Which Double Standard for Women Applies To You? All of Them?

Double standard for women in leadership is an age-old problem, but it turns out that it’s not just a problem for leaders; it’s a problem for all women in the workplace.

Key Takeaways:

• Numerous Double Standards: The article highlights the plethora of double standards for women in the workplace, ranging from leadership expectations to compensation differentials and age biases.
• Rooted in Unconscious Bias: Unconscious biases and stereotypes drive these double standards, shaping perceptions and expectations about how women should behave and be treated in professional settings.
• Personal Brand & Communication Evaluation Disparity: Women’s communication is evaluated differently, often with negative consequences for their reputations and careers, such as being stereotyped as “bitchy” or “bossy” for assertive behavior.
• Age & Wage Disparity: Despite efforts to address it, women still earn less than men, with factors like weight, age, and parenthood affecting women’s pay negatively compared to men.
• Leadership Challenges: Women in leadership roles face unique challenges, including the need to balance agentic and communal behaviors, along with differing gender expectations for delivering critical feedback.

Double Standards Between Men and Women in the Workplace

Few people find it surprising that women face double standards in society and the workplace. (For those who do find it surprising, I recommend (re)watching the Barbie movie–or just America Ferrera’s speech and its snub by the Oscars–for a refresher.)

The most common double standard in business that most women in leadership experience is the fact that men can–and often must–be ‘aggressive’ and direct in leadership (i.e., agentic) while women are expected to be more socially sensitive (i.e., communal). This frustrates many women who just want to get sh!t done, and I’m sympathetic to their plight. Still, it gives me an opening to work with them on broadening their emotional intelligence skills, as there are situations in which women are allowed to be more direct when they learn to read the room and build the most authentic reputation.

In any case, I have been watching this issue of double standards for women for many years, trying to understand it better and help the women I coach navigate through it. Over the last few years documenting research about women in leadership, I’ve become absolutely gobsmacked at the vast number of ways that women face unfair standards in the workplace and society. The ‘aggressive’ double-bind is just the beginning.

To be clear, there is not enough written about the double standards that men face in the workplace as well, but clearly they do face double standards. The saddest one, for both women and men, is that men are penalized for displaying the traits most valued in leadership literature, which are exhibited by women. Still, for now, I simply wanted to begin a list of all the research we’ve come across to show the many and varied forms a double standard for women can take.

This post was germinated by Inc. contributor Jessica Stillman who wrote, Women don’t face a double standard at work. They face a slew of them. So true, Jessica, so true. This list will be updated in the future as we find more (and I’m sure we will) evidence of the complexity women encounter when seeking success.

Unconscious Bias + Stereotypes = Double Standards

It’s important to see the double standards women face in their broader context as a result of implicit and unconscious biases we all hold. So, let’s take a step back and realize that our unconscious biases (and we all have them) drive our beliefs about what people “should” and “shouldn’t” do, which both sets our standards and leads to stereotypical thinking. No matter who you are and what you look, sound, or act like, you encounter unconscious bias that either works for or against you–and sometimes both. For example, it’s common for women to assume other women will support them, simply because they are women. Those women who do not conform to stereotypical expectations that all women “are sisters” often receive our wrath, but it can also demonstrate that those women are fair-minded, willing to think outside the box of stereotype, and only willing to provide their support judiciously.

Literally, every double standard will find an unconscious bias at its core. For example:

• When men require women to “speak up” to be noticed, but then penalize them for doing so in ways men are not (e.g., interrupting, being too straightforward), it is because this behavior violates their unconscious bias that “women should be nice, and when they’re not they can be sanctioned or ignored.”
• When women’s pay decreases as their weight increases or their age becomes more visible, when men’s salary remains the same or even increases, it’s evidence of the unconscious bias that heavier and older women are less confident and less capable.
• When women who tout their accomplishments are penalized for their “bragging” while men who do so are rewarded, this demonstrates the bias many have that a women’s role is to support others more than themselves.
• When a man’s salary increases due to parenthood, while a woman’s decreases, it’s evidence of the unfounded biases people have which assumes a man’s primary role is to be the breadwinner for his family and that mothers will be less devoted to their jobs.

Personal Branding & Communications Double Standards for Women

One’s personal brand comprises many elements, not the least of which is the way one communicates. We’ve gathered data that suggests that women’s communication is evaluated very differently than men’s, and most often with negative consequences for their reputations, careers, and promotability.

• The use of humor is a tricky communication element, as it may (or may not) be perceived more positively for women. 
• Women in STEM careers who publicly communicate about their work are “more likely to be stereotyped as ‘bitchy’, ‘bossy’, and ‘emotional’—often by their own gender.” 
• Males who listened to audio clips of a woman who interrupted another speaker during a conversation characterized the woman as “ruder, less friendly and less intelligent” than men who interrupted, which pointed to systemic gender disparities in how American English-speaking people interpret interruptions. 
• Both male and female managers ask women to volunteer for non-promotable tasks 44% more often than their male peers. Yet when a woman complies it can put her in yet another double-bind situation where, if she refuses, she can be perceived as more competent, but less of a team player.  This demonstrates a distinct preference for women who accept non-promotable work, thereby threatening to make them more likely to overworking and burning out. 

Compensation Double Standards for Women

It’s well-documented that women, on aggregate, still make less money than men. With 50% of survey respondents stating that the reason for the pay gap is that employers “treat women differently than men,” we’re starting to gain some traction in recognizing the disparities. We think it’s worth examining how much of this wage disparity might be attributed to stereotypes about women that result in double standards for their compensation.

• Research shows that for every six pounds an average American woman gains, her hourly pay drops 2%. Men’s weight does not appear to affect their pay. 
• Women at the top executive level of large European corporations earn an average of 1.2 million euros less per year than their male colleagues. Top executive pay also depends on whether an executive function (e.g., finance vs. human resources) is perceived as “typically masculine” or “typically feminine.”
• Women don’t get as much credit for their achievements as men, performing better and still rated as lower potential for promotion.
• Women’s pay decreases when they become mothers, while men receive a “pay premium” for becoming fathers leading to the so-called “Motherhood Penalty/Fatherhood Premium” effect. 

Age Double Standards for Women

• At every age, women face bias, but for different reasons. It’s as if there’s no “good” age to be, because women will always face headwinds – they’re either not experienced enough, “don’t look ‘vital’ enough,” or are “not relevant anymore (code for “too old”). Men do not face these same ageist judgments against them.
• The pay gap widens for women as they age, but not for men
• As women move towards middle age, they’re perceived as less “warm” than their similarly-aged male counterparts. 

Leadership Style Double Standards for Women

We often want to believe that as we gain more power and authority in an organization, rising through the ranks of leadership, our gender-related problems go away. Why? Because obviously, we’ve proven ourselves! There’s only one catch: competitive forces grow in the higher ranks, which means people are more critical of each other, rather than less. This makes the double standard phenomenon even more problematic for women at, or nearing, the top.

• Men are considered good leaders when they display “agentic” behaviors alone, even if their “communal” skills are sub-par. By contrast, women are judged primarily on their “communal” skills (sought-after skills that are not always valued), while also having to demonstrate the sometimes-antithetical “agentic” behaviors of stereotypical leaders. This is Ginger’s plight, doing the same thing Fred did but backwards and in heels.
• Workers have differing gender expectations when it comes to receiving critical feedback. Female managers who delivered strong critical feedback had double the magnitude of impact on worker job satisfaction. Researchers posit that it’s because workers are conditioned to expect “high standards”/harsh critiques from men, but not women. Women are supposed to be nice.

What does a woman do in the face of this?

While this list is daunting, and there are many ways of trying to deal with each of the issues listed above, I think it paints a larger picture of the way in which the dominant business culture still skews towards the white male standard. The true solution to fair treatment for women, women of color, and everyone else who is not a white male is for white males to see the unfairness of the system and expand their own thinking about the diversity of ways to succeed, which don’t always look like it does for them.

But absent enough of those individual men having an ah-ha moment, my clients and I have had success by engaging in a three-pronged strategy to address these dynamics in our own lives:

1. Let go of triggering anger. Anger can be useful in helping us find the courage to deal with clear inequities listed above, but when it triggers us, it makes us less effective. Once detriggered, we have a better chance of navigating the tricky waters of the double standard. Facing it head-on and rationally is rarely the best strategy, though when it is, we need the clarity and courage to own our emotions as we ask for fair treatment. When we can’t deal with it head-on, we need the emotional clarity to live with aspects of the unfairness while we work to prove ourselves and to demonstrate the uselessness of the double standard for women, the kind of demonstration that can change hearts and minds.

2. Use the opportunity to rise to your best self. Unfairness seems like a problem other people–the people treating us unfairly–must fix. And they do need to fix part of the problem, the part they control. But there are always aspects of our own behavior and approach, which we control, that we should explore before we blame others. When we do the work ourselves, we demonstrate to those we’re asking to change that we take ownership of our own engagement in the process. This looks different in different circumstances. Sometimes it simply looks like detriggering our anger so we can meet people where they are. Sometimes, it looks like adapting to certain aspects of the double standard that have value (for example, to become more outcomes-driven) and draw the line at what feels inauthentic and ineffective. 

3. Stand with courage for what you believe must change, and be willing to own the consequences. This is the hardest part. Sometimes, taking a stand means facing disapproval. Sometimes it means quitting to find a place with different double standards for women, which are more navigable for you. Most of the time, it means sitting in the messy middle trying to help other people see how the inequity you’re experiencing affects them, and people they care about (hopefully, you!) in ways that are counterproductive. 

If you’re female and reading this, I suspect you may be feeling like you’re in the messy middle of the double standard for women right now. Whenever you find yourself in the messy middle, make sure you have people on your side: colleagues, stakeholders, mentors, coaches, family, and friends. You are not alone, so be sure to remind yourself of that often.