent at meetings?	152	17	136	33
5. Do you try to know the specific situation of your colleagues?	161	8	154	15
6. Do you try to know the operational and financial needs of your organization?	157	12	161	8
7. Do you have to work harder than your colleagues to prove yourself at work?	131	38	103	66
8. Is it important for you to have work-life balance?	156	13	135	34
9. Is it possible for you to have work-life balance?	124	45	120	49
10. Have you sacrificed personal happiness for professional success?	103	66	94	75
11. Do you feel that you will never attain a top management position?	144	25	49	120
12. Do you find it difficult to give negative feedback during performance reviews?	38	131	46	123
13. Do you have a bias for action?	145	24	57	105
14. Do you think that empathy is necessary in work-life?	161	8	149	20
15. Do you show empathy at work?	159	10	145	24
16. Are you able to deal with feelings of jealousy at work?	144	25	144	25
17. Do you discuss work problems with your boss?	148	21	153	16
18. Do you like working in an organization that seeks diversity in its workforce?	160	9	161	8
19. Do you find it necessary to discuss your work-related problems with a colleague?	133	36	110	59
20. Do you like collaborative work?	165	4	153	16
21. Do you have colleagues who help you succeed?	139	30	152	17

Source: Authors’ own.

SPSS: SPSS 20 was used for our data analysis, given in a forthcoming section in this article.

Method and sample: The survey was undertaken in 2019. The questionnaires were administered anonymously through a reputed third-party-HRM organization in India, the NHRDN. This is an autonomous, not-for profit organization, which brings together the HRM departments of member companies through networking events. (NHRDN website). The HRM departments of most leading companies in India are members of this organization, which is why we collected the sample data through this body. In 2020, 12,500 companies were members of this organization. The NHRDN ensured that an equal number of male and female managers responded.

The NHRDN had selected member organizations from different parts of India to participate in the survey (as told to us by NHRDN and in keeping with our request). Less successful organizations were filtered out from the randomly selected pool of organizations. This ensured that the managers surveyed were high performers.

The effort yielded a sample of 372 managers holding leadership positions (n = 372). About 50% were female respondents and 50% were male respondents, which ensured that both genders were equally represented in the sample. Each respondent had around a decade of work experience without which he/she could not have attained a leadership position. The response rate we achieved was almost 90%.

The questionnaires were returned with no information about the respondent divulged, other than the gender. Hence, it is expected that there will be little social desirability bias. Additionally, the respondents were contacted directly by NHRDN. Hence, respondents could fill up their questionnaires without anxiety that their responses might get back to their employers. The situation under which the respondents gave their answers, thus, mollified possible social desirability bias. The leadership questionnaires most frequently used have been the multifactor leadership questionnaire (MLQ), the leader behaviour description questionnaire (LBDQ) and the least preferred co-worker (LPC) scale (Bryant, 2011). These questionnaires are normally administered to subordinates, who evaluate their leader on various dimensions. The scope for social desirability exists with these questionnaires as well, but it is mitigated by anonymity. We followed suit. We cannot guarantee that the respondents have accurately described themselves, any more than the respondents who fill up MLQ, LBDQ and LPC can be said to have accurately described their leaders. We have also not been able to ameliorate self-report bias, except to note that our sample size is large enough to somewhat dampen self-report bias. Self-reporting has allayed the possibility of gender biases arising, where, for example, male respondents could be tempted to give higher scores to male leaders than to female leaders. In any case, this article is about how managers in leadership positions see themselves as leaders. So, if a self-reporting bias comes into play, it will be consistently applicable to all respondents.

SPSS: SPSS 20 was used for our data analysis, given in a forthcoming section in this article.

V. Analysis and Results

We did not run item-wise t-tests to ascertain significant differences between male and female responses, as this statistical tool assumes an ordinal scale. The t-test also assumes that the data can be plotted as a normally distributed, bell-shaped curve. Our scale, eliciting binary responses, does not conform to these two assumptions. Hence, we used decision-tree analysis. This approach takes all 21 items of our questionnaire into consideration while testing for significant differences, and thus operates in a multi-dimensional space. The use of t-tests would entail testing items one-by-one, making the results unidimensional. The chi-square test would also have to be done for each item separately. Meanwhile, decision-tree analysis subsumes the chi-square test in its computations. We observe here that the results yielded using item-wise t-tests will not necessarily be the same as those generated by decision tree analysis. We preferred applying decision-tree analysis partly because of its multidimensional capability, but mostly because it (a) does not assume an ordinal scale, (b) can be used where the data is binary-coded and (c) does not require the normalizing of data.

The decision tree analysis was undertaken using SPSS version 20. The other standard tests of difference for social science research, ANOVA and MANOVA, like the t-test, cannot be applied as they do not work where the scale is nominal. Additionally, a decision tree is a graphical representation that allows the viewer to observe how independent variables affect the decision variable. It is a non-parametric tool. We have also used logistic regression and discriminant analysis as these tools too can be applied where the data is in the form of binary responses. They confirmed the results obtained through decision tree analysis. This makes our findings more robust.

Figure 2 shows the questionnaire that was used and the responses received from the sample of male and female managers holding leadership positions. Figure 1 shows the decision tree analysis results. Quinlan (1986) has explained how decision tree analysis enables the successive refinement of data results. He has clarified how it extracts the attribute(s) which display the greatest difference between the selected variables. In our case, decision tree analysis left us with those leadership attributes which significantly differentiate female managers from male managers.

The decision tree analysis is presented in Figure 2. The results reveal that there are significant gender differences for the attributes measured by questions 4, 8, 10 and 21 of the questionnaire. The remaining 17 items gauged by the survey reveal no gender differences.

Table 2 presents the results of the logistics regression analysis.

Table 2.
Classification Table Logistic Regression

Observed Predicted

Gender
Percentage Correct

F M

Step 1 Gender F 152 45 77.2

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 69.4

Step 2 Gender F 151 46 76.6

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 69.1

Step 3 Gender F 152 45 77.2

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 69.4

Step 4 Gender F 152 45 77.2

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 69.4

Step 5 Gender F 151 46 76.6

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 69.1

Step 6 Gender F 150 47 76.1

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 68.8

Step 7 Gender F 148 49 75.1

M 69 106 60.6

Overall percentage 68.3

Step 8 Gender F 145 52 73.6

M 65 110 62.9

Overall percentage 68.5

Step 9 Gender F 146 51 74.1

M 66 109 62.3

Overall Percentage 68.5

Step 10 Gender F 145 52 73.6

M 61 114 65.1

Overall percentage 69.6

Step 11 Gender F 144 53 73.1

M 61 114 65.1

Overall percentage 69.4

Step 12 Gender F 142 55 72.1

M 60 115 65.7

Overall percentage 69.1

Step 13 Gender F 138 59 70.1

M 58 117 66.9

Overall percentage 68.5

Step 14 Gender F 156 41 79.2

M 89 86 49.1

Overall percentage 65.1

Step 15 Gender F 147 50 74.6

M 68 107 61.1

Overall percentage 68.3

Observed	Predicted
Step 1	Gender	F	152	45	77.2
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			69.4
Step 2	Gender	F	151	46	76.6
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			69.1
Step 3	Gender	F	152	45	77.2
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			69.4
Step 4	Gender	F	152	45	77.2
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			69.4
Step 5	Gender	F	151	46	76.6
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			69.1
Step 6	Gender	F	150	47	76.1
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			68.8
Step 7	Gender	F	148	49	75.1
M	69	106	60.6
Overall percentage			68.3
Step 8	Gender	F	145	52	73.6
M	65	110	62.9
Overall percentage			68.5
Step 9	Gender	F	146	51	74.1
M	66	109	62.3
Overall Percentage			68.5
Step 10	Gender	F	145	52	73.6
M	61	114	65.1
Overall percentage			69.6
Step 11	Gender	F	144	53	73.1
M	61	114	65.1
Overall percentage			69.4
Step 12	Gender	F	142	55	72.1
M	60	115	65.7
Overall percentage			69.1
Step 13	Gender	F	138	59	70.1
M	58	117	66.9
Overall percentage			68.5
Step 14	Gender	F	156	41	79.2
M	89	86	49.1
Overall percentage			65.1
Step 15	Gender	F	147	50	74.6
M	68	107	61.1
Overall percentage			68.3

Source: Authors’ own.

Note: The cut value is 0.500.

Table 3 displays the results of the discriminant analysis.

The decision tree analysis, logistic regression analysis and discriminant analysis (Figure 1, 1 and 2) demonstrate that four items from our questionnaire can be used to predict gender. These four items are 4, 8, 10 and 21. In other words, women managers respond differently from men as far as these four items are concerned.

Table 3.

Classification Results Discriminant Analysis

REc Gender			Predicted Group Membership		Total
REc Gender			0	1	Total
Original	Count	0	146	51	197
	Count	1	67	108	175
	%	0	74.1	25.9	100.0
	%	1	38.3	61.7	100.0

Source: Authors’ own.

Note: 68.3% of original grouped cases correctly classified.

Item 4: The difference in responses between male and female managers shows that, more than men, women are more likely to elicit participation from reticent team members.

Item 8: The difference in responses between male and female managers shows that women are more likely to attach importance to work–life balance than men.

Item 10: The difference in responses between male and female managers shows that women are more likely to sacrifice personal happiness for professional success than men.

Item 21: The difference in responses between male and female managers shows that women are less likely to have colleagues who will help them succeed than men.

Tables 1 and 2 affirm the results extracted from the decision tree analysis, which are: (a) female managers are better able than male managers to make reticent team members participate in meetings, (b) male managers are more likely to have colleagues who want them to succeed than female managers, (c) male managers have a better work–life balance than female managers and (d) female managers are more likely to make personal sacrifices in order to attain professional success than male managers. These results connect with our research question. Result (1) highlights the fact that women are significantly better able than men to elicit participation at meetings.

The predictive power of our logistic regression analysis and discriminant analysis is 69%; and that of our decision tree analysis is 70%. This means that, if our findings are extrapolated to an entire population, they will be valid 70 % of the time. Based on this, we can infer that it is preferable to have women lead meetings in organizations.

The decision tree analysis has split the dataset (as it is supposed to do), so that item 4 in our questionnaire, emerges as an attribute that is positively associated with female leaders. (Item 4: Do you elicit participation from colleagues who are reticent at meetings?). Additionally, the data has been split in such a fashion that 70% of the time, item 4 distinguishes women leaders from their male counterparts. In our informal conversations with men, we found that they do not particularly appreciate this ability of women, even if they acknowledge that women leaders usually enable participation. Our informal conversations also revealed that women are conscious of this ability, but do not expect to be given credit for it. Both men and women are thus not advancing the case for women as leaders, though for different reasons. Since women possess unique leadership attributes, career pathways to the top should be developed for them.

VI. Discussion

Our study indicates that women are better able than men to enable participation by reticent members at meetings. It has been argued that accomplished female managers find their attempts to rise to the top get thwarted (Weinberger, 2011). Their gender goes against them. Our study suggests that aspiring female leaders should find their gender working in their favour. Female leaders are not in competition with men. They complement men, by contributing in ways which are necessary, but overlooked by men.

It may appear that the implied superiority of female managers over male managers for leadership positions hinges on a single capability. Nonetheless, getting reticent team members to participate in meetings is both important and difficult. This is exemplified by the plethora of published papers in the past decade explaining how participation by reticent members at meetings can be facilitated.

A brief reference is presented here to provide a few insights gleaned from these papers: even people who participate moderately may be reticent about making unsolicited suggestions (Detert & Burns, 2016). Reticence can lead to groupthink and poor judgement (Riordan & Riordan, 2013). To deal with such issues, Knight (2015), has provided some practical suggestions about how introverts’ views can be obtained at meetings. Meetings can be specially designed for shy employees, whereby people write out their ideas and then hand them in to the team leader (Rogelberg & Kreamer, 2019).

The paramount point that emerges from all these publications is that getting reticent employees to participate in meetings is an ongoing challenge.

While women may possess leadership capabilities which are not adequately leveraged by companies, our study indicates that they are also disadvantaged because they find it more difficult to achieve work–life balance than their male counterparts. The challenge of finding work–life balance at middle-level leadership positions may deter women from pushing for advancement.

Our findings also highlight the nurturing role played by women leaders at the workplace.This is of consequence as contemporary models of leadership attach importance, inter alia, to participatory decision-making (Gergen, 2005). We believe that having women in leadership positions will contribute to inclusiveness, participatory decision-making and employee engagement at the workplace. We are supporting a theory that identifies gender-specific attributes of women that encourage their holding of managerial leadership positions.

Proposition: It is desirable for organizations to promote gender diversity in their leadership teams to ensure that reticent members can be drawn out and more inclusive participation is encouraged.

Our survey also uncovered two barriers which may prevent women managers with leadership abilities from reaching the top. First, there is the issue of work–life balance. Our study shows that women leaders find it more difficult than men to enjoy work–life balance. The practical implication is that companies should help women leaders attain work–life balance, as lack of this can impede women’s professional growth. Flexitime, on-site childcare facilities and a cap on the maximum working hours per week for both men and women are measures increasingly being adopted by organizations, to promote work–life balance. When an organization incorporates flexitime in its functioning, it leads to greater loyalty to the organization and a desire to remain with it (Richman et al., 2008).

Second, women do not have colleagues who will champion their career progress as much as men do. While 86% of women said they do not have colleagues who want them to succeed, only 14% of men reported that they do not have collegial support. The practical implication here is that women need to be resilient and persevere, even when colleagues do not overtly want them to succeed.

However, the most important practical implication is for India. The ‘nurturant-task leadership style’ has been proposed as being particularly apposite for India (Sinha, 1980). This style recommends that a leader is someone who, ‘cares for his (or her) subordinates, shows affection, takes personal interest in their well-being and, above all, is committed to their growth’ (Sinha, 1980, p. 55). An ability to draw reticent members out at meetings aligns itself well with the nurturant-task leadership style. The connotation then is that women are particularly suited for leadership positions, especially within the Indian context, where the nurturant-task leadership style has acceptance, and researchers undertake studies assuming the validity of this leadership style (Sayeed, 2010).

VII. Conclusion

This survey-based study generated new data about corporate female leadership in India. The issue pertained to whether women managers possessed leadership attributes not found among men. We collected data from a total of 372 managers (sample size), of which half were male, and half were female. The data were collected through the administration of a questionnaire. We used decision tree analysis, supported by logistic regression analysis and discriminant analysis, to test for significant differences between the male sample and the female sample. Our analyses showed that men typically do not help reticent colleagues participate at meetings, while women typically do. Women, it appears, are primed temperamentally to foster inclusive leadership. This is the principal finding emerging from our study. The implication is that women may prove superior to men, in certain spheres of leadership.

Inclusivity leads to enhanced job satisfaction. Increasingly, there is a perceived sense that women leaders possess certain inclusive leadership qualities. To test this supposition, a month after our principal survey of 372 managers was completed, we undertook a follow-up survey of 40 managers in middle management positions. The 40 managers comprised 20 female managers and 20 male managers. We posed the simple question: can you name one attribute which female managers possess, and male managers do not? If you cannot identify any such distinguishing attribute, please give the response ‘NA’.

Of the 40 managers surveyed, only two responded with a ‘NA’. The remaining managers were able to identify an attribute which they had observed in female managers, but not in male managers holding leadership positions. The differentiating attribute that was mentioned the most was ‘empathy’. It was cited by 16 managers. In second place was ‘capacity for multi-tasking’. This was put forward by 12 respondents. The research implication here is that evidence should be gathered showing that women leaders have more empathy than men. In the process, it may emerge that encouraging reticent people to participate at meetings is a behavioural manifestation of empathy.

Yet women are not occupying half of all top management positions. Our research can contribute to debate about gender equality and the gender gap.

When women are given opportunities to occupy leadership positions, their gender-specific leadership behaviours are leveraged. The principal finding of our research is that women managers can elicit participation from reticent members, significantly better than male managers. Thus, the implication of our research is that women may be required in leadership positions not merely because they can perform as well as men, but because they can do better. Thus, our article enriches gender diversity studies by highlighting unique leadership behaviour of women and recommends that further such gender-specific leadership behaviour be identified. Gender diversity studies can examine the unique leadership behaviours of both genders in the future and see how these strengths can be made to synergize each other. Wilson and Clerkin (2017) have done important preliminary work in this regard.

We have demonstrated that women leaders can be better than their male counterparts. We have also found that women leaders struggle to maintain a work–life balance, more than men do.

More data generated about the positive gender-specific leadership behaviours of women will contribute to organizations encouraging women leaders. Such encouragement should include initiatives whereby women can enjoy greater work–life balance. Against this background, future areas of research could be to (a) ascertain the financial gains that accrue with female leadership, and (b) identify more unique attributes of female leadership.

Footnotes

Author Contribution

The first author, Nina Jacob, did the study conception and design. She performed the material preparation, and data collection. The data analysis using the statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) was done by S. Chandrasekhar. The manuscript was written and revised by Nina Jacob.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship and/or publication of this article.

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