Subtle gender bias and desegregation of promotion ladders: Challenges and remedies

Abstract

Although societal and economic forces have dramatically altered the fabric of the workplace, gender inequities continue to exist in organizations. These inequities include wage disparities, glass ceilings, and other differences that impact the productivity, advancement, well-being, and contributions of men and women in the business world. Although such inequities are well documented, there are continuing gaps in our understanding of these phenomena. This symposium presents four methodologically diverse papers with a common focus on investigating the nature of gender bias in organizations. These papers rely on analyses of archival data (Compustat), inductive analyses (50 career stories), and laboratory work and simulation, with the shared focus on how to address important gaps in our comprehension of why gender biases exist and how to address them at both the individual and organizational levels. The symposium has three primary objectives. First, the symposium advances theoretical insights into the nature of gender bias. It shines the spotlight on how even small gender biases can result in increased segregation of promotion ladders and how the presence of uncertainty in the upper echelons of a firm can exacerbate such bias. Second, it presents key findings on how women can prevail despite subtle gender bias and how such bias might be overcome by decision makers. In particular, it discusses how women can climb the corporate ladder by emulating female business leaders who successfully made it to the top by establishing the legitimacy of their ascent. Third, it points at a structured way out of the gender bias labyrinth by designing a nudge for promotion committees. Specifically, it suggests that such committees should be encouraged to engage in joint versus individual evaluation of male and female applicants to provide a level playing field for both sexes. Together, the four papers that constitute this symposium not only present state-of-the-science research findings and discuss the practical implications of the research, but also highlight avenues for future work in the domain of glass ceilings and related gender bias issues. The themes of the symposium will be drawn together by the discussant, Jeanine Prime, Vice President of Catalyst, a leading nonprofit organization on the topic of gender issues. A particular feature of this symposium is that it brings together a diverse collection of participants with different backgrounds (economists, OB scholars, mathematicians), experience in academia and practice, and cultures that hail from different parts of the world (England, USA, India, and Malaysia). From bias to exclusion: A multilevel emergent theory of gender segregation in organizations Presenter: Richard F Martell; Montana State U. Presenter: Cynthia G. Emrich; Catalyst Presenter: James Robison-Cox; Montana State U. Claiming authority: How women explain their ascent to top business leadership positions Presenter: Hannah Riley Bowles; Harvard U.