Leadership

In today's organizations, flexibility, teamwork, trust and information sharing are replacing rigid structures, competitive individualism, control and secrecy. The leadership styles of women and men continues to differ as women increasingly enter leadership roles that traditionally are occupied mainly by men. Similarities in women and men leadership styles tend to out weigh the differences.

Although revealing relatively small differences, women, more than men, appear to lead in styles that recommend them for leadership. In contrast, men, more than women, appear to lead in less advantageous styles by attending to supervisors' failures to meet standards and displaying behaviors that entail avoiding solving problems.

The best leaders listen, motivate and provide support to their people. The leadership communication styles that women typically use make them better than men at negotiating. Some communication strengths for women leaders include: they enhance teamwork, they encourage innovation through collaboration, and they increase opportunities for continuous improvement because of open access to information. Communication strengths for men leaders include: they tend to set strong boundries, they assign clear responsibilities and they weed out weak performers.

Companies may suffer by not developing and retaining some of the best talent, which is key in remaining competitive in the business world. The perceptions by senior executives of women and men are more informed by gender-based stereotypes than facts. Women are stereotyped as being better at feminine caretakering skills such as supporting and rewarding. Men are perceived as having essentially masculine taking- charge skills such as influencing supervisors and delegating responsibility. Stereotyping can be devasting, potentially in