Women face serious obstacles on the road to success. Despite reporting the same career aspirations and ambitions, women are underrepresented at the top and tend to be less satisfied with their careers than men. Women make up 44% of S&P 500 companies, but only 25% of corporate boards and only 6% of CEOs. Gender discrimination accounts for a large part of this discrepancy: certain attributes that are considered essential for career advancement are stereotypically male, and professional women face backlash when they display these traits.
How do men react to the prospect of working with agentic women in male-dominated environments, and how can we make men more willing to work with agentic women? The final WAPPP seminar of the year figured Chiara Trombini, AY’17 WAPPP Fellow, as she presented three studies on this line of research.
Why focus on men evaluating agentic women in male-dominated environments? Gender differences are more likely to emerge in male-dominated environments, and women are evaluated more harshly when they occupy male-dominated roles, exhibit stereotypically male attributes, or are evaluated by men. In particular, women face a competence-likability double bind: either they are well-liked but considered incompetent, or are competent but socially unattractive and therefore less worthy of hiring or promotion.
Is there a way to overcome the “threat” posed by agentic women? Chiara argues that self-affirmation is one way to reduce backlash and promote gender equality. Self-affirmation is when individuals reflect on values that are personally relevant to them. Self-affirming individuals are less likely to experience distress, less likely to react defensively, and are more likely to be objective in their decisions and less likely to rely on stereotypes. From a cognitive perspective, self-affirmation is effective at reducing the effects of prejudice and stereotypes, makes individuals more likely to accept threatening information and modify their behavior in response to threat, and increases concession-making and openness to compromise in negotiations.
How can self-affirmation reduce backlash? The mechanism lies in men’s emotional response to agentic women. Men dominate the current gender system and are sensitive and responsive to threats to their masculinity. When gender status is uncertain or challenged, men experience anxiety and react aggressively. There is some evidence that self-affirmation reduces cortisol levels and may be able to reduce stress and anxiety responses in these situations.
Chiara hypothesized that self-affirmation would make individuals less likely to rely on stereotypes and prejudices, so men who practiced self-affirmation would be more willing to work with agentic women and would feel less anxious at the prospect of doing so. She presented three studies testing these hypotheses on self-affirmation and gendered backlash.
Study 1
In the first study, evaluators were asked to rank 11 values (sense of humor, politics, religion, creativity, etc.) in order of personal importance. In the self-affirmation condition, evaluators were asked to write why their most important value was important to them. In the control condition, evaluators were asked to write why their least important value could be important to someone else. Then, evaluators watched a job interview and evaluated an internal candidate for job placement. The measured variable was willingness to work with the candidate. As hypothesized, self-affirmation increased male evaluators’ willingness to work with agentic women.
Study 2
Study 2 followed the same design as Study 1, but included measures for negative trait perception (whether the evaluator found the candidate to be arrogant, greedy, etc.), level of anxiety, and neutral feelings. The findings from Study 2 replicated Study 1: evaluators were less willing to work with women than men overall, but self-affirmation increased general willingness to work with candidates and particularly increased men’s willingness to work with women. In addition, men in the self-affirmation condition had lower rates of negative trait perception and lower anxiety.
Study 3
Study 3 set out to evaluate whether anxiety decreases willingness to work with a job candidate. Participants were asked to evaluate a job candidate based on their behavior in a job interview after being exposed to a music clip designed to induce feelings of anxiety or feelings of calm – in this case, either the theme from Psycho or “Weightless” by Maroni Union. Evaluators then rated their current mood in terms of anxiety or calmness. In general, male evaluators were more willing to work with male candidates, and female evaluators were more willing to work with female candidates. Participants in the high anxiety condition were less willing to work with candidate across the board. In addition, male evaluators in the high anxiety condition were less willing to work with agentic women.
These studies lend a cognitive and affective perspective to examining the roots of gender discrimination in hiring. It appears that perception of negative traits and feelings of anxiety are wrapped up in hiring discrimination. Self-affirmation is a low-cost, powerful affirmation that can increase men’s willingness to work with women in male-dominated environments, which could ultimately reduce gender gaps in professional settings. Organizations could institute self-affirmation practices before hiring, promotion, and performance review decisions in order to alleviate gender discrimination and ensure that they are benefitting from the entirety of the hiring pool.
Showing posts with label negotiation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label negotiation. Show all posts
Thursday, May 4, 2017
Wednesday, July 20, 2016
Gender, Conflict, Israel and Palestine: Gender in Peace Negotiations
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| President Clinton and Yasser Arafat, then-Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) |
“If we’d had women at Camp David,” Bill Clinton later rued, “we’d have an agreement.”
There’s one thing that almost all negotiations between Israel and Palestine have had in common: a relative lack of women at the table.
It’s important not to neglect the important contributions several women have made to the much-maligned peace process. Dr. Hanan Ashrawi was a key player on the Palestinian team at the 1991 Madrid Conference as official spokesperson. Her prominence prompted the Israelis to summon their own female negotiator, Sarah Doron.
But by 1993, as talks towards the Oslo Accords progressed, it was clear that women would largely be limited to backseat roles.
One senior Palestinian negotiator at Oslo justified women’s exclusion by privately suggesting that the decisions taken were “too serious and monumental” for women to be involved as lead negotiators.
On the Israeli side, there was a clear divide: almost all the primary negotiators were men, while women were limited to the role of secretary, assistant or junior adviser.
Women’s lack of representation at the negotiating table has endured through the 20th and into the 21st century.
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| L to R: Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, US President Barack Obama, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas |
Perhaps “cultural” or social norms play a role.
In both societies and economies, patriarchal structures exist that discriminate against women. Women are less likely to work. Those women who do work are less likely to occupy senior roles and less likely to receive fair pay. Women are less likely to enjoy their fundamental human rights.
These social or cultural norms have ramifications for many walks of life in both Israel and Palestine. But discrimination against women in the military and political spheres in particular has resulted in fewer women being picked to lead or join negotiating teams.
There’s mandatory military conscription for women in Israel, but they’re much less likely than men to serve in combat positions. The perception endures that men are the “real” soldiers.
But cultural norms aren’t the only factor at play here. Politics is also to blame. (Side note: When isn’t it?)
In trying to understand women’s marginalization from peace negotiations between Israel and Palestine, Espanioli and Sachs found that the perpetuation of the conflict itself has pushed “gender” off the table.
The conflict and the occupation are all-consuming. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it defines political competition and discourse in Palestine and Israel alike. And while both parties remain at diplomatic and military loggerheads, these scholars argue that “gender” issues continue to be pushed aside.
Any discourse that detracts from the main objective for each party is seen as an unhelpful distraction, somehow of secondary importance: How can we talk about gender now when we should be focusing all our efforts on securing our borders?; How can we talk about gender now when we should be focusing all our efforts on ending the occupation?
I’m clear about the answer to the second question. Does it matter? Yes. But maybe not only for the obvious reasons.
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The same should go for government delegations sent to peace negotiations.
Some might make the same argument but in utilitarian terms. Countless studies have shown that businesses that effectively leverage diversity — including gender diversity — do better in a multitude of ways. They’re more profitable, they’re more fulfilling places to work, and they’re more likely to retain talented staff.
It’s been claimed that women are inherently more peaceful than men. This utilitarian argument would therefore predict that having more women sat at the negotiating table would increase the likelihood of success at the next stage of the peace process between Palestine and Israel.
I resist essentialist arguments: That any one group of people exhibits any particular strength or deficiency based on any given biological trait they bear: like the gender they identify with, or the color of their skin. And since there’s evidence for and against the idea that women are more inherently peaceful than men, I’m not going to try to make any conclusions about that.
The more important conversation is about how to make gender front and center in future negotiations between Israel and Palestine.
That starts with having greater diversity in the two parties’ negotiating teams, but it certainly doesn’t end there.
The conflict and the occupation have profoundly different effects on men and women. And when peace processes fail to integrate women, peace agreements fail to address these differential gendered effects.
Those issues might include the impact of the occupation on girls’ access to education; how women’s sexual and reproductive health rights are threatened; how women’s economic opportunities are particularly constrained.
Leaders from Palestine, Israel and the international community can’t afford to regard these gendered consequences of conflict as an afterthought, to be dealt with once settlement construction, incitement to violence and movement and trade restrictions are resolved. They are part of the problem, and must be part of the solution.
So while having greater gender diversity at the table doesn’t necessarily mean those negotiators will be inherently or biologically more inclined to peace, it might prevent these issues being left off the agenda.
Hanan Ashrawi once remarked that “gender does not constitute a structured role in negotiations [between Israel and Palestine.]” It must if future rounds of peace talks are to succeed.
Friday, April 29, 2016
Gendered Career Negotiations: A Toolkit for Navigating, Bending, and Shaping Institutions
This week’s WAPPP seminar was the last of the year! It’s been an honor being your blogger this semester, and I’m looking forward to more cutting-edge gender research in these seminars next year. This week, WAPPP’s own Bobbi Thomason, Senior Fellow and Lecturer at Wharton, presented her work in collaboration with Hannah Riley Bowles and Julia Bear.
Current Literature Doesn’t Reflect Many Women’s Negotiation Experiences
We’ve spoken a lot this year about women’s career negotiations, focusing in particular on the effects of ambiguity and stereotypes on negotiation and the social cost of negotiating flexible work arrangements. However, much of the research on gender and negotiations doesn’t reflect the diversity of contexts in which women negotiate. Professor Thomason’s research group analyzed 43 studies on gender and career negotiation, and realized that the overwhelming number (70%) were lab studies, all of them talked about compensation while only some discussed job benefits or promotion, and 95% were negotiations with just one counterpart.
Because the literature is overwhelmingly on institutional topics and standard terms, like one’s starting salary, it’s unclear whether it generalizes to broader career topics that matter for women’s leadership positions and lifetime earnings. One other concern is that negotiating about money may be a gendered trigger. The “ideal worker” for most organizations is a male breadwinner with no outside commitments or distractions, who is understood to have a full-time caregiver at home. When women negotiate for a higher salary or bonus, it may go against stereotypes of how a female worker “should” act and elicit negative reactions.
Using Fieldwork to Build Lab-Testable Theories
Ideally, Professor Thomason explained, research is a combination of grounded theory building in the field – conducting interviews and observing people in the real world – which helps researchers construct hypotheses to test in the lab. Because the current understanding of gender and negotiations is so dominated by lab work on compensation, there is a significant opportunity to do qualitative fieldwork to better understand women’s lived experiences with negotiation.
In that vein, Professor Thomason presented three interrelated studies on the lived experiences of gender in career negotiations: a survey of 46 women, interviews with 49 male and female senior government officials, and a survey of workers in a large professional services firm.
Study 1: Understanding the Types of Negotiation
Professor Thomason’s research group surveyed women in corporate and entrepreneurial roles about their negotiation experiences and found three main types of negotiations. Institutional negotiations are standard requests, like asking for a raise. Institution bending negotiations are about creating a nonstandard work arrangement for an individual employee, like negotiating a flexible schedule. Institution shaping negotiations change the organization itself, often by creating a new role, program, or practice.
Study 2: Who Participates in Each Type of Negotiation, and What Do They Discuss?
In the second study, the research group examined a more institutionally constrained context, the US federal government. This study allowed the researchers to survey men and women and to test whether certain types of negotiations are easier in startups or other work settings that value flexibility and disruption. Each of the 49 interviewees shared stories of negotiating for their own and for others’ career advancement.
The researchers found that men in this sample did far more institutional negotiations and institution shaping negotiations. By contrast, women did significantly more institution bending negotiations for themselves than men did. (So much for the notion that women don't negotiate!) When negotiating for others, that gap disappears: men and women do about the same amount of institution bending and shaping negotiations for others, and men do more institutional negotiations for others than women.
Examining the topic of negotiations showed that compensation was a very small proportion of the issues discussed, in contrast to its disproportionate representation in most studies. Role negotiations were the most common topic – all of the institution shaping negotiations were about role, but role considerations were discussed in each of the three types. Notably, only women participated in institution bending negotiations for geographic and temporal flexibility.
Study 3: Understanding Gender and Leadership in Negotiation
The researchers interviewed 156 partners and senior partners in a professional services firm for the third study. Participants were asked about the frequency of certain types of career negotiation over their career at the firm and were prompted to recall and report on a recent career negotiation. At the end of the survey, participants were asked a series of questions to measure their “perceived freedom to negotiate.” The overall mean for the sample was a 4.7 on a 7 point scale – an “agree somewhat” that they feel free to negotiate career-related issues. There was no difference in perceived freedom to negotiate based on gender or leadership role, which is quite noteworthy!
Professor Thomason’s research group asked whether certain negotiation types are correlated with gender or leadership roles. Women (both partners and senior partners) report significantly more institution bending negotiations than men. However, there are no significant gender differences in institutional or institution shaping negotiations. Senior partners (those in leadership roles) report significantly more institution shaping negotiations, but leadership role is not significantly correlated with institutional or institution bending negotiations. In terms of topic, men report a much higher frequency of job-offer negotiations, like those regarding compensation, whereas women report a much higher frequency of workload and work-life flexibility negotiations.
In their interviews, there was no gender difference in ability to recall a recent negotiation, which refutes the assumption that “women don’t negotiate.” There was also no difference between partners and senior partners in recalling a recent negotiation, which indicates that everyone negotiates. The median length of reported negotiations was an extraordinary 90 days, which may present some obstacles to replicating real-life negotiations in a lab setting. Reported negotiations tend to be with more senior and “somewhat close” colleagues, and unlike most lab studies, most negotiations involve multiple counterparts. On average, 90% of men’s negotiation counterparts were also men, while only 13% of women’s negotiation counterparts were also women. There was no gender difference in satisfaction with the outcome, and 88% of the reported negotiations were resolved.
Opportunities for Future Research
This research provides important information about who negotiates, what negotiation type they employ, and the topic of negotiation that can be used to inform new theories and new lab experiments. However, Professor Thomason pointed out, these self-reports could be influenced by gender-appropriate narratives, which may obscure some of the reality of negotiations. It’s also unclear whether leaders conduct more institutional shaping negotiations because they are already in leadership roles or whether they use these negotiations to attain leadership roles. Future research is needed to test these propositions.
One of the key contributions of this work is examining women who have made it and women who have made it big. If the negotiation literature only focuses on barriers to women’s negotiation or the women who have failed to advance, it may inadvertently perpetuate the stereotype that women don’t negotiate or don’t negotiate well. Further research will help us develop a broader conceptualization of gender and career negotiations beyond “women don’t ask” to better understand how women wield negotiation to advance in their careers.
Current Literature Doesn’t Reflect Many Women’s Negotiation Experiences
We’ve spoken a lot this year about women’s career negotiations, focusing in particular on the effects of ambiguity and stereotypes on negotiation and the social cost of negotiating flexible work arrangements. However, much of the research on gender and negotiations doesn’t reflect the diversity of contexts in which women negotiate. Professor Thomason’s research group analyzed 43 studies on gender and career negotiation, and realized that the overwhelming number (70%) were lab studies, all of them talked about compensation while only some discussed job benefits or promotion, and 95% were negotiations with just one counterpart.
Because the literature is overwhelmingly on institutional topics and standard terms, like one’s starting salary, it’s unclear whether it generalizes to broader career topics that matter for women’s leadership positions and lifetime earnings. One other concern is that negotiating about money may be a gendered trigger. The “ideal worker” for most organizations is a male breadwinner with no outside commitments or distractions, who is understood to have a full-time caregiver at home. When women negotiate for a higher salary or bonus, it may go against stereotypes of how a female worker “should” act and elicit negative reactions.
Using Fieldwork to Build Lab-Testable Theories
Ideally, Professor Thomason explained, research is a combination of grounded theory building in the field – conducting interviews and observing people in the real world – which helps researchers construct hypotheses to test in the lab. Because the current understanding of gender and negotiations is so dominated by lab work on compensation, there is a significant opportunity to do qualitative fieldwork to better understand women’s lived experiences with negotiation.
In that vein, Professor Thomason presented three interrelated studies on the lived experiences of gender in career negotiations: a survey of 46 women, interviews with 49 male and female senior government officials, and a survey of workers in a large professional services firm.
Study 1: Understanding the Types of Negotiation
Professor Thomason’s research group surveyed women in corporate and entrepreneurial roles about their negotiation experiences and found three main types of negotiations. Institutional negotiations are standard requests, like asking for a raise. Institution bending negotiations are about creating a nonstandard work arrangement for an individual employee, like negotiating a flexible schedule. Institution shaping negotiations change the organization itself, often by creating a new role, program, or practice.
Study 2: Who Participates in Each Type of Negotiation, and What Do They Discuss?
In the second study, the research group examined a more institutionally constrained context, the US federal government. This study allowed the researchers to survey men and women and to test whether certain types of negotiations are easier in startups or other work settings that value flexibility and disruption. Each of the 49 interviewees shared stories of negotiating for their own and for others’ career advancement.
The researchers found that men in this sample did far more institutional negotiations and institution shaping negotiations. By contrast, women did significantly more institution bending negotiations for themselves than men did. (So much for the notion that women don't negotiate!) When negotiating for others, that gap disappears: men and women do about the same amount of institution bending and shaping negotiations for others, and men do more institutional negotiations for others than women.
Examining the topic of negotiations showed that compensation was a very small proportion of the issues discussed, in contrast to its disproportionate representation in most studies. Role negotiations were the most common topic – all of the institution shaping negotiations were about role, but role considerations were discussed in each of the three types. Notably, only women participated in institution bending negotiations for geographic and temporal flexibility.
Study 3: Understanding Gender and Leadership in Negotiation
The researchers interviewed 156 partners and senior partners in a professional services firm for the third study. Participants were asked about the frequency of certain types of career negotiation over their career at the firm and were prompted to recall and report on a recent career negotiation. At the end of the survey, participants were asked a series of questions to measure their “perceived freedom to negotiate.” The overall mean for the sample was a 4.7 on a 7 point scale – an “agree somewhat” that they feel free to negotiate career-related issues. There was no difference in perceived freedom to negotiate based on gender or leadership role, which is quite noteworthy!
Professor Thomason’s research group asked whether certain negotiation types are correlated with gender or leadership roles. Women (both partners and senior partners) report significantly more institution bending negotiations than men. However, there are no significant gender differences in institutional or institution shaping negotiations. Senior partners (those in leadership roles) report significantly more institution shaping negotiations, but leadership role is not significantly correlated with institutional or institution bending negotiations. In terms of topic, men report a much higher frequency of job-offer negotiations, like those regarding compensation, whereas women report a much higher frequency of workload and work-life flexibility negotiations.
In their interviews, there was no gender difference in ability to recall a recent negotiation, which refutes the assumption that “women don’t negotiate.” There was also no difference between partners and senior partners in recalling a recent negotiation, which indicates that everyone negotiates. The median length of reported negotiations was an extraordinary 90 days, which may present some obstacles to replicating real-life negotiations in a lab setting. Reported negotiations tend to be with more senior and “somewhat close” colleagues, and unlike most lab studies, most negotiations involve multiple counterparts. On average, 90% of men’s negotiation counterparts were also men, while only 13% of women’s negotiation counterparts were also women. There was no gender difference in satisfaction with the outcome, and 88% of the reported negotiations were resolved.
Opportunities for Future Research
This research provides important information about who negotiates, what negotiation type they employ, and the topic of negotiation that can be used to inform new theories and new lab experiments. However, Professor Thomason pointed out, these self-reports could be influenced by gender-appropriate narratives, which may obscure some of the reality of negotiations. It’s also unclear whether leaders conduct more institutional shaping negotiations because they are already in leadership roles or whether they use these negotiations to attain leadership roles. Future research is needed to test these propositions.
One of the key contributions of this work is examining women who have made it and women who have made it big. If the negotiation literature only focuses on barriers to women’s negotiation or the women who have failed to advance, it may inadvertently perpetuate the stereotype that women don’t negotiate or don’t negotiate well. Further research will help us develop a broader conceptualization of gender and career negotiations beyond “women don’t ask” to better understand how women wield negotiation to advance in their careers.
Friday, October 2, 2015
Iron Fist in a Velvet Glove: Gender/Professional Identity & Women's Negotiation Performance
Dr. Shira Mor, Assistant Professor at the Rotterdam School of Management in Erasmus University, presented her work on gender professional identity integration in today's HKS WAPPP Seminar. While introducing Dr. Mor, Professor Hannah Riley-Bowles noted that she "thinks about the practical at the individual level", meaning that her work aims to deliver insights that women can use in their individual lives. "My message is very positive, it's very rewarding to engage in this research", Dr. Mor commented.
The question that triggered her research was about what it means to integrate the feminine and the masculine side that all persons have within them. She recalled a description by Virginia Woolf of the two "important and resonant" powers inside us that are both, feminine and masculine, and mentioned that if integrated, could have incredibly creative outcomes. How to actually bridge these two identities is one of her main interests.
Dr. Mor described a number of studies she has run to see the effect of gender/professional identity integration (GPII) on negotiation results for women. GPII refers to the degree to which any person feels like their gender identity fits in well with the professional role they perform, measured by self-reported responses to an eight item questionnaire. The questionnaire is administered most commonly to people whose gender is opposite to the dominant gender in their field, such as male nurses or female engineers. If a person reports that their gender identity interferes with their work or that they feel uncomfortable exhibiting certain gendered traits in a professional setting, they will score low on GPII. Conversely, people who see their gender identity as a professional resource will score high on GPII. Essentially, it is looking at how well people can integrate their feminine and male sides.
In the first study, Dr. Mor observed the results of a negotiations class exercise. Before the exercise began, the students were scored on GPII; female students tended to report lower GPII than males. The students conducted a simple negotiation simulation in which they would play either the buyer or the seller. After the negotiation, female students with high GPII achieved much better outcomes than female students with low GPII. In contrast, GPII had no effect on men's negotiation results.
In the second study, the research team brought in a group of women into a negotiation training environment and put them in a salary negotiation with a male actor who they believed to be a recruiter. The goal was to find out whether it was really GPII driving the effects or whether there were other personal traits that were producing the results. After the negotiations, high GPII women obtained higher starting salary offers regardless of other characteristics such as race. These negotiators tended to smile more frequently and have more open body postures than low GPII negotiators.
One of her next papers took this a step further and looked at whether GPII for women could be induced. Participants in the experiment were randomly assigned to one of three groups before the negotiation exercise. The first group was asked to list ways in which being female helped them professionally; the second listed ways in which being female negatively impacted them at work; the third was a control group who entered the negotiation without any prior activity. The research assistants who coded the responses found the negative experiences especially difficult to read, because they contained reports of a wide array of experiences like harassment, catcalling, among others.
The participants then answered the GPII questionnaire and conducted a negotiation. The study finds that participants who listed positive traits scored higher on GPII and obtained better outcomes from the negotiation. Commenting and referencing related research, professor Riley-Bowles mentioned GPII might not likely come from within but from an interaction with society. Also striking was the fact that results for those who listed negative aspects of their gender identity at work were very similar to the control group's, sadly suggesting that women's 'default' setting is to have low GPII. "It's sad to say that there is no real control condition", Dr. Mor said.
Dr. Mor is continuing this course of study to identify the struggles and challenges women face to hopefully be able to prescribe useful adaptive strategies to navigate around them. Follow her research to learn more.
The question that triggered her research was about what it means to integrate the feminine and the masculine side that all persons have within them. She recalled a description by Virginia Woolf of the two "important and resonant" powers inside us that are both, feminine and masculine, and mentioned that if integrated, could have incredibly creative outcomes. How to actually bridge these two identities is one of her main interests.
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| Virginia Woolf made it into the discussion at the HKS WAPPP Seminar |
In the first study, Dr. Mor observed the results of a negotiations class exercise. Before the exercise began, the students were scored on GPII; female students tended to report lower GPII than males. The students conducted a simple negotiation simulation in which they would play either the buyer or the seller. After the negotiation, female students with high GPII achieved much better outcomes than female students with low GPII. In contrast, GPII had no effect on men's negotiation results.
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| Dr. Mor explains her methodology |
One of her next papers took this a step further and looked at whether GPII for women could be induced. Participants in the experiment were randomly assigned to one of three groups before the negotiation exercise. The first group was asked to list ways in which being female helped them professionally; the second listed ways in which being female negatively impacted them at work; the third was a control group who entered the negotiation without any prior activity. The research assistants who coded the responses found the negative experiences especially difficult to read, because they contained reports of a wide array of experiences like harassment, catcalling, among others.
Dr. Mor is continuing this course of study to identify the struggles and challenges women face to hopefully be able to prescribe useful adaptive strategies to navigate around them. Follow her research to learn more.
Friday, March 13, 2015
Negotiating Across Gender: A Workshop
If you’ve ever found yourself in need of a better salary, a title that reflects your skill set, or a bigger staff to get the job done, then this week’s WAPPP seminar applies to you. Harvard Kennedy School Senior Lecturer in Public Policy and WAPPP Research Director Hannah Riley Bowles used the workshop to guide attendees through a research-based negotiations toolkit she recently created. Bowles argued that these main takeaways can help anyone - not just women - succeed in their professional negotiations.
1. Apply negotiations skills broadly. Bowles encouraged attendees to think about negotiation skills broadly, since academics and the media tend to focus too closely on salary negotiations. Through negotiation, employees can enhance their recognition and rewards (i.e. securing a new title or getting their name on research), seize opportunities to expand their authority (i.e. budget or who reports to them), overcome barriers, since more powerful employees are more prone to action, and make their work more personally meaningful.
The research: A recent Simmons CGO Survey of 364 female executives revealed that 80% of participants reported recent career negotiations. The most commonly cited opportunity that involved negotiations was seeking a new position or leadership opportunity, demonstrating that negotiating is about more than just salary.
2. Avoid ambiguity. Bowles encouraged attendees to consider the importance of ambiguity in negotiations. Research shows that ambiguity can lead to a heightened potential for gender-specific attributions, especially if the employees are operating in a gendered environment. There are two types of ambiguity at play here: norm ambiguity, or the degree of clarity about norms for appropriate negotiating behavior, and structural ambiguity, or the degree of clarity about zone of possible agreement and appropriate standards for agreement. When you provide employees with these standards, however, the gender gap disappears.
The research: A study that Bowles conducted on MBA graduate job market outcomes highlighted the power of ambiguity. Controlling for 30 variables that might otherwise explain the difference in income, Bowles found an overall gender gap of $5,000 (on an average salary of $100,000). In low ambiguity situations, such as investment banking and consulting, which comprised 70% of the sample, there was no gender gap difference. However, in high ambiguity situations, Bowles observed a 10% salary gap, leading to an average gender gap of $11,000 a year.
3. Be conscious of where you get your information. Bowles cautioned to make sure that our information search itself isn’t gendered, as we are likely to compare ourselves to those who are similar to us, therefore creating a self-perpetuating cycle. Since informal networks enhance access to information and advocacy channels, it’s important to reach outside of convenience networks to get information.
4. Watch out for stereotypes – both others’ and your own. There are several kinds of stereotypes in negotiation. Explicit and implicit biases might be more familiar to us; the former is easier to recognize and therefore avoid or correct, while the latter is harder to detect. There is also descriptive stereotyping (assumptions about what an individual will do) and prescriptive stereotyping (assumptions about what an individual should do). Bowles explained that self-advocacy violates society’s prescriptive stereotypes of feminine behavior, which in turn limits willingness to work with or hire the woman who violated that norm.
The research: Using a study of a fake resumes with a gender-neutral name, Bowles found that women who advocate for themselves are perceived much more negatively than women who advocate for others.
5. Enhance negotiations through relationships, and enhance relationships through negotiations. Bowles argued that explaining why what you’re asking for is legitimate in your employer's eyes will enhance your chances of getting what you’re asking for. In addition, signaling concern for your organizational relationships can mitigate the social cost of such negotiations. While some question whether teaching organizations to reward women who act relationally and don’t reward the women who don’t is helpful for women's professional prospects, Bowles asserted that the skills she encourages women to use are good practice for any employee facing a negotiation situation.
1. Apply negotiations skills broadly. Bowles encouraged attendees to think about negotiation skills broadly, since academics and the media tend to focus too closely on salary negotiations. Through negotiation, employees can enhance their recognition and rewards (i.e. securing a new title or getting their name on research), seize opportunities to expand their authority (i.e. budget or who reports to them), overcome barriers, since more powerful employees are more prone to action, and make their work more personally meaningful.
The research: A recent Simmons CGO Survey of 364 female executives revealed that 80% of participants reported recent career negotiations. The most commonly cited opportunity that involved negotiations was seeking a new position or leadership opportunity, demonstrating that negotiating is about more than just salary.
2. Avoid ambiguity. Bowles encouraged attendees to consider the importance of ambiguity in negotiations. Research shows that ambiguity can lead to a heightened potential for gender-specific attributions, especially if the employees are operating in a gendered environment. There are two types of ambiguity at play here: norm ambiguity, or the degree of clarity about norms for appropriate negotiating behavior, and structural ambiguity, or the degree of clarity about zone of possible agreement and appropriate standards for agreement. When you provide employees with these standards, however, the gender gap disappears.
The research: A study that Bowles conducted on MBA graduate job market outcomes highlighted the power of ambiguity. Controlling for 30 variables that might otherwise explain the difference in income, Bowles found an overall gender gap of $5,000 (on an average salary of $100,000). In low ambiguity situations, such as investment banking and consulting, which comprised 70% of the sample, there was no gender gap difference. However, in high ambiguity situations, Bowles observed a 10% salary gap, leading to an average gender gap of $11,000 a year.3. Be conscious of where you get your information. Bowles cautioned to make sure that our information search itself isn’t gendered, as we are likely to compare ourselves to those who are similar to us, therefore creating a self-perpetuating cycle. Since informal networks enhance access to information and advocacy channels, it’s important to reach outside of convenience networks to get information.
4. Watch out for stereotypes – both others’ and your own. There are several kinds of stereotypes in negotiation. Explicit and implicit biases might be more familiar to us; the former is easier to recognize and therefore avoid or correct, while the latter is harder to detect. There is also descriptive stereotyping (assumptions about what an individual will do) and prescriptive stereotyping (assumptions about what an individual should do). Bowles explained that self-advocacy violates society’s prescriptive stereotypes of feminine behavior, which in turn limits willingness to work with or hire the woman who violated that norm.
The research: Using a study of a fake resumes with a gender-neutral name, Bowles found that women who advocate for themselves are perceived much more negatively than women who advocate for others.
5. Enhance negotiations through relationships, and enhance relationships through negotiations. Bowles argued that explaining why what you’re asking for is legitimate in your employer's eyes will enhance your chances of getting what you’re asking for. In addition, signaling concern for your organizational relationships can mitigate the social cost of such negotiations. While some question whether teaching organizations to reward women who act relationally and don’t reward the women who don’t is helpful for women's professional prospects, Bowles asserted that the skills she encourages women to use are good practice for any employee facing a negotiation situation.
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Hannah Riley Bowles on NBC's TODAY Show
This weekend, WAPPP research director, Hannah Riley Bowles appeared on NBC's TODAY Show to discuss Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella's comments about how women should not ask for a raise.
“It’s not really about asking for the raise, but knowing and having faith that the system will actually give you the right raises as you go along.”
Hannah shares the research: that women are hesitant to ask for a raise in large part because of this type of social backlash. Until organizations and systems are fixed, women can overcome this bias by employing relational accounts when asking for a raise.
Watch Hannah's piece here:
“It’s not really about asking for the raise, but knowing and having faith that the system will actually give you the right raises as you go along.”
Hannah shares the research: that women are hesitant to ask for a raise in large part because of this type of social backlash. Until organizations and systems are fixed, women can overcome this bias by employing relational accounts when asking for a raise.
Watch Hannah's piece here:
Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Bargaining Power within Households: Can it Prevent HIV?
Over the last few months, we’ve been looking at how gender imparity has affected equity and efficiency in some very high-power spaces: politics, the corporate board, academia, and the STEM fields. But what about those more banal, day-to-day issues of gender imparity---those that most people don’t even see? Namely, how couples relate to one another. As commonplace as it might seem, relationship dynamics can have wide and profound consequences for society.
In the WAPPP seminar this week on “Intra-household bargaining power and HIV prevention,” WAPPP Fellow and PhD Candidate at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland, Berit Gerritzen, looked at how married couples in rural Malawi approach issues of sexual health. Approximately 14.3 percent of the adult population of Malawi were living with HIV/AIDS in 2005, demonstrating the need for better information on its transmission.
And because many HIV infections throughout Sub-Saharan Africa take place during heterosexual intercourse between persons in stable couple relationships, the way that each of those partners approaches the other---and the issue itself---can be most telling for the diffusion of the virus.
Through data from the Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project, Gerritzen looked at questions of (a) whether partners spoke about HIV risk, (b) accepted condom usage within marriage, (c) self-reported infidelity, among other issues including, of course, (d) HIV infection itself. Gerritzen cross-referenced those answers with indicators of household bargaining power, namely a spouse’s personal economic status, the number of wives in the family, local political participation, and other demographic data.
While conceding that there are a number of additional variables at play, Gerritzen concludes that factors associated with gains in female bargaining power---such as a wife’s own earnings and education, fewer co-wives, and political participation---are in fact generally related to increases in spousal discussions of sexual health, greater acceptance of condom use within marriage, and other HIV risk-reduction efforts.
When women demand the processes and outcomes that they know to be best for themselves, the household’s own welfare improves. And behaviors within the house are often what influence societal health outcomes, further strengthening the case that empowering women and increasing agency has benefits far beyond equality.
Photo Source
In the WAPPP seminar this week on “Intra-household bargaining power and HIV prevention,” WAPPP Fellow and PhD Candidate at the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland, Berit Gerritzen, looked at how married couples in rural Malawi approach issues of sexual health. Approximately 14.3 percent of the adult population of Malawi were living with HIV/AIDS in 2005, demonstrating the need for better information on its transmission.
And because many HIV infections throughout Sub-Saharan Africa take place during heterosexual intercourse between persons in stable couple relationships, the way that each of those partners approaches the other---and the issue itself---can be most telling for the diffusion of the virus.
Through data from the Malawi Diffusion and Ideational Change Project, Gerritzen looked at questions of (a) whether partners spoke about HIV risk, (b) accepted condom usage within marriage, (c) self-reported infidelity, among other issues including, of course, (d) HIV infection itself. Gerritzen cross-referenced those answers with indicators of household bargaining power, namely a spouse’s personal economic status, the number of wives in the family, local political participation, and other demographic data.
While conceding that there are a number of additional variables at play, Gerritzen concludes that factors associated with gains in female bargaining power---such as a wife’s own earnings and education, fewer co-wives, and political participation---are in fact generally related to increases in spousal discussions of sexual health, greater acceptance of condom use within marriage, and other HIV risk-reduction efforts.
When women demand the processes and outcomes that they know to be best for themselves, the household’s own welfare improves. And behaviors within the house are often what influence societal health outcomes, further strengthening the case that empowering women and increasing agency has benefits far beyond equality.
Photo Source
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Negotiating a Better Future - WAPPP Seminar Series
The Women: Kathleen McGinn, Cahners-Rabb Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
Nava Ashraf, Associate Professor, Harvard Business School
The Talk: Negotiating a Better Future: Measuring the Impact of Negotiation Skills on Health and Social Outcomes in Zambia
The Question: Can teaching young girls negotiating skills impact their health and education?
The Question: Can teaching young girls negotiating skills impact their health and education?
Teaching girls negotiating skills may not just boost morale, it may also change lives. At least that’s what research from Harvard Business School is finding when it comes to young girls in Zambia making choices around pursuing education and making decisions around sexual behavior. While the study is ongoing, the research suggests that when girls are taught negotiation skills and techniques -- in addition to information about sexual behavior and education -- they are better equipped to influence their future.
The Numbers.
Currently 57 percent of adults living with HIV in Zambia are women; young girls have a higher prevalence of HIV compared to boys of the same age; and girls are less likely to be enrolled in school. This puts girls at an increased risk of early pregnancy, marriage, HIV infection, and lowered economic and social capital.
Plenty of research exists on the role of public health campaigns and educational programs to reduce HIV and prevent early pregnancy; yet, simply teaching safe sex practices may not be enough.
Why Not?
Teaching women and girls about condom use, reproductive health and the importance of education assumes one critical component -- women and girls have the agency to influence and make these decisions.
“Information is power, but not if you’re powerless,” says Kathleen McGinn. For example, negotiating sex or requesting money for education may not be areas where young girls can control the outcome. Patriarchal systems, social stigmas, male-favoritism -- a myriad of reasons -- means that having the information does not necessarily translate to gaining the desired results.
This is where the power of negotiation enters. When women and girls couple negotiation skills with knowledge, they may be more likely to effectively influence and persuade those in power, thus leading to better results. In terms of education and health, this could have an exponential impact for girls, families and communities. Furthermore, the World Health Organization recently cited both “negotiation skills for women” and “expanded efforts to keep girls in school” as two significant tools for women and girls to protect themselves from HIV. McGinn, Ashraf and Low appear to be reinforcing this recommendation.
While the trials are still ongoing, McGinn et al found that girls in their program reported positive impacts in both school and social environments. These included advocating for themselves, setting ambitious goals, and effectively communicating.
“There is great variation in how well individuals can take advantage of the information in front of them. That ability is a skill that we believe can be taught,” says McGinn.
The Numbers.
Currently 57 percent of adults living with HIV in Zambia are women; young girls have a higher prevalence of HIV compared to boys of the same age; and girls are less likely to be enrolled in school. This puts girls at an increased risk of early pregnancy, marriage, HIV infection, and lowered economic and social capital.
Plenty of research exists on the role of public health campaigns and educational programs to reduce HIV and prevent early pregnancy; yet, simply teaching safe sex practices may not be enough.
Why Not?
Teaching women and girls about condom use, reproductive health and the importance of education assumes one critical component -- women and girls have the agency to influence and make these decisions.
“Information is power, but not if you’re powerless,” says Kathleen McGinn. For example, negotiating sex or requesting money for education may not be areas where young girls can control the outcome. Patriarchal systems, social stigmas, male-favoritism -- a myriad of reasons -- means that having the information does not necessarily translate to gaining the desired results.
This is where the power of negotiation enters. When women and girls couple negotiation skills with knowledge, they may be more likely to effectively influence and persuade those in power, thus leading to better results. In terms of education and health, this could have an exponential impact for girls, families and communities. Furthermore, the World Health Organization recently cited both “negotiation skills for women” and “expanded efforts to keep girls in school” as two significant tools for women and girls to protect themselves from HIV. McGinn, Ashraf and Low appear to be reinforcing this recommendation.
While the trials are still ongoing, McGinn et al found that girls in their program reported positive impacts in both school and social environments. These included advocating for themselves, setting ambitious goals, and effectively communicating.
“There is great variation in how well individuals can take advantage of the information in front of them. That ability is a skill that we believe can be taught,” says McGinn.
*Photo courtesy of Nava Ashraf, taken by Kelsey Jack.
Melissa Sandgren is an MPP1 candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School and a participant in WAPPP's From Harvard Square to the Oval Office program.
Tuesday, January 17, 2012
Women as peacemakers: Activists share success stories at Harvard Kennedy School
Published in the Harvard Gazette
When three women, including Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, an alumna of Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), received the Nobel Peace Prize in October, it was more than just a testament to their work. The prize was also a clear signal to the many unheralded women around the world that their peace building efforts were not only noble but necessary.
Several such women from across Africa and the Middle East gathered at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum Wednesday to share their stories and convey a similar message. “Why Women Won the Nobel Prize,” hosted by the Institute of Politics, the Center for Public Leadership, the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, and the Women and Public Policy Program at HKS, testified to the influence of women in peace efforts around the world.
The Nobel was just another example of the ways women leaders, both at the highest reaches of government and at the ground level, are “changing the whole security paradigm,” said moderator Swanee Hunt, Eleanor Roosevelt Lecturer in Public Policy. “Right now, security, in most people’s minds, means bombs and bullets.”
Increasingly, however, leaders recognize a need for women’s participation throughout the entire peace process, from street-level protests to formal negotiations. President Obama, for example, recently signed an executive order on women, peace, and security that he hopes will provide “a comprehensive road map” to increasing female participation in peace building, Hunt noted.
Women bring “soft skills” to the negotiation table, said Orit Adato, a retired lieutenant general in the Israeli Defense Forces and former commissioner of the Israeli Prison Service. Those traits — “the ability to see the whole picture but at the same time to identify and give your attention to the details,” to contain situations and deal with them, and to balance priorities — are crucial to the peace process.
Samira Hamidi, director of the 5,000-member Afghan Women’s Network, noted that women, so often denied a role in peacemaking, are likely to show steadfast commitment to the process if given the chance — if only to prove to themselves and their families that their presence at the table is worthwhile.
In the summer of 2010, she recalled, at Afghanistan’s national peace jirga, three rockets hit just outside the tent where she and other delegates had gathered for an address by President Hamid Karzai. While many male delegates left to ensure their safety, the women remained on principle.
“Peace is too important,” Hamidi said. “It is dangerous, but we are proud of what we’re doing.”
Mossarat Qadeem, a Pakistani activist, discussed her work rehabilitating young men formerly of the Taliban and other radical militias. The work often involves getting the boys’ mothers to trust her to intervene.
“Those boys would dare not come to a woman like me,” she said. “The most difficult part is reintegration into their communities.”
In the world’s newest country, South Sudan, which gained its independence from Sudan in July after nearly 20 years of conflict, women leaders are hoping to turn “years of fear into opportunity and stability,” said Rebecca Joshua Okwaci, founder of Sudanese Women Empowerment for Peace. Women recognize the importance of building up civil society and individual rights to create long-lasting peace, she said.
Her years as a “freedom fighter” for South Sudan’s independence confer not power but a great responsibility to her fellow citizens, said Okwaci, who is now deputy minister for general education and instruction. The new government must repay the sacrifices the South Sudanese made for so many years to support the war.
“The same way their eggs were taken from them [during the war], it is time now for us to give them peace,” Okwaci said. “Their chickens were taken from them — now it is time to give them stability. Their goats were taken from them — it is time to give them independence, give them recognition, and give them hope.”
The evening, which ended with a call-and-response performance of a traditional Arabic song and impromptu dancing led by Okwaci, seemed to inspire those in attendance.
Those who follow conflict for a living “flirt a lot with cynicism, and I didn’t hear a note of that tonight,” said Jina Moore, a human rights journalist, during the question-and-answer session. “Which reminds me that cynicism is a luxury for people who think about conflict and not for people who are forced into living with it. For me that was very powerful.”
Women activists from conflict regions have been coming to Cambridge since 1999 as part of an annual conference supported by the Institute for Inclusive Security, a program of Hunt’s family foundation, Hunt Alternatives Fund.
When three women, including Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, an alumna of Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), received the Nobel Peace Prize in October, it was more than just a testament to their work. The prize was also a clear signal to the many unheralded women around the world that their peace building efforts were not only noble but necessary.
Several such women from across Africa and the Middle East gathered at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum Wednesday to share their stories and convey a similar message. “Why Women Won the Nobel Prize,” hosted by the Institute of Politics, the Center for Public Leadership, the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, and the Women and Public Policy Program at HKS, testified to the influence of women in peace efforts around the world.
The Nobel was just another example of the ways women leaders, both at the highest reaches of government and at the ground level, are “changing the whole security paradigm,” said moderator Swanee Hunt, Eleanor Roosevelt Lecturer in Public Policy. “Right now, security, in most people’s minds, means bombs and bullets.”
Increasingly, however, leaders recognize a need for women’s participation throughout the entire peace process, from street-level protests to formal negotiations. President Obama, for example, recently signed an executive order on women, peace, and security that he hopes will provide “a comprehensive road map” to increasing female participation in peace building, Hunt noted.
Women bring “soft skills” to the negotiation table, said Orit Adato, a retired lieutenant general in the Israeli Defense Forces and former commissioner of the Israeli Prison Service. Those traits — “the ability to see the whole picture but at the same time to identify and give your attention to the details,” to contain situations and deal with them, and to balance priorities — are crucial to the peace process.
Samira Hamidi, director of the 5,000-member Afghan Women’s Network, noted that women, so often denied a role in peacemaking, are likely to show steadfast commitment to the process if given the chance — if only to prove to themselves and their families that their presence at the table is worthwhile.
In the summer of 2010, she recalled, at Afghanistan’s national peace jirga, three rockets hit just outside the tent where she and other delegates had gathered for an address by President Hamid Karzai. While many male delegates left to ensure their safety, the women remained on principle.
“Peace is too important,” Hamidi said. “It is dangerous, but we are proud of what we’re doing.”
Mossarat Qadeem, a Pakistani activist, discussed her work rehabilitating young men formerly of the Taliban and other radical militias. The work often involves getting the boys’ mothers to trust her to intervene.
“Those boys would dare not come to a woman like me,” she said. “The most difficult part is reintegration into their communities.”
In the world’s newest country, South Sudan, which gained its independence from Sudan in July after nearly 20 years of conflict, women leaders are hoping to turn “years of fear into opportunity and stability,” said Rebecca Joshua Okwaci, founder of Sudanese Women Empowerment for Peace. Women recognize the importance of building up civil society and individual rights to create long-lasting peace, she said.
Her years as a “freedom fighter” for South Sudan’s independence confer not power but a great responsibility to her fellow citizens, said Okwaci, who is now deputy minister for general education and instruction. The new government must repay the sacrifices the South Sudanese made for so many years to support the war.
“The same way their eggs were taken from them [during the war], it is time now for us to give them peace,” Okwaci said. “Their chickens were taken from them — now it is time to give them stability. Their goats were taken from them — it is time to give them independence, give them recognition, and give them hope.”
The evening, which ended with a call-and-response performance of a traditional Arabic song and impromptu dancing led by Okwaci, seemed to inspire those in attendance.
Those who follow conflict for a living “flirt a lot with cynicism, and I didn’t hear a note of that tonight,” said Jina Moore, a human rights journalist, during the question-and-answer session. “Which reminds me that cynicism is a luxury for people who think about conflict and not for people who are forced into living with it. For me that was very powerful.”
Women activists from conflict regions have been coming to Cambridge since 1999 as part of an annual conference supported by the Institute for Inclusive Security, a program of Hunt’s family foundation, Hunt Alternatives Fund.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Must Women Negotiate Like Uncle Tom? - Forbes
Article from Forbes.com
Remember assertiveness training? It was supposed to help women work up the nerve to speak freely without being considered bossy and bitchy. Now we’re told every few months that there’s a social cost for being assertive too.
According to Professor Hannah Riley Bowles over at the Harvard Kennedy School, “negotiating in an assertive, self-interested way contradicts the feminine stereotype of women as selfless caregivers, and the social costs of contradicting this stereotype can be significant.”
According to Professor Hannah Riley Bowles over at the Harvard Kennedy School, “negotiating in an assertive, self-interested way contradicts the feminine stereotype of women as selfless caregivers, and the social costs of contradicting this stereotype can be significant.”
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