Gender in Supervision:

Abstract

Despite years of inconclusive and contradictory research, conclusions regarding gender differences in leadership and supervisory styles continue to exaggerate whatever differences there may be between the genders, while minimizing the differences among women and among men. Such research frequently focuses solely on gender, reflecting and reinforcing popular cultural assumptions that gender, reflecting and reinforcing popular cultural assumptions that gender is primary and that men and women are opposites, thus inadvertently contributing to perception of gender difference. Recognition of the complexity of individuals' multiple identities as members of both dominant and subordinate societal groups, as well as recognition of the multiple ways power can be enacted and affected by perceptions and context, calls into question the viability of studying gender in isolation.