women in leadership positions

Information failure exists when some or all of the participants do not have complete information about the situation at hand or when one participant knows more than another; there is an asymmetry of information among different parties. This is the core of the problem that exists in the labor market for top leadership positions and that leads to major barriers for women leaders. There is a lack of women in top leadership positions to provide incumbent leaders, who are more generally men, with complete information on the competence of women leaderships.

Exposing people to competent women leaders positively changes their beliefs on the ability of women to be successful in high-power positions (Duehr and Bono, 2006). The implementation of gender quotas would directly address the information failure found in the marketplace by increasing the number of women in political offices and the corporate boardroom and consequently, increasing the frequently and amount of information of women leaders provided to the population. Women are not faced with a lost cause as the numbers show more and more women in top management and governmental positions. Repeated exposure to competent women leaders reduces gender biases in leadership (Beaman et al., 2009). This suggests a market failure of the lack of adequate information about competent female leaders.

Gender quotas automatically increase the number of women leaders, thus increasing people’s exposure to women leaders. This has shown (1) a shift in perceptions of female leaders towards the positive and (2) a shift in perceptions of leadership roles toward more androgynous and less masculine roles. The first point likely increases the chances that decision-makers would hire a woman for such position...

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...lities, the use of mandatory quotas is the most efficient way to ensure the increase in presence of women in high-power positions. The private sector of the United States needs gender mandates because while there has been progress in the number of women occupying leadership positions, the rate at which this occurs is slow and has stagnated in many cases.

The impact of gender quotas in other countries

The use of quotas increases the percentage of women in leadership positions, diminishes gender barriers, and changes the stereotypical attitudes and beliefs held by the elite and the general population. While this paper focuses attention on the implementation of quotas in the private sector and more specifically, the corporate boardroom, important lessons on the impact of quotas can be drawn from the public sector in other countries where extensive research exists.