The Management Style of Women versus Men are Vastly Different?

Chapter I

Introduction

Despite progress toward equality in recent years , women continue to experience less favorable outcomes than men in many business settings They are concentrated in low-paying jobs and receive lower average salaries . Further , when they succeed on various tasks or in various roles , their performance is often attributed to external factors (e .g luck ) rather than to their ability or effort . These negative effects are especially apparent when women seek or hold managerial-level positions in this context , they receive lower ratings than men as job applicants and lower

performance appraisals once they hold such positions . In addition , women appear to face more barriers than men in developing informal mentoring relationships and benefit less from such relationships , especially if their mentors are also women . Perhaps most disturbing , such negative effects seem to occur even when women are closely matched to men in terms of experience , specific job duties education , and several other factors (Heilman 2004

Under these conditions , differences between women and men in terms of outcomes experienced are reduced , but they continue to exist . Although many factors contribute to these persistent and disturbing disadvantages for women , considerable evidence suggests that negative gender stereotypes - widely shared beliefs about the attributes of men and women - play an important role . Despite major changes in many societies in recent decades , gender stereotypes remain largely unchanged and are generally less favorable for women than for men . For instance , in recent research , Hosada and Stone (in press ) found that women and men continue to be viewed as different with respect to many traits that have long been included in traditional gender stereotypes . For example participants in Hosada and Stone 's study - more than 1 ,000 college students - reported that men are more forceful , assertive , aggressive confident , and independent , whereas women are more nurturant , emotional considerate , indecisive , and submissive . Perhaps most damaging to women is the fact that traits included in gender stereotypes for women appear to be less consistent with those required for managerial success than traits included in gender stereotypes for men . As a result , women are often seen as less qualified for managerial-level jobs . In sum persistent gender stereotypes appear to work against women in many business settings , especially ones involving managerial-level positions (Valian 2003

To date , however , existing literature on this important has not considered the following question : Do such negative effects occur in another business context as well - that is , with respect to female entrepreneurs ? This appears to be an important issue because mounting evidence suggests that the activities of entrepreneurs are crucial to the economic growth and prosperity of modern societies . Indeed , the new ventures started by entrepreneurs more than made up for the loss of millions of jobs in large , existing companies during the 1980s and 1990s and thus played a key role in the current strength of the U .S . economy In this context , the fact that women are underrepresented among entrepreneurs and face daunting obstacles to assuming this role are disturbing . Thus , efforts to identify...