Gender roles in leadership and how they impact behavior - Research Paper Example

? Gender Roles in Leadership and How They Impact Behavior Index Topic Page Number Introduction……………………………………………………… 3 2. History of leadership…………………………………………….. 3 3. Change in Gender Stereotype in Leadership…………………… 4 4. Gender and Leadership…………………………………………… 5 5. Charisma and Leadership: Gender Differences………………… 5 6. Conclusion…………………………………………………………. 7 7. Bibliography……………………………………………………….. 8 Introduction: Leadership can be defined as the aptitude to inspire and guide a group of people by an individual to achieve a certain goal. According to Sullivan (2009), leadership was responsible to create a relation between an individual who acts as a leader and people who followed him or her. Action of any leader has been always dependent on the response given by the followers, and these actions also responsible to control the leader’s future activities. Therefore according to Sullivan leadership in a mutual process of influence between an individual (leader) and the followers to achieve a certain goal. (Sullivan, 2009, abstract). With the development of society and work culture, it is now very clear that the opportunity to free both men and women from the concept of gender stereotype is already there, to understand the implication of this change it is quite essential to discuss about the history of gender roles in respect to leadership. According to Perschel (2009), There was a long standing though that men were strong and assertive where as women were communal, strong and understanding, this was the thought process presented to describe why the successful women were not the leaders. But according to her, this concept brought few questions such as why in the first place leadership was only associated with men and so on (Perschel, 2009). History of leadership: During 1900 most of the people were not well educated and therefore he leadership role was associated with only a few men, the theory of the great man clarified the fact that due to that less education only a handful of men was associated with leadership power and enjoy superiorintelectual and moral capabilities. But after world war I and II, the scenery started to change as more people get well educated and different industry all over the world was in search for more leaders. During the middle of 1900 century people who was acting as the leaders were used the military style and command .These were also noticed in different hierarchialorganizations where the prevalence of command and control level were established. Most of the leaders were men and the power was distributed among them. They used to be dominative, aggressive and individualistic. By the late 20th century women used to take part in the management activities but at the beginning they have to learn how they could survive in the culture of command and control of men. The minority group of female, who entered the management structure are initially recognized just as tokens. Perschel refers to the concept of “ rules of three”- there was a necessity to have at least two people supporting the thoughts of minority groups, before it could be heard by the dominant male management team. According to her, women needed to show their power-both individualism and assertiveness with a proper balance of feminity, softness and community orientation to be heard and get proper attention by the top management (Perschel, 2009). Change in Gender Stereotype in Leadership: With the development of the world economy and standard of work culture it is at present absolutely necessary that every organization has to be fast and nimble in order to be successful. leaders of the top management need to create a work culture where the employees feel comfortable and adapt quickly.the high performing work force can only be managed by a leader who have qualities that ensured 6the belief on each and every individual that ther are important for the success of the organization. According to Perschel (2009), transformational leadership now started to become as the essential part of great leadership quality.According to her view, women could demonstrate a greater propensity for this kind of quality and therefore they also now started to get noticed as the leaders.Apart from this, there was a change according to her that brought women into leadership as gender stereotypes concept now started to get abolished and men also looking after their families (Perschel, 2009). Gender and Leadership: According to Applebaum, Audet and Miller (2003), the landscape of theoretical approach was dependent on four different school of thoughts. These are gender role, casual issues and attitudinal drivers. In their article, they have given answers to different parameters associated with leadership quality of both men and women. According to their analysis the leadership style of women was completely different from that of the men. They also believed that men could learn from those and effectively apply those in the field of work. According to them the concept of effective leadership was not gender specific as both men and women could learn from each others style.According to them the leadership style of women were more effective in the perspective of team based work,and in the consensually driven organization which were more prevalent from the starting of the twentyetyh century.in their review they also stated that the concept of women leadership being less effective than that of the men were far more a thought or believe rather than fact based, as from the past it was nothing but a perception which was prominant in the male dominated society (Applebaum, Audet and Miller, 2003, pp. 43-48). Charisma and Leadership: Gender Differences According to Takala and Aaltio (2007), charisma , society and leadership were allays interrelated. In their review they have mentioned that, a leader must be an individual with power and sincerely truth speaking vision.the essential components of a leader were charisma, gift of grace, being assured of their own success model.According to them the overall view of the world organization leadership demonstrate the facts that leadership charisma with major emphasis on individuality and autonomy was more associated with the male character as most of the leading positions of the organizations were dominated by the men. But there were certain exceptions also. As they cited the example of Mother Teresa who sacrificed her own life to ensure people in the Indian slum can live life happily. Another example cited by them was of Margaret Thacher, who was a charismatic leader and also have many followers. She had a very strong vision for Britain and it was argued that her way of leadership was more male like.. She was known as the Iron Lady just because of her strong view point and mindset. According to them charismatic leadership was based on emotions which was irrational in nature. The behavior associated with leadership was interactive with the situation and relation. So a good charismatic leader whether a man or women have to have these characteristics with a balanced mode of behaving as , his or her behavior was the main thing that determines whether followers went along with their leaders or not. So according to them the behavior associated with leadership was not gender specific as almost all the leaders , better to say successful leader behave almost in a same way broadly, but the nature of the outcome may be different depending on which field or in what organization they were associated with (Takala and Aaltio, 2007). Conclusion: The effective leadership quality is always dependent on the organizational environment , style of leadership and management style of the leaders. The leadership style as well as the management style cannot be same for both men and women , infact not even same between two men or two women, So to lead an institution or organization successfully and effectively it is absolutely essential that leaders be it men or women must have an charismatic presence. Their work culture may be different but the behavior of them are more or less. And to be a good leader one always needs a good surrounding environment without that no matter how much capability he or she have it is of no use. References Appelbaum, S.H., Audet, L., Miller, J.C.,(2003), Gender and leadership? Leadership and gender? A journey through the landscape of theories, Leadership and Organization development Journal, 24 (1), pp. 43-51. Perschel, A. (2009), “Leadership and Gender: Why it Matters - How it’s Changing” , The Linkage Leader, retrieved on 04.09.2013 from http://www.linkageanz.com.au/uploads/pdf/Anne_Perschel_Leadership_and_Gender.pdf Sullivan, L.E. (2009), Glossary of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, Sage Publication. Takala, T. and Aaltio, I.(2012), Charismatic Leadership and Ethics from Gender Perspective, Business and Organization Ethics Network, 12 (2), pp. 1-20 Read More