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ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКОЕ ОБРАЗОВАНИЕ В РОССИИ. 2016. № 4
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УДК 37.014:316.46
ББК С561.1+Ч404.1 ГСНТИ 14.35.07 Код ВАК 13.00.08
Бабич Галина Николаевна,
кандидат филологических наук, профессор, кафедра английского языка, методики и переводоведения, Институт иностранных языков, Уральский государственный педагогический университет; 6200017, г. Екатеринбург, пр-т Космонавтов, д. 26; e-mail: bgn@uspu.ru
Крылова Светлана Геннадьевна,
кандидат психологических наук, доцент, кафедра социальной психологии, конфликтологии и управления, Уральский государственный педагогический университет; 620017, г. Екатеринбург, пр-т Космонавтов, д. 26; e-mail: s_g_krylova@mail.ru
Симонова Алевтина Александровна,
доктор педагогических наук, профессор, Уральский государственный педагогический университет; 620017, г. Екатеринбург, пр-т Космонавтов, д. 26; e-mail: simonova@uspu.ru
ЖЕНСКОЕ ЛИДЕРСТВО В ГЛОБАЛЬНОМ КОНТЕКСТЕ: ВЫЗОВЫ И ВОЗМОЖНОСТИ
КЛЮЧЕВЫЕ СЛОВА: лидерство; контекст; тендерные роли; стереотипы; диспропорция; управление.
АННОТАЦИЯ. В статье рассматриваются различные аспекты проблемы женского лидерства. Анализируются социальные факторы, обусловившие более активную включенность женщин в социальную, экономическую и политическую жизнь в последней трети ХХ века. Рассматривается влияние на поведение людей распространенных в обществе тендерных стереотипов. Приводятся результаты исследования содержания гендерных стереотипов. Респонденты мужского и женского пола демонстрируют сходство представлений о качествах, которыми должны обладать женщины и мужчины. Женщинам приписываются такие качества, как доброта, мудрость, женственность, а мужчинам - ответственность, мужественность, честность и целеустремленность. Сохранение в общественном сознании традиционных представлений о женских и мужских качествах создает трудности для женщин-лидеров. Они испытывают межролевой конфликт между тендерной ролью, предписываемой обществом, и лидерской ролью, которая традиционно ассоциируется с мужскими качествами. Причины трудностей женщин-лидеров анализируются с позиций авторов гендерных теорий лидерства: концепции токенизма Р.Кантер и социально-ролевой теории Э. Игли. Приводятся статистические данные по России и другим странам мира о преобладании мужчин на высших уровнях управления в системе образования. Рассматриваются два пути уменьшения гендерной диспропорции в управлении: институциональный и психолого-педагогический.
Babich Galina Nickolaevna,
Candidate of Philology, Professor of Department of English, Teaching Methods and Translation Theory, Ural State Pedagogical
University, Ekaterinburg, Russia.
Krylova Svetlana Gennadyevna,
Candidate of Psychology, Associate Professor of Department of Social Psychology, Conflictology and Management, Institute of
Psychology, Ural State Pedagogical University, Ekaterinburg, Russia.
Simonova Alevtina Aleksandrovna,
Doctor of Pedagogy, Professor, Ural State Pedagogical University, Ekaterinburg, Russia.
FEMALE LEADERSHIP IN THE GLOBAL ENVIRONMENT: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES
KEYWORDS: leadership; environment; gender roles; stereotypes; disproportion; management.
ABSTRACT. The paper considers various aspects of women's leadership and analyzes the factors that led to a more active involvement of women in social, economic and political life in the late 20th century. The authors study the influence of common gender stereotypes on the behavior of people. The article presents the results of research of the content of gender stereotypes. Both male and female respondents show similar opinions about the qualities men and women are expected to possess. Women are ascribed such qualities as kindness, wisdom, and femininity; men are believed to be responsible, masculine, honest and purposeful. Conventional stereotypes of public consciousness create difficulties for women leaders. They experience inter-character conflict as the role of the leader is traditionally associated by society with masculine qualities. The problems of women leaders are analyzed from the viewpoint of the authors of leadership theories: R. Kanter's tokenism conception and A. Eagl/s social-role theory. The data collected indicates the male prevalence at the managerial level in academic institutions of Russia and other countries. Two ways are significant to reduce the gender disproportion in management: institutional and psychological-educational.
The problem of women's leadership is a part of the more general problem of gender inequality. The concept "gender" was introduced into scientific thesaurus by an
American psychoanalyst Robert Stoller [1] in 1958 to describe not only biological, but also cultural differences between men and women. However, reflections about the role and desti-
© Бабич Г. Н., Крылова С. Г., Симонова А. А., 2016
nation of women and men in society could be found in the works of ancient philosophers [2]. A significant increase of interest to the study of gender differences and the development of first gender theories of leadership was in the 70th of the XX century. Apparently it was a result of the influence of social and political factors. The first factor is feminist movement, which was aimed at achieving equality of political, economic, personal and social rights for women. Feminist ideas influence to some extent the public opinion since the late nineteenth century. The second factor is the XX century world wars. While men were fighting, women have demonstrated that they can successfully replace them in various social and industrial spheres. And finally, the third factor is the scientific and technological "revolution" that influenced the household and women were able to be actively involved into the social life of the community. Despite the fact that modern society provides women with a wide set of rights and opportunities, the participation of women in management (especially at top levels) remains limited. And issues concerning women's inequality continue to be valid and are being actively discussed in the meetings of various international organizations [3].
Materials and Discussion
People are social beings, so their behavior is determined by social conventions specific to each culture. A society prescribes to both male and female a set of socio-cultural and behavioral characteristics and roles to perform according to their gender. These requirements and expectations of the society are reflected in the minds of people in the form of generalized and simplified representations. These representations are called gender stereotypes.
Gender stereotypes are generalized representations of behavioral models and traits of men and women which are formed in the culture. Researchers find the roots of gender stereotypes in social roles that were traditionally played by women and men throughout the history of mankind. In such a social institution as family men played the role of a breadwinner and head of the family and women (probably due to her natural mission) - a homemaker, who supports relationships and provides a positive emotional climate in the family. Hence, it logically follows that for the effective implementation of these roles a man should be energetic, proactive, able to compete, dominant and even aggressive (a masculine set of qualities), and a woman should be caring, gentle, sensitive, obeying (a feminine set of qualities).
In today's world, women are not so closely tied to the family and are exempted from many of the duties that previously they had to perform themselves. However, in the minds of people representations of the psychological dif-
ferences between men and women still exist. In 2015-2016 we conducted a study of gender stereotypes. The respondents were 103 students of the Institute of Psychology of Ural State Pedagogical University (full-time and parttime students) aged from 18 to 48. They survey had two questions: 1) "What qualities, in your opinion, should a man have?" 2) "What qualities, in your opinion, should a woman have?" The survey responses are represented in Tables 1 and 2.
Table 1
The content of the stereotype about men
There is little difference between male and female respondents. But both groups agree that men should have such characteristics as responsibility and masculinity.
Table 2
The content of the stereotype about women
A set of women's characteristics corresponds to the traditional gender stereotypes: carefulness, kindness and house-proud.
It is not a comprehensive and representative examination, but it characterizes a tendency to maintain sustainable representations about the psychological differences between men and women. These representations about the gender differences are the basis for the conclusion that men and women are effective in different areas. This conclusion is partially true. Nobody denies the existence of physiological differences between men and women. Therefore, there are the spheres which can be called "genuine male", for example, everything connected with heavy physical labor. However, the division of spheres of activity into the "genuine male" and "genuine female" on the basis of attributed psychological differences between men and women without considering physiological ones is debatable.
female respondents (N=73, aged from 18 to 48) male respondents (N=30, aged from 18 to 42)
qualities response rate qualities response rate
kind 39,7% kind 43,3%
clever, wise 38,4% feminine 33,3%
feminine 31,5% clever, wise 30,0%
careful 28,8% careful 23,3%
houseproud 20,5%
female respondents (N=73, aged from 18 to 48) male respondents (N=30, aged from 18 to 42)
qualities response rate qualities respons e rate
responsibility 49,3% responsibility 33,3%
masculinity 28,8% masculinity 30,0%
honesty 27,4% purposefulness 23,3%
kindness 27,4 % strong 23,3%
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Gender stereotypes are related not only to the specific areas of activity, but also to the position in the organizational hierarchy. Thus, the common stereotype is that men are more effective leaders than women. In Russia, this view is supported by culturally determined opinion that the leader must be strong and tough. And these features are included in the set of masculine qualities. Researchers also describe other reasons that explain why women find it difficult to be leaders. There are several theories that give different explanations of this situation [4].
The tokenism conception of Rosabeth Kanter postulated that group dynamics depends on the composition of the group. A group can be homogeneous (for example, consisting of members of the same gender, age, race and so on), but quite often groups are heterogeneous in composition. These members of the group, whose characteristics prevail in the group, were called "dominants", and those who are quantitatively less represented in the group, were called "tokens". Tokens are more visible and more stereotyped, their characteristics are exaggerated compared to the dominants [5].
Kanter R. found several informal roles expected of women in male-dominated groups. These roles correspond to gender stereotypes:
1) "mother": colleagues expect from her emotional support, but not business activity;
2) "seduction": token is perceived only as a sexual object for men with high status in the organization and this causes resentment among male colleagues;
3) "mascot": nice, but not a business woman, brings good luck;
4) "an iron lady": unfeminine stiffness is attributed to these tokens, and they were particularly isolated from the group [6].
All these roles create difficulties for women to occupy a position equal to the dominants. These roles are in conflict with the role of a leader and reduce women's career opportunities. The situation can be changed only by increasing number of women among the leaders [7].
A. Eagly, the author of the social-role leadership theory, suggests, that to be accepted by society people should behave in accordance with their gender role. It is true for both male and female leaders [8]. On the other hand, the role of a leader makes specific demands to the individual. And since, according to stereotypes, the role of a leader is masculine, women leaders will experience a conflict between gender and leadership roles.
The negative prejudices against women leaders can cause them to decrease self-esteem,
self-doubt, and, accordingly, to reduce their performance. Although competent women are able to overcome these difficulties, men get an advantage compared to women in leadership roles, because such barriers do not exist for them.
Eagly A. finds that reducing inter-role conflict for women leaders will lead to the growth of their achievements. This can be achieved by:
a) real success of women;
b) choice of such employment and positions in organizations where leadership role is not too masculinized, but rather androgynous (for example, the head of children's educational institution and not the military department or the business company);
c) demonstration of a relatively feminine leadership style - a democratic one based on effectiveness and relationships with subordinates [9].
The research considers some objective factors which can act as a barrier for the success of women leaders: women have fewer opportunities than men to learn from the leaders of their gender having higher status in the organizational hierarchy. It is noted that the mentoring process is more successful if both participants are similar in many characteristics, including gender [10; 11].
Theories of Kanter R. and Eagly A. explain the ratio of men and women at top management levels. The report prepared by Peterson Institute for International Economics (PIIE), presents the results of the survey, which was attended by almost 22 thousand companies around the world. It was found that in 2014 almost 60% of these companies had no women on boards of directors, about half of companies top management was completely male, and only 5% of companies had women as CEO [12]. However, the indicators were distributed very irregularly in different countries: in Japan the percentage of women on the board of directors is about 2%, in the US it is about 17%, in Norway - 20-40% [13]. Similar differences can be observed in various sectors of the economy. For example, there were more female top managers in health care, telecommunications and financial services, and less - in the sector of raw materials, processing industry and power engineering.
In Russia, "female" spheres of activity traditionally are education, especially preschool and school levels, as well as health care. Statistical data provided by the Federal State Statistics Service of Russia are presented in Table 3 [14].
Table 3
The distribution of men and women in the field of general education (schools) and health care in Russia (2014)
According to the data provided by the Ministry of Education of Russia, there are opportunities for women's career and achieving higher managerial positions in general education (Table 4).
Table 4
Heads and teaching staff of general educational institutions (excluding evening educational institutions) at the beginning of 2013/2014 academic year
But the indicators are not the same for academic institutions (universities) (Table 5).
Table 5
Heads and teaching staff of academic institutions (2014/2015 academic year) [15]
Federal State Statistics Service of Russia didn't provide data regarding gender distribution on the top level of management (rectors) in academic institutions.
As regards the situation in the world, the study was conducted by global executive search organization Egon Zehnder (Zurich, Switzerland) in 2011. The scope of this study was the CV analysis of the top leaders of top academic institutions in different regions of the world, including Germany, Austria, Switzerland, USA, UK, Benelux, Scandinavia, Japan, Singapore and South East Asia. The leadership of the global top academic institutions was found to be mostly male, born in their country/region, citizen of their country/region with some international experience and approximately 60 years of age. There are some variations across regions. Women are dramatically underrepre-
sented among the top leaders of academic institutions. Only in the US and in Scandinavia does the percentage of women in top leadership positions reach approximately 20%.
Despite these findings, it is noted that the presence of women at a managerial top level could contribute to future growth and development of the academic institutions. This is primarily due to the fact that women-leaders possess unique feminine qualities as emotionality, reactivity, compassion, desire for harmony that work synergistically with their leadership skills in solving problems [16]. So a variety of skills and abilities of top managers (both male and female) is instrumental for more effective management of human resources. To ensure that these benefits are real it is necessary to carry out special measures for the promotion of women with leadership skills. The first way is to adopt laws establishing a quota on the number of women on top levels of management. The European Commission decided on November 14, 2012, that at least 40 percent of the seats on the boards of directors of large public European companies should be reserved for women. The proportion of women on the boards is expected to grow to 30 percent by 2015 and to 40 percent by 2020. This idea has both supporters and opponents in the European Union. The effectiveness of this measure is limited like any other instrument of an external control.
Another way has a long-term nature and involves the changes in women's professional identity. USPU Institute of Personnel Administration prepares leading managers for various pedagogic institutions in a number of bachelor's and master's programs]. Some other institutions and faculties enacted leadership promoting programs for prospective educational workers [17].
Conclusion
Since the last third of the XX century women were more actively involved in the social, economic and political life. However, women are less than men presented on the top levels of management and authority. Researchers consider a number of psychological factors for the explanation of this situation.
The image of leaders was formed in the process of historical development of mankind when leaders needed physical strength to provide collective survival and defense against external threats. But this image still exists. Women-leaders face inter-role conflict between the leadership and gender roles. Women can overcome this conflict, if they reach real success and choose the sphere of activity in which they can apply relatively feminine leadership style.
In Russia, even in traditionally "female" spheres of activity the percentage of women in top leadership positions is low. According to
women men
general education (schools) 83% 17%
health care 70% 30%
Amount (thousands) Percentag e ratio
women men women men
Total number 1759,3 358,6 83 17
Director 32,2 11,1 74 26
Deputy Director 88,3 11,5 89 11
Teaching staff 1103,0 151,3 88 12
Amount (thousands) Percentage ratio
women men women men
Total number 154,6 117,0 57 43
Dean of Department 1,8 2,5 42 58
Head of Chair 8,5 11,8 42 58
ПЕДАГОГИЧЕСКОЕ ОБРАЗОВАНИЕ В РОССИИ. 2016. № 4
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the studies conducted by international organizations around the world, the leadership of the global top academic institutions was found to be mostly male. At the same time, researchers have noted the benefits associated with the presence of women at the top levels of management.
To solve the problem of women's leadership long-term measures aimed at changing
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Статью рекомендует д-р пед. наук, проф. С. А. Минюрова.
professional identity of women are more effective. These measures can be implemented in educational programs, as well as in the leadership promoting programs for prospective educational workers. This work is successfully carried out at USPU and is one of the strategic directions of development of the university.
