LANSING – It has been proven that women are promoted less, underrepresented in the C-suite, and receive lower wages then men. A recent study set out to discover why and see if women’s behavior is responsible. The study, published by Harvard Business Review, revealed that biological differences between men and women do not affect the way they act at work and are not responsible for gender bias.
The study used badges containing sensors to track behavior in 100 men and women at various seniority levels in a large business office. The badges recorded communication patterns, proximity to other badges, and speech volume and tone. From this they were able to measure who speaks with who, where people communicate, and who dominates conversations. They were specifically looking for differences between men and women in these areas. “We went in with a few hypotheses about why fewer women ended up in senior positions than men: Perhaps women had fewer mentors, less face time with managers, or weren’t as proactive as men in talking to senior leadership,” the researchers stated.
But they were shocked to find virtually no differences between the women and men in their study. Male and female work patterns were nearly identical, and the results held true at various levels of seniority. There were no differences in the amount of time spent on concentrated work, time online, or time in face-to-face conversations as well as no difference in their access to senior management. Both sexes were two social steps or connections away from senior management.
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