Choose to Challenge – Stereotypes at Work

“Stereotypes are a central concern in society and in the workplace. Stereotypes are cognitions that drive what individuals know, believe, and expect from others as a result of their social identities. Stereotypes predict how individuals view and treat one another at work, often resulting in inaccurate generalizations about individuals based on their group membership. Therefore, it is important to break down and combat the use of stereotypes in decision-making at work. If stereotypes can be overcome in the workplace, fairness and equity in organizations becomes more likely.” (Oxford Research Encyclopaedia of Business and Management (Sawyer, Retrieved 23 Feb. 2021)

The question though is, are we aware of stereotypes we consciously or unconsciously believe in? And how these stereotypes play out as micro behaviors in our day-to-day interactions and communications with people around us. How do they impact lives of people around us?

Often, we familiarize, learn and acquire norms, general beliefs, values, ideas and common ways of working through our socialization both at internal and institutional levels. They impact our response to events and situations, behaviors and decision making in a given context. However, how often are we comfortable in confronting or reassessing what we learn and acquire through our socialization and social cues?

Biases are often learnt through associations developed over a period of time which in psychology we call mental conditioning. If we look at the roots, its inception is in our early childhood. Our socialization begins at home first through our families and relations with people from early childhood. Another popular medium of learning and acquiring stereotypes are media- through advertisements, films etc. Followed by educational and social institutions that cement the general perception. These building blocks contributes to how Indian workforce composition where number of still only a few young women enter the work force or are considered for supervisory and managerial levels (middle management roles). Out of these a very small percentage get an opportunity to get access to be considered for senior leadership positions/ roles in an organisation. Due to lack of opportunities at middle management levels a number of women chose to drop out of the formal workforce and this contributes to the leaking pipeline for women in organisations. Across sectors the demographic representation may vary but this is a major cause for lower female labour force participation (FLFP) rate in India. The environment both at personal and professional front still has a lot of work to be done. The responsibility not only lies on the shoulders of organisations, governments, recruiters and policy makers alone but also on women who are capable and skilled to be a part of the workforce. Are women willing to break free of their own biases and stereotypes?

Silent Structures: How Do Stereotypes and Biases Affect Women in Workplace?

• What are some of the ways through which biases — both internal and institutionalized — impact women at work? And what can we do about them?
• Today, India’s women are more educated than ever before, with experts suggesting that achieving equal gender participation in the labour force could increase the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by nearly 27%.
• Yet, perceptions about their abilities often follow women to the workplace, affecting their equal participation as well as their career progress.

Virtues and Voices –

• Childhood socialization is among the first internal biases women carry to work. In schools and homes, girls are encouraged to strive for perfection, seek approval, be pleasing and serve others.
• This social training extends to adulthood, according to social anthropologist and former senior advisor to the World Bank, Dr. Deepa Narayan. If girls are conditioned to put the needs of others ahead of their own, this means they are unable to assert their opinions in the office and negotiate professional conflicts later in life because they have been conditioned to see it as being “shameful,” according to Dr. Narayan.
• This social training contributes to the plateau effect among India’s most educated women in the workforce.
• Young women in junior positions often work for the approval of managers. However, on reaching management positions themselves, they are required to negotiate conflict, critique their colleagues’ work and open themselves up to being disliked.
• “If throughout her entire life she has been conditioned to be liked, to be pleasing, to serve others: how will she ever show up as a leader?” Dr. Narayan asks.
• Silence is seen as a virtue — furthered by an appeal to ‘respect.’ Young girls are often taught not to answer back and this leads to them becoming “their own self-editing, self-censoring and self-monitoring systems.” This self-censorship is dangerous, because it sets a terrible precedent for working women. It also exacerbates a tendency to walk on a constant tightrope — one between being liked and respected. In a bid to avoid conflict, they often choose silence — and those who speak up, are labelled as “difficult”.

Double-Binds and Double-Standards

• A second, equally damaging perception issue is external. Identical professional behaviour is often read differently depending on the gender of the person in question. When asserting themselves, women are more likely to be viewed as “unlikeable” than male counterparts who do the same.
• This double standard is built upon what is seen as gender-appropriate behavior. As a result of this, women also face a “double-bind,” which means that in doing one thing they fail to meet the standard for another.
• A 2018 Harvard Business Review study examining gendered language in leadership evaluations found that women are frequently told they need to “be more confident and assertive” while being told they are “too bossy” in the same evaluation.
• This “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” evaluation of women reveals the conflicting messages workplaces give women as they pursue careers.

Pay Gaps and Power Plays

• In India, like several countries across the world, the pay gap exists across sectors. The average pay gap in the country stands at 22.5 percent, according to the 2018 Monster Salary Index.
• The index highlights that this gap increases with an increase in tenure and higher education. This indicates that women (on average) earn increasingly less than their male counterparts with the same qualifications as they progress in their careers.
• The presence of the pay gap also points to a third issue — that of negotiation. When negotiating raises and promotions, women are often disadvantaged by “deeply ingrained societal gender roles.”
• Studies indicate that men tend to negotiate better than women when it comes to personal outcomes — and researchers conclude that this is largely due to the expectation that women be “accommodating” rather than assertive.
• This ties back to the idea that perceptions matter — whether their own, or those of society’s — and they follow women up the ladder of success.

Glass Ceilings and Pressure Points

• It is mindsets that need changing, not a ceiling that needs smashing; there are a few small things we can all change in our workplaces and everyday lives to challenge long-held, pervasive stereotypes.
• The first, is a change in behavior. It is important to recognize our own social roles in perpetuating stereotypes, but it is also vital to pass that learning on to those around us. To teach the men and boys in our lives that taking instructions from women is not a bad thing, and equally encourage young women to speak up for themselves, for their ideas, and for each other.
• The second, is a change in language. To shed the assumptions that hold women back, we must stop using gendered, sexist language. Phrases like the ‘mommy track’ and ‘leaky pipeline’ perpetuate existing biases. Women with children are not on any track apart from one of success, and women’s participation in the workforce is certainly not a pipeline. For that matter, we didn’t create the glass ceiling and breaking it should not be our load to bear.
• The third, is a change in attitude. We are all trying, in a hundred different ways, to measure up to society’s standards. Working and getting through each day is hard enough, so perhaps the best we can do for those around us is stop placing the burden of “expected” behaviour on them.

It is only when we chip away at our internalized biases and the stereotypes that we have unconsciously learned that we can create space for women in the workplace. After all, they are only looking for a fighting chance, without having to wonder if they’re fighting too hard, or not fighting hard enough.” (Outlook, (Chaudhry, 2020))

This year’s International Women’s day theme, Choose to Challenge is so apt, nudging each and every one of us to challenge ourselves and break these moulds and stereotypes to unleash our true potential, and of those around us. Each one of us has a role to play, we just need to break our own barriers.