Article Review: Woman Managers

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A company that conducted performance reviews of executives turned up an interesting finding: women executives are generally ranked higher in key areas of job performance than their male counterparts. The study, conducted by the Hagberg Consulting Group, did not set out to study gender differences, which leads researchers to give the results additional weight (since there was no gender bias introduced in the original study). Instead, researchers found the gender gap when they compiled statistics based on their performance evaluations. Additional studies have reached similar conclusions, although different studies have reached less stark differences between the two genders.

There is little surprise to learn that gender differences exist along traditionally stereotypical role lines: women are expected to be better listeners and to have better interpersonal skills, and the studies bear this out. However, the studies also show that women are as competent (or more so) than men at analyzing issues and producing high quality work, and that women also excel at motivating others.

These findings are considered to have particular import at this time because of the new types of companies that are being formed today. Instead of having companies which rely on heavy production and assembly, there are increasing numbers of service companies being formed where communication skills and teambuilding skills are critical to t

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eached the highest positions of organizations in significant numbers. For example, the very skills at which women excel can actually hide women in an organization. Because researchers have found that women are less likely to seek personal glory, their contributions to an organization may go unnoticed, or another might take credit for those contributions. Similarly, women may spend too much time ensuring that their work is done to a high level of excellence, and less time building strategic alliances within the organization. In addition, women still have difficulty in breaching the informal male communication networks. Critique/Opinion There has long been discussion about the "glass ceiling," a concept that women have difficulty in progressing past a certain point in organizations. This article suggests that women do, in fact, have such difficulty, but that the difficulty should not be traced to an inability to perform the tasks that are required at the highest levels of an organization. To some degree, this article reinforces stereotypes about women; namely, that women are better communicators than men, that they are interested in reaching consensus rather than entering into confrontation, and that women do not actively se
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1250
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page)

Article Review: Woman Managers

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