Male Champions for Gender Inclusive Organizations

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Research shows that companies with greater representation of women in leadership positions perform better than those with lower percentages of women in the upper echelons of the organization. In order to encourage female leaders, many companies leverage diversity training initiatives or women-centered solutions, such as women's networking groups or leadership training. While these solutions have merits, they often place the burden of creating more gender inclusive organizations on women themselves. A more effective approach to enhance gender inclusivity is to understand the role that male leaders may play in supporting women's advancement within organizations. While many male leaders may understand the importance of supporting female leaders, they may not know how to effectively do so. This proposal seeks to identify effective behaviors of male champions for female leadership and for supporting gender equality in organizations. This research highlights ways in which males can contribute to gender inclusivity at work. Results from this project can inform organizations about how to influence, train, and encourage possible male champions to actively support female leadership in the workplace. Male champions, or male leaders who value diversity in the workplace and support advancing talented females to leader positions, have a critical role to play as agents of change to enhance gender equality. The purpose of this project is to identify the effective behaviors of male champions. Multiple studies that utilize different research designs and methods will be conducted to examine these behaviors. First, we will conduct a qualitative study, which utilizes interviews with male champions and those who have been supported by male champions, to determine key gender inclusive leadership behaviors. Themes derived from the interviews will be used to generate a quantitative measure of gender inclusive behaviors among male leaders. Second, we will conduct a quantitative study to examine the relationship between gender inclusive leader behaviors and workplace outcomes. Effects of top-level leaders' gender inclusive behaviors on their direct reports attitudes and performance will be examined using multi-source, multi-level data. Finally, we will conduct an in-depth case study of a best practices company for gender inclusive leadership. This study will utilize observational data and in-depth interviews with high level leaders and their direct reports to better understand the processes through which male champion behaviors create gender inclusive workplace cultures. Results of this research can benefit workers and their organizations by enhancing our understanding of factors contributing to gender equality in organizations.