Sam Bowman Archives | The Glasshammer

Guest Contributed by Sam Bowman

Women are rising up in the ranks, leading companies, global organizations, and even countries.

According to a Pew Research Center study, the number of world leaders who are women has doubled since 2005.

Women simply make great leaders. As WGU points out, women are more effective than men in leadership roles. They’re also more innovative and cooperative problems solvers who tend to see the bigger picture as they work toward goals.

It’s not a stretch to say that as leaders, women are unique. Here are just a few of the exceptional traits they bring to the leadership table and how women can highlight these strengths to move up in their chosen field.

Women Are Empathetic

When leading people, it’s important to be able to put yourself in their shoes. Leaders must understand the different perspectives people bring to the table and empathize with them in order to be effective.

This is not to say that men aren’t empathetic, but it’s a trait that research supports as being a strength possessed and utilized more effectively by more women in leadership roles than men. The ability to empathize also assists leaders in being more flexible and able to build stronger interpersonal relationships with subordinates than their male counterparts.

Women Communicate Effectively

If you want to lead, then you must be an effective communicator, especially when it comes to communicating across cultural lines. Many studies done over the years indicate that women are better at communication than men. A study published in The Journal of Neuroscience found that women’s brains possess a “language protein” that may explain the communication differences between men and women.

In the workplace, women put these communication gifts to good use. Their naturally interactive leadership style encourages participation and the sharing of information at all levels. This makes them better at getting results from their teams since they’re able to communicate what they want and set expectations clearly.

Women Collaborate

It’s important for leaders to understand that team members simply approach problems differently than they might and value those different perspectives. Women seem to possess an innate quality for working well with others and enjoy learning about new solutions to solve problems together. This all relates back to the fact that women value teamwork and can make everyone on the team feel as if their contributions are valued.

Women can also use this collaboration skill to keep information flowing throughout teams and departments, ensuring that everyone has the data needed to do the job right.

Women Are Convincing

The willingness to build interpersonal relationships in the workplace also helps them to be more persuasive leaders. This is due to the fact that many women are empathetic listeners that take the time to learn about people in order to appeal to their sensibilities and needs. The result? Women tend to understand concerns or objections others may have to ideas and can effectively formulate a response that bears these facts in mind.

Women Are Generous

Many women are givers in their personal lives and that translates to the workplace, too. It’s easy for women to encourage the people around them and allow them to thrive as team members. They inspire and uplift the people they’re surrounded by, which is part of what makes women such great long-term strategic thinkers in the workplace. They want others to do well because they recognize that if their team does well, they do well too.

Don’t mistake generosity in the workplace for weakness, however. Women may be willing to be inclusive, but that doesn’t mean they are playing the role of mother to the people on the team. They’re not there to make sure you have your lunch, they’re there to make sure you’re participating in an environment that welcomes your ideas.

How to Highlight Your Unique Skills

Remember, being a positive and effective leader isn’t a position you apply for or a title you’re given, it’s something you show through example and action. When writing a compelling resume or cover letter, it serves you well to include your leadership skills and expertise, highlighting how you use these skills to set you apart from the crowd.

To showcase your workplace leadership styles and skills, you should:

● Discuss them: In your cover letter, address the leadership experience you have that makes you a successful manager or executive. Talk about the qualities you possess concisely to help convince a prospective employer that you have what it takes to be an effective leader.
● Prove it: You can say that you’re great at solving problems or delegating work, but you have to be able to demonstrate it with your resume too. Back up claims you make with bullet points that show your achievements and describe how you’ve leveraged this skill set in the past. Also, think about how you have used your leadership skills in the past to benefit employers and make sure to point these out in detail.
● Prepare: Whatever skills you choose to highlight in your resume must be backed up in conversation. You should expect to be pressed for details on these subjects, so think about how these skills make you perfect for this job and come to the table with examples.

Women Make the Workplace Successful!

Research has shown that companies that have women as a representative portion of their management teams perform better financially than those that don’t. While women still face many challenges in the workplace and must work hard to show they’re up to the task, progress is being made. As women continue to chip away at the barriers they face, organizations only become stronger. Lead by example and soon enough, people begin to follow.

About the Author

Sam Bowman writes about marketing, tech, and how the two merge. He enjoys getting to utilize the internet for community without actually having to leave his house. In his spare time he likes running, reading, and combining the two in a run to his local bookstore.

The opinions and views expressed by guest contributors are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of theglasshammer.com

Data analysis positions are currently playing a huge role in tech as corporations around the world seek to understand and utilize big data for their business.

As we noted in 2012, 90 percent of Fortune 500 companies are investing in big data, expecting over $1 billion in revenue as this technology changes the way we use information.

However, despite how these positions in the technology sphere are flourishing, the standard gender disparity of STEM fields remains intact. While women continue to earn degrees in technology and analytics, societal factors and discrimination within STEM industries keep them from getting and keeping these high-paying positions that are, by and large, taken up by men.

The Gender Disparity in Data Analysis

Gaining the education needed to fulfill these positions is the necessary first step to achieving equality in STEM fields. Although the number of women in data analysis and STEM fields remains lower than men, more women than ever are earning degrees in STEM, with 40 percent of statistics degrees currently being earned by women. Women also make up 40 percent of statistics department faculty that are set to move into tenured positions. There are a variety of campaigns that exist solely to push women and minorities towards these high-pay and in-demand jobs, and based on the number of degrees these groups are earning, it seems that their efforts are working.

Unfortunately, this isn’t necessarily resolving the problem.

Although women are earning these degrees at higher rates than ever, it’s often still difficult for them to remain in these fields due to the low number of women they often work with, especially in workplaces that particularly lack diversity. A lack of women in leadership roles and as fellow coworkers can often make women feel out of place and unwelcome, and with the casual discrimination that women often experience, they sometimes choose to move on to other roles.

Women can help combat these experiences by furthering their education in data analysis roles and gaining background knowledge on business and marketing touchpoints that make the application of their education even more valuable. Being able to calculate marketing acquisition cost and having the ability to dig through the conceptual data it entails can make women an even larger asset for businesses that are trying to incorporate these skills throughout their company.

The Value of Women in Data Analysis

One reason women are unable to live up to their potential in STEM fields is due to a narrative that is still used throughout media today, generalizing those working in STEM and tech as nerdy males. However, women are just as naturally suited for these positions as men. Although this narrative never had any factual basis behind it, times have changed. The value of women in STEM roles has become more apparent as women excel in roles throughout every related industry.

Still, social conditioning has an impact. When women are not introduced to computing and data analysis skills early on in their life and education, it can be difficult for them to develop the type of organic connection that they would form if they had more exposure to these subjects in early years. In order to close the gender gap that is so prevalent in STEM fields today, experts often espouse the belief that early exposure to STEM and computer-related skills could help make a huge difference to the number of women who pursue these fields.

Another reason that gender diversity is often unbalanced is due to the way companies recruit for various positions. Many recruiting efforts rely on referrals to determine top candidates. However, a study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York found that 64 percent of employees recommend candidates of the same gender as themselves. In 2015, a study found that women are three times less likely to seek tech internships than men, which is another common way that companies recruit for STEM-related positions.

Strong, bold, and intelligent women are in the public eye now more than ever. Still, women tend to cause surprise and even strike uneasiness in some of their male coworkers because of how uncommon women tend to be in STEM industries. This type of environment causes women to turn away from tech and data analysis directions as options in school and for their future careers.

There are many factors that contribute to the lack of women in data analysis roles, and there is a lot of evidence to support theories that societal constructs hold women back from taking up space in these positions. Diversity is known to attract the best and freshest talent to growing businesses. Making an effort to reassess company recruiting efforts to draw more women and minorities to these positions can make companies stand out from the rest. Women have valuable perspectives to bring to the field of data analysis, and encouraging more women to pursue data analysis roles and STEM fields in general would advance them greatly.

Disclaimer: The opinions and views of guest contributors are not necessarily those of theglasshammer.com

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How Are Women Unique as Leaders?