The Glass Cliff, Part 2: Differences in Perceived Suitability

Curious Ones:

My last post described some intriguing research into whether men and women react differently to the idea that the "glass cliff" exists for women. As you may recall, the "glass cliff" refers to the concept that women are more likely than equally qualified men to be placed in leadership positions associated with a higher risk of failure and criticism, where the positions involve organizations or units that are in crisis. Tonight's discussion focuses on the recently published study, The Road to the Glass Cliff: Differences in the Perceived Suitability of Men and Women for Leadership Positions in Succeeding and Failing Organizations. Researchers S. Alexander Haslam and Michelle Ryan described three carefully designed experiments to test whether there is evidence that, all other things being equal, a woman will be perceived to be more suitable for a precarious leadership position, as compared to a man.

The researchers studied three groups of decision makers: management school graduates (Study 1), high-school students (Study 2) and business leaders (Study 3). In each study, the participants were asked to select a leader for a hypothetical organization whose performance was either improving or declining. Interestingly, participant gender was not found to play a consistent role in the decisions and judgments evinced in the above studies.

Haslam and Ryan noted:

"Consistent with predictions, results indicate that the likelihood of a female candidate being selected ahead of an equally qualified male candidate increased when the organization's performance was declining rather than improving. Study 3 also provided evidence that glass cliff appointments are associated with beliefs that they (a) suit the distinctive leadership abilities of women, (b) provide women with good leadership opportunities and (c) are particularly stressful for women.
…

These studies demonstrate that the glass cliff phenomenon … can be reproduced under laboratory conditions, where key variables (in particular, candidates' biographical details and the precise nature of the positions) are controlled. This is important, as, in the absence of this data, it could be argued simply that women prefer, and actively choose, leadership positions which are more risky … or, more drastically, that women leaders are actually the cause of organizational crisis ... Indeed, whatever else they do, these studies surely demonstrate that the previously observed association between organizational crisis and women's appointment to leadership positions has an underlying causal structure inconsistent with attributions to women's incompetence. In light of the invidiousness of such beliefs, this is no trivial point."

The authors discussed a number of possible reasons for this difference, and areas ripe for further investigation. I would like to believe that the rationales they suggest are wrong: that sexism and in-group favoritism are not the reason for the glass cliff and that gender discrimination is not used in a pernicious way to throw women into hopeless situations. I would like to believe that their findings are not just based on the relative minority status of women in senior management and a desire by those making the appointment to superficially promote women, but to do so only in hopeless situations. I would like to believe that group dynamics protecting the status of men, and reacting against social change are not the cause, and that women are not just used in these situations to simply to signal radical change in the organization and attract attention.

I would like to believe that glass cliffs are not a reaction to threats to the existing status hierarchy because women are starting to break through the glass ceiling into senior leadership positions. I would like to believe that this threat to the status quo is not being countered culturally through discriminatory practices that reduce the prospects of success on the part of low-status group members.

I would like to believe that the reason women are selected more often for very difficult and challenging assignments, is because, all other things being equal, we believe a women will do a better job.

Next up, musing on the glass escalator.

Cynthia