The challenges and barriers that women face in both entering into and performing effectively in leadership roles have been widely documented across many research domains.  In this seminar Aparna Joshi takes a look at this issue from the perspective of both women and men in leadership roles. First, she unpacks conditions under which women leaders can be effective change agents in highly male-dominated settings. Based on a sixteen- year longitudinal data set of women legislators in the US Congress she examines how the content of bills can prime the legitimacy of women in leader roles and predict their success in passing bills over the course of their tenures.  Second, shifting the focus on men in leadership roles, she also problematizes the “think manager think male” paradigm that has been applied extensively to understand barriers faced by women, from the perspective of men. Based on a sample of Fortune 500 male CEOs she examines the consequences for firm performance and CEO pay among men who subscribe (or not) to masculine stereotypes.  Through these two studies she aims at highlighting new ways of thinking about gender and leadership effectiveness.

Aparna Joshi, Arnold Family Professor of Management, Smeal College of Management, Penn State University