Let's say you divide a large work group into two teams. In the first group you assign a female leader, and in the second, a male. The two teams employ very different problem-solving strategies. In one, there is consensus and collaboration; in the other, clear direction and a hierarchical approach to decision making. If you didn't know which was which but had to guess, you'd probably say that the first team was led by the woman and the second by the man. And, most often (but not always), you'd be right.
When generalizing about any population segment—especially such large and diverse segments as “male” and “female”—there is bound to be a degree of inaccuracy and stereotyping. As you read this chapter, you will think of many individuals to whom the generalizations don't apply. Yet science has discovered some major gender differences in brain function, evolutionary predisposition, and communication style that can have a profound effect on the way men and women behave and are perceived in leadership roles.
This chapter explains the ways that gender can influence the body language of leaders. You will learn how the brains of men and women react differently to emotion and stress, how unconscious and unspoken reactions can undermine an emergent female leader, how followers evaluate the communication strengths and weaknesses of male and female leaders, and how to alter, accommodate, or modify your body language to be more effective.
When it comes to brain research and gender, it's not a question of better or smarter—but it is a matter of difference. For example, men have approximately six-and-a-half times more grey matter related to cognitive functioning in the brain, and women have nearly ten times more white matter related to cognition than men have.1 White matter connects brain centers in the neural network, whereas grey matter tends to localize brain activity into a single active brain center. Because of this difference, men tend to compartmentalize more brain activity and prefer to focus intently on one task at a time, whereas women's ability to integrate and assimilate information (aided by the fact that the female brain also has a larger corpus callosum—a thick band of fibers that connects the two brain hemispheres and facilitates their communication) gives them the edge in making crucial connections between seemingly disparate elements.
Until recently, differences in how men and women feel and express emotions were thought to be due to upbringing alone. But, according to Louann Brizendine, professor of clinical psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco, emotional processing in the male and female brains is quite different.2 In both genders, another person's emotional pain activates mirror neurons, but in the male brain, a second system (the temporal-parietal junction) quickly takes over, which in turn activates his “analyze-and-fix-it” circuits. So while the female brain is locked in emotional empathy, the male brain (having quickly identified the emotion) is busy searching for solutions.
Evolution programmed the male brain for hunting—which accounts for a man's narrower range of physical vision when compared with women, his ability to focus on a single source, and his better sense of direction (along with his reluctance to ask for directions when lost). Women have developed better peripheral vision, helping them take in multiple signals. Both genders stay alert for signs of danger—but, again, do so in their own unique ways: when entering a room, men automatically look for exits to estimate a possible escape, whereas women pay attention to people's faces to sort out who they are, how they feel, and whether it is safe to remain in their company.
Even women's propensity for crying has a partially neurological and physiological basis: the chromosomal development of prolactin in the female body and brain results in larger tear glands. So even in cultures where male tears are acceptable, women will produce more tears and cry more often.3
For decades, psychological research maintained that both men and women reacted to stress in the same physiological ways, meaning that when confronted with stress, individuals would either respond with aggressive behavior or withdraw from the stressful situation.
Recently, however, neuroscientists have exposed a flaw in that assumption. Using fMRI, studies from University of Pennsylvania have discovered that men and women react to stress in very different ways.4 In male brains, increased blood flow to the left prefrontal cortex did indeed suggest the activation of the “fight or flight” response. In women, however, stress activated the limbic part of the brain, which is associated with emotional responses. Women, they found, were more likely to manage their stress with what scientists have termed a “tend-and-befriend” response. When threatened, fearful, or stressed, women are more likely to protect and nurture others and to turn to family and friends for solace. This difference in giving and seeking social support during stressful periods seems to be the principal way men and women differ in their coping methods. But it is not the only difference.
Researchers at the University of Southern California, also looking at the divergent ways men and women's brains respond to stressful conditions, found a striking gender difference in brain function and how people evaluate emotions when under stress. The gender difference appeared in the brain regions that enable people to simulate and understand the emotions of others. According to the research, stress seemed to increase the capacity for empathy in women, whereas in males, stress reduced it.5
So what does all this science mean in the business arena? It means, for example, that in stressful and potentially threatening organizational challenges (a massive layoff, say, or a major departmental restructuring), it shouldn't surprise you if men on the leadership team tend to isolate and withdraw (working on “the numbers” to make it equitable for each department) while female leaders focus on addressing employees' concerns and distress. And although neither response is necessarily “better” in a given situation, these findings do suggest that a male-female balance on a leadership team would probably prove to be optimal in most situations.
Before we look at the body language of male and female leaders, I want to tell you about some interesting research that offers an insight into why corporations have relatively few females in senior leadership positions. It has everything to do with body language—but not in the way you might anticipate.
Women have now crossed the 50 percent threshold and become the majority of the American workforce. They make up the majority of university graduates in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries as well as the majority of professional workers in several rich countries, including the United States. And women already run many of the world's great companies, from PepsiCo in America to Areva in France.
There is also a genuine commitment in many organizations to develop the leadership abilities of female employees and to create workplace environments with family-friendly policies and flexible working arrangements—all in hopes of attracting, retaining, and grooming women for top management roles.
But despite the female majority in the workforce, women's strides in educational attainment, and an ongoing organizational effort in leadership development, relatively few females have made the journey all the way to the highest rungs of the corporate ladder. In fact, women number only 2 percent of the CEOs of the nation's Fortune 500 companies.
There is much speculation as to why this is so. For example, most research shows that people believe successful leaders need to have the characteristics typically associated with men—although the actual qualities of effective leadership are a combination of masculine traits (forcefulness, self-confidence, task orientation) and feminine traits (concern for people, feelings, and relationships). An obvious consequence of this mistaken belief is that a man is more likely to be selected for a leadership position than is an equally qualified woman.
But there is another reason for the striking dearth of female leadership at the corporate level: the difficulty women find being subconsciously recognized by their peers as acceptable leadership material.
Researchers at the University of Delaware compared the nonverbal responses to male and female leaders and found that intellectual assertiveness by women in mixed-sex discussions elicits visible nonverbal cues of negative affect. Females speaking up and taking a leadership role receive fewer pleased responses and more displeased responses from fellow group members than male leaders offering the same input.
Here, with minor variations, is what the researchers observed in team meetings: a woman states her opinion; in response, negative nonverbal affect cues—frowns, head shakes, eye contact avoidance, and so on—are displayed, processed, and often mimicked by the entire group to produce a less-than-positive consensus about the value of the woman's contribution. And all of this occurs without individuals on the team being aware of what's happening.6
At a time when conscious responses (for example, direct answers on questionnaires) are becoming less biased against women generally, unconscious responses to women asserting leadership behaviors continue to reflect discrimination from men and women alike. Because a person's hiring, salary, and promotion (especially to top leadership positions) often depend on her being recognized by all colleagues as an emergent leader, this reflexive, unconsidered response goes some way to explain why Jane doesn't lead even when she may be the best qualified to do so.
Keep these three key points in mind:
Colleagues Kate and Grant are part of a team sent to negotiate with a potential client. Grant thought the initial meeting went well, but Kate felt otherwise. While Grant was focused on the details of the business opportunity, Kate was picking up on the silent signals—the eye contact, the subtle emotional expressions, and shifts in body posture—that were being displayed by the members of the client team. These signals were telling her that the clients had some issues with their proposal.
Robert Rosenthal at Harvard University developed a test called the Profile of Nonverbal Sensitivity to analyze gender differences in decoding body language signals. The results showed that the ability to pick up and read body language is greater in females. With the exception of men who held jobs involving “nurturing, artistic, or expressive” work, females (from fifth grade to adulthood) had superior scores in accurately judging messages communicated by facial expressions, body movements, and voice quality.7
Women are not only more adept at identifying nonverbal cues but also better at expressing them—employing more animation, gesture, and vocal variety in their communication behavior. Women as a group react physically when something surprises or frightens them. (Men tend to be more controlled, more stoic.) But gender-influenced body language differences don't stop there. Here are a baker's dozen more:
The Anger Effect
Studies conducted at Yale and Northwest Universities found that women who have angry outbursts in professional settings are perceived as having less power, status, and competence than men who get angry. In fact, anger expressed by men often heightened their perceived status. But whether the woman was a CEO or a trainee, coworkers viewed any show of anger as a personal flaw; anger in men was seen as the result of external circumstances.8
Generally speaking, women leaders tend to be more interactive, wanting to keep an encounter going until the emotional content has been played out. Women employ a more participative leadership style, they are more likely to share information and power and to foster collaborative environments, and they have strong relational skills that make them seem empathic to their staffs.
Whereas women focus on accommodating interpersonal needs, men don't place the same emphasis or value on the skills required to do so. Many men don't admire “people skills” as much as they do authority and control. Male leaders tend to be more transactional in their approach to business dealings, and once the transaction has been completed, they tend to move away from the interaction and back to solitary tasks. Men tend to favor a more hierarchical leadership style and to take a directive approach. Males are viewed as formal authorities and stronger leaders in roles that require more “command and control.” This difference has appeared in both laboratory studies and observations of real leaders.
Obviously, both men and women lead successful teams, but even here I have observed differences. Male leaders tend to use competition—comparing team members' ideas—whereas women look for connections between team members' ideas. And here, once more, is a good argument for having both genders represented (and both collaborative processes valued) on a leadership team.
I recently conducted research with managers in the United States, Canada, and Europe about masculine and feminine communication styles and the problems and opportunities that the different styles create for leaders. I asked these four questions:
The responses indicated that both sexes identify the same set of strengths and weaknesses in themselves and each other. As you look at the findings that follow, notice how much of what people refer to as “communication” is determined or influenced by gender-specific nonverbal traits and behaviors.
Top Three Communication Strengths of Male Leaders
Top Three Communication Strengths of Female Leaders
As you will see in the next set of responses, communication strengths turn into weaknesses when overdone.
Top Three Communication Weaknesses of Male Leaders
Top Three Communication Weaknesses of Female Leaders
In the first chapter, I told you about two sets of signals that followers look for in their leaders: warmth (empathy, likeability, caring) and authority (power, credibility, status). Although I have coached many leaders of both sexes who do not fit the stereotypes, I've also observed that gender differences in body language most often do align with these two groupings. Women are usually the champions in warmth and empathy, but men display more power and authority cues.
If you are like most of the leaders I work with, there are situations in which your current nonverbal behavior is very effective—and other situations where you could benefit by having the flexibility to change the signals you are sending. (Often men's body language, instead of conveying confidence and competence, is perceived as cold and uncaring; women may undermine their authority by unknowingly using deference and submission signals.) Here are some tips on how to alter, accommodate, or modify your body language to be a more effective leader.
If you are a woman seeking to project authority and credibility,
Likeable Loser
Women gain likeability but lose the advantage in a negotiation when they flirt. In a UC Berkeley study, professors had female actors play the roles of sales representatives for a biotech business. Half were told to project a no-nonsense, businesslike approach. Half were instructed to flirt (using the nonverbal behaviors of smiling, leaning forward suggestively, tossing their hair, and so on)—but to do so subtly. The outcome was that the “buyers” offered the flirts 20 percent less, on average, than they offered the more straitlaced sellers. The only payoff for the flirts in the study was that they were deemed “more likeable.”10
If you are a man seeking to project more warmth and empathy,
Yes, as John Gray told us in his famous battle-of-the-sexes best seller twenty years ago, men and women are different—different in temperament, vision, understanding, intuition, analytical gifts, communication skills, emotional and creative strengths and weaknesses—plus a whole lot more ways too numerous to list here. Brain science explains many of these differences, as does the “behavioral molding” of upbringing and societal expectations. And there is much we are still learning.
Nothing about our experience of one another has changed since that book first appeared, nor will it in the future. A hundred years from now, men and women will still seem to have come from different planets. What has changed in business, however, is that the Venus-Mars dichotomy is beginning to make a critical impact on leadership philosophy and practice as more women lead teams, assume leadership roles, enter the (still) male-dominated upper echelons of corporations, and start their own businesses.
So I'm going to close this chapter with some useful words of advice about interplanetary cooperation: don't be afraid of aliens; they've come in peace, with the same aspirations as you have—to serve customers, build great products, help society, make money, work with friends, and create a brighter future.
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