Gender in the Management Education Classroom: A Collaborative Learning Journey

Abstract

In this article, the authors describe a classroom incident and their subsequent learnings about effectively managing issues of gender diversity in an MBA course titled “Women in Organizations.” The authors employ Kolb’s learning cycle as a framework for describing the incident ( concrete experience), reflecting on and discussing what occurred ( reflective observation), examining pertinent literature for possible explanations ( abstract conceptualization ), and devising practical strategies to mitigate such incidents in the future ( active experimentation). The study describes the collaborative learning journey in which the authors engaged as a team of instructors and researchers to make sense of this incident and refine their pedagogical practices. The article concludes by offering practical suggestions for improved pedagogy in management education settings, specifically fostering greater gender reflexivity in the classroom, and using functional subgrouping to encourage understanding and integration of differences.