Introverted Women as CEOs Will Soar
American women’s performance as managers and workers is impressive.
Are American women or men better managers? Answer: women. A Gallup survey published in the Gallup Business Journal in 2014 showed that 35% of male managers were engaged at work compared to 41% of female managers. In all working-age generations, female managers were more engaged than male managers. Remarkably, female managers with children living in their households were also more engaged than their male counterparts. Higher engagement means higher levels of workplace performance. 1
Are American workers more productive if they work for men or women? Answer: women. The same Gallup survey showed that 35% of female workers and 29% of male workers who worked for female bosses were engaged, while only 31% of female workers and 25% of male workers were engaged when they worked for male bosses. Engaged workers are more productive. 2
Are women or men workers more engaged in the United States and Canada? Answer: women. A 2024 Gallup survey conducted in the United States and Canada showed that 35% of women were engaged at work compared to 31% of men. By comparison, the engagement rate worldwide for both genders is just 23%. 3
Does having at least one woman on the board of large-cap companies yield lower leverage, higher valuations, and higher return on equity than those that do not? Answer: Yes, according to a Credit Suisse Research Institute global analysis of 2,400 large-cap companies. Those with at least one woman on the board outperformed large-cap companies with no women on the board by 26%. 4
Are men or women managers fairer in deciding how much to compensate employees? Answer: women. A 2012 Karlsruhe Institute of Technology study showed women award 13% more pay to their employees than male managers when circumstances allow. 5 Since the 1600s, women have sometimes been referred to as the fairer sex. It took 400 years for studies to show that women are indeed fairer.
A survey published in Industrial Psychiatry showed that only 2% of introverts become top executives. 6 A ten-year study published in the Harvard Business Review shows that introverts are moderately more likely to exceed the expectations of their investors and corporate boards. 7 This is a massive disconnect between the effectiveness of introverted CEOs and the tiny percentage selected as CEOs. Corporate boards know that their selection of CEOs is their most important responsibility and can spell success or failure for their organizations. 8
Once these surveys and studies become widely known, the percentage of introverted women as CEOs will soar.
1 Kimberly Fitch and Sangeeta Agrawal, “Why Women Are Better Managers Than Men: U.S. employees with female bosses are more engaged than employees with male bosses,” Gallup Business Journal, October 16, 2014, pp. 26–28, https://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/178541/why-women-better-managers-men.aspx.
2 Ibid.
3 “State of the Global Workforce 2024 Report: The Voice of the World’s Employees,” Gallup, p. 35, file:///C:/Users/Owner/Downloads/state-of-the-global-workplace-2024-download%20(15).pdf
4 “Large-cap companies with at least one woman on the board have outperformed their peer group with no women on the board by 26% over the last six years, according to a report by Credit Suisse Research Institute,” Press Release, July 31, 2012.
5 Olivia Konotey-Ahuhu, “Female Managers Make Fairer Pay Decisions Than Male Counterparts,” Bloomberg, September 1, 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-01/female-managers-make-fairer-pay-decisions-than-male-counterparts?embedded-checkout=true.
6 Pete Ross, “If You’re an Introvert, You’re Probably Getting Screwed at Work,” Observer, January 30, 2017, https://observer.com/2017/01/introverts-underrepresented-managerial-positions/.
7 Elena Lytkina Botelho et al., “What Sets Successful CEOs Apart,” Harvard Business Review, May-June 2017, https://hbr.org/2017/05/what-sets-successful-ceos-apart.
8 Fitch and Agrawal, “Why Women Are Better Managers Than Men.”