Is a lack of confidence hurting women's careers?
Women have made great strides in the workforce in recent generations: More women now graduate from college than men, and since 2009 there are as many women in the workforce as men. As I聽, the greatest growing economic force in the world isn鈥檛 China or India, it鈥檚 women.
Yet in the upper echelons of the business world, women have made few statistical strides in recent years. According to the research outfit聽Catalyst, women鈥檚 16.6% share of corporate board seats聽. The percentage of female executives at Fortune 500 companies is even smaller,聽and remained flat at 14.3%聽from 2009 to 2012.
By one important yardstick of success鈥攑erhaps the most important鈥攚omen have yet to earn their full measure: Across all professions and management levels, females still make less than their male counterparts. Women earn an average of 77 cents for every dollar earned by a man, according to analysis by the聽. And as聽聽this week, female doctors are pulling in only about half as much money as their male counterparts in the Medicare system.
The Atlantic magazine聽聽by Claire Shipman, a reporter for ABC News, and Katty Kay, an anchor at BBC America, arguing that women face a glaring 鈥渃onfidence gap鈥� when competing with men.
鈥淐ompared with men, women don鈥檛 consider themselves as ready for promotions, they predict they鈥檒l do worse on tests, and they generally underestimate their abilities. This disparity stems from factors ranging from upbringing to biology,鈥� they write. 鈥淪uccess, it turns out, correlates just as closely with confidence as it does with competence.鈥�
They back their claims with a raft of聽: Women ask for 30% less money than men do; men initiate salary discussions four times more than women do; women rate themselves negatively compared to men on scientific ability, yet score almost the same as men do.
Why? Nature, nurture and society all are to blame, they say.
Biology plays a part
Women鈥檚 amygdalae, sometimes described as the brain鈥檚 primitive fear center, activates more easily, meaning 鈥渨omen are more apt to ruminate over what鈥檚 gone wrong in the past.鈥� This impedes risk-taking. The anterior cingulate cortex, the 鈥渨orrywart center of the brain鈥� that helps us recognize errors and weigh options, is also larger in women.
High testosterone levels also correlate to an appetite for risk-taking in men. Males also chronically overestimate their abilities in study after study, while women underestimate their skills.
Women reared to be 鈥榩erfectionists鈥�
Girls start school with 鈥渓onger attention spans, more-advanced verbal and fine-motor skills, and greater social adeptness. They generally don鈥檛 charge through the halls like wild animals, or get into fights during recess.鈥� That behavior is rewarded and, a result, a streak of perfectionism runs higher in women. 鈥淧erfectionism is another confidence killer,鈥� they write. 鈥淲e watch our male colleagues take risks, while we hold back until we鈥檙e sure we are perfectly ready and perfectly qualified.鈥�
Boys, meanwhile, are constantly upbraided for unruly behavior, which helps desensitize them to criticism later in life. There is also a high correlation between participation in school sports鈥攚hich nurture persistence and resiliency in defeat鈥攁nd success in business. Yet girls are six times more likely to drop out of sports in school, the authors note.
Confidence and the B-word
The most troubling finding is that when women display more confidence and assertiveness in the workplace, their coworkers鈥攂oth men聽and聽women鈥攙iew it in a negative light. 鈥淚f a woman walks into her boss鈥檚 office with unsolicited opinions, speaks up first at meetings, or gives business advice above her pay grade, she risks being disliked or even鈥攍et鈥檚 be blunt鈥攂eing labeled a bitch,鈥� they write.
鈥淪o confident women can find themselves in a catch-22,鈥� they say. 鈥淏iology, upbringing, society: all seemed to be conspiring against women鈥檚 confidence.鈥�
The authors argue that confidence鈥斺�渢he stuff that turns thoughts into action,鈥� as one researcher called it鈥攃an be learned. 鈥淚t is the factor that turns thoughts into judgments about what we are capable of, and that then transforms those judgments into action.鈥�
One important question goes unanswered in the Atlantic article. As the authors note, investments run by female hedge-fund managers outperform those run by male managers. There鈥檚 also a slew of data that companies with more women on executive boards and senior management teams are聽.
On the personal finance level, studies consistently show that women are better at managing family money. Nobel Laureate Muhammad聽Yunus, the father of microfinance, built the system of giving small loans to the poor almost exclusively through women. 鈥淲e noticed that women were better borrowers,鈥� Yunus told me in. 鈥淲omen took better care of the finances; the children benefited more.鈥�
Doesn鈥檛 this suggest the opposite of the Atlantic鈥檚 thesis? That instead of more women who mimic the testosterone-soaked assurance of men, the business world could profit from a more female worldview: not so overconfident, more circumspect with a higher degree of humility?
As Elizabeth Plank聽: 鈥淚nstead of telling women to change their personalities, maybe it鈥檚 time we take a look at the entire system.鈥�
That would require a great deal of confidence.
