The Hidden Pressure Women Leaders Are Expected To Carry
Why competence alone is rarely enough when we still see men as the leadership standard
“Women belong in all places where decisions are being made.”
Last week I was in a workshop with a group of smart switched-on business women in a Melbourne co-working space where every meeting room was named after a male tech CEO: Zuckerberg, Musk, Gates, etc.
Someone called it out. We'd all noticed. The not-so-subtle message was: this is what ambition looks like, this is success, this is who is remembered, this is an exemplary leader worth naming a room after.
Two days earlier, Jacinta Allan had stepped aside as Victorian Premier before a caucus vote she'd been told she would lose, never having had the chance to face voters as leader. I've met Jacinta through my executive work in government. She entered the Victorian parliament at twenty-five, the youngest woman ever elected there, which is remarkable when you think about it. She's always struck me as sharp and genuinely warm at the same time, which isn't a common combination in politics.
Her leaving hit me harder than I expected that week, and it wasn't about her politics. I want to see women in leadership as a matter of course, not a novelty before things go back to ‘normal’.
Every time a woman leaves high office, whatever the reason, I feel that part of the public conversation treats it as confirmation rather than coincidence, as if her time in the role was the exception, a temporary variation before going back to ‘normal’ with a man at the helm. I don't want to keep normalising that pattern.
We've become good at naming bias. We haven't done nearly as well yet in changing the normative standard it's judged against.
Women in leadership carry a specific kind of pressure.
Research on gender and leadership repeatedly finds women face a narrower band of acceptable behaviour: competence expected alongside warmth. Assertiveness that reads as leadership in men can carry social penalties for women. Susan Fiske's stereotyping research and Alice Eagly and Linda Carli's labyrinth research point to the same pattern, the template for leadership was built watching men lead it.
Julia Gillard proved something important about that pressure in 2012, telling parliament she would not be lectured about misogyny by the man in front of her. She was calling out the whole pattern, not just her own experience. The speech, which still gives me chills, came after years of gendered attacks, including placards at a 2011 rally calling her "Juliar" and telling her to "ditch the witch."
Fifteen years later, in June this year, a billboard carrying that same slogan targeted Jacinta Allan, months before she stepped down, condemned across parties and repeated anyway.
Bringing this into your own leadership
Notice the specific pressure. If you feel you're being asked to show competence and warmth at the same time, while that balance seems less important for male peers, start by recognising the pattern. You may not always choose to call it out directly, but understanding what is happening can help you decide how you want to respond.
Measure your leadership by impact, not endurance. A difficult period doesn't have to be judged by how much you managed to withstand. A better question may be whether you're still able to lead with judgement, influence and purpose, without losing sight of the kind of leader you want to be.
Broaden your picture of who looks like a leader. If you're deciding who gets promoted, mentored or put forward, notice who comes to mind first and whether your idea of leadership is wider than the examples we've traditionally seen. Adaptive Stability isn't only about your own steadiness. It is also present in who you help create space for behind you.
Diverse leadership for tomorrow’s problems
We need more women at the tables where tomorrow's problems are solved. But getting women into the room isn't enough if we keep measuring their leadership against a male standard of leadership.
A system that can only tolerate one kind of leader isn't adaptable. It doesn't cope well under pressure, no matter whose name is on the door. Women need to be able to lead their way, on their terms and the system must adapt to enable it.
What can you do to support women leaders doing it their way?
