I sat quietly, intending to simply observe, at a recent meeting for healthcare women executives and leaders. The discussion at hand was about mentoring emerging women leaders.
One of the executives, when asked about what could be some of the challenges related to the topic, mentioned that in her opinion there were two:
- Those who were up there in leadership are already very tough and strong, and this makes it difficult for them to be empathetic and patient enough to mentor.
- Their toughness, or rather tough exterior, made it hard for the juniors to approach them.
At some point, somebody made a comment that ‘some of us have even been called men!’
Now, being called a man would be uncomfortable to any woman. I have been called one several times by men, and been told my approach was just like a man’s by women. Each time I shrug it off, but it drove to my core. I even internalized it as my identity for a second. But was it?
Teammates and juniors being afraid of you can’t make for a healthy work environment. The other challenge with the toughness is that it doesn’t just end at the office, it follows one straight home, creating another unhealthy environment around you. Can discord and disharmony in your life make for a healthy you? I don’t think so.
The discussion in the meeting did leave me with a glaring and nagging question:
If women leaders progressively ‘became like men’, what’s the use/value of being a woman in the workplace then?
Diversity in DEI involves incorporating groups of individuals with real or perceived differences in demographic factors including gender. Equity is about fairness in access to opportunities and outcomes. Inclusion speaks to the incorporation of groups that have been previously discriminated against and underrepresented in certain spaces.
In terms of leadership, women are an obvious group in all three.
We’re gladly seeing DEI initiatives for increased women leadership starting to move the needle, albeit at a painful snail’s pace. The proportion of women employed in leadership positions has increased by an average of 1% per year. In 2023, it was found that women CEOs led a record-breaking 10% of Fortune 500 companies.
Yes, inclusion in and access to leadership opportunities for women is evidenced by the gradually increasing numbers. However, inasmuch as employing a wheelchair user means building a ramp, embracing the essence of diversity for women leaders should not only be a numbers game. It should also be about the intentional acknowledgment of what a woman is, in her natural make-up (pun highly intended😄), the value that she brings to the table, and the empowerment for her to be and operate that way.
What Does a Female Bring to the Table?
Apart from the individual gifts and talents aligned to the work/purpose that she has to carry out here on earth as a human being, a woman brings a tangible and high level of femininity to the table.
We all have masculine and feminine traits. The essence of a woman is in her expression of high femininity, supported and protected by her masculinity. I evangelize about femininity because, for various reasons ranging from trauma to politics and patriarchy, the world has gotten a woman’s femininity severely depressed.
Whilst some argue that feminine traits are more a matter of nurture than nature, I’m of the school that they are inherent. A study demonstrated that male and female babies express stereotypical toy preferences without prior exposure as early as 9-17 months.
Feminine Traits
Drawing from Christianity, neuroscience, psychology, and various femininity coaching experts, feminine traits and properties include the following:
- Receptivity & welcoming
- Flexibility
- Intuitiveness
- Sensitivity & Emotional Intelligence
- Risk aversion
- Compassion
- Sensuality
- Empathy
- Connectedness & Collaboration
- Trusting
- Gentleness & Kindness
- Creativity
- Beautifying
- Restful
- Nurturing
A woman brings her community-building nature and ‘softness’ to the often harsh environment that a business workplace presents. Female CEOs bring ‘collaboration, empathy, and inclusivity, creating an environment where employees feel valued and heard’.
There has been much work on the rising recognition and need for ‘soft’ skills, which have been proven beneficial for organizational success. Most, if not all, of these soft skills are feminine traits, focused on building strong connections with others. Here are some of the mentioned skills:
- Trust your team members so they can trust you. Members who trust their leader demonstrate better performance, satisfaction, and commitment.
- Collaboration fosters a sense of unity and quick effective decision-making.
- Empathy, especially beyond lip service, is the most important leadership skill, with benefits such as innovation, engagement, retention, and inclusivity.
- Research shows that creative competencies are validated as effective for leadership.
- Intuition is an essential leadership skill, and the best leaders use it.
- Leading with kindness is a powerful influence.
Despite the notion that it would not be easy to quantify and attribute contributions of specific DEI actions, growing evidence shows that women are great for a business’s bottom line. Organizations with at least 30% women leaders are 12x more likely to have excellent financial performance. Interesting and robust research at Leadership Circle found that women far outscore men in leadership effectiveness. They scored high in ‘connecting and relating’ and ‘greater good of all’ dimensions. Whereas women ‘played for all to win’, men most likely ‘played not to lose’. They dubbed the women’s effectiveness the ‘feminine leadership advantage’.
If feminine (soft) skills are great for business leadership, and if women are great for business leadership, it stands to reason to conclude that femininity is not weak (words echoed by a male, Stephan Labossiere, a relationship coach), and that women leaders should be empowered to capitalize and operate in their feminine selves.
This has great implications for those women who’ve had to put on a hard exterior and seem to have become like men. It’s somewhat of a call for them, if they will, to be set free.
It’s also a call to organizations to let women be women and do what women do best. Granted, many companies don’t have such programs currently, and it will probably be a long time coming as it involves planning, finances, and still having to sell them on it through building a solid case for the feminine leadership advantage. Nonetheless, such targeted DEI empowerment programs could involve regular engagement with women leaders; the ability to evolve, adapt, and mature; setting quantifiable goals; accountability from the top; etc.
The most impactful mechanism to include in those leadership development programs would be ones that empower women leaders to gain confidence in their authentic female selves. Facilitated by coaches, this means doing the so-dreaded-by-many inner work. Not just working on external behavior, but starting with the foundation of self-identity and self-worth as a woman, and addressing limiting beliefs against women leadership and femininity.
In her book Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg rightfully advocates for self-advocacy and for women to stop downplaying themselves. I like that there’s a clear thread of a feminine approach in her discourse. I join the discourse on the back end to say, it’s when you are assured of who you are, why you are here, and your own (inherent) worth, that you can have the confidence to effectively self-advocate, and take those risks to be in places you are called to be in.
The secret sauce is confidence because, despite women being more effective leaders, their downplaying and underestimating of their skills, communication, and influence, means that they:
- Are hesitant to speak up in business meetings
- Are afraid to appear too loud or aggressive
- Feel unconfident because they don’t speak in a commanding voice, as society expects leaders to
- Get over-committed, and I opine that it is because they are seeking validation. Just like I did.
This distressing double bind phenomenon has us second-guessing ourselves as leadership material, driving us into imposter syndrome and more burnout (than men).
On the flip side, women may develop the so-called ‘queen bee’ tendencies, where women leaders exert their power on ‘worker bees’, keeping them down. I can’t blame them, because they need to maintain and prove their position of ‘strength’, as femininity is stereotypically weak. This means that, in addition to a non-approachable masculinized tough exterior, they may actively push down emerging women leaders.
So, NO, women leaders are not empowered to be women leaders. Yes, they are allowed in the room, but are not allowed to sit and rest in their authentic female selves.
It’s not up to companies to get women to a place of confidence in their femininity, it’s up to us women. It would be great if they could offer support through executive coaching opportunities, however, their main mandate is to create the environment for us to operate and thrive as women.
How to Embrace Your Female and Feminine Authenticity
To round up, here are some tips to help you get started on your journey of embracing your female nature and the power you carry in your femininity as a leader.
Understand and Embrace Your Nature as a Woman
This requires that you sit down, write, and clarify your identity: who you are, how you’re made up, and why you’re here as a human being and female. For me as a Christian, for example, my identity starts with my Creator, whose I am, and trickles right down to my roles.
Dr. Jay Barnett (psychologist) once said something in a podcast interview that stayed with me (not verbatim): when you show up in the world not knowing who you are, you’re walking around with a blank piece of paper and having everyone write anything on it, and that becomes your identity. No truer words have been said. Write it, read it out loud, and visualize it frequently.
Radically Accept the Inherent Value/Worth You Carry as a Female Being
You didn’t come into this world to just take up space and consume oxygen, no, you have work to do. This means your value and worth is automatic. Accept and internalize that you have something to do or say that only you, and nobody else, can bring to the table.
What you have to say matters. I suggest you find a mirror and say that to yourself out loud! Let go of the limiting beliefs that you may have around feminine leadership: you’re not good enough, not strong enough, not loud enough to influence, etc.
Develop Habits that Will Support Your Femininity
- Find ways to increase your emotional intelligence, which should include therapy and/or coaching, so you can respond to situations with wisdom and sensibility.
- Make room for approachability: reduce stress, smile more, compliment more, occasionally go to your teammates’ workspaces instead of calling them to yours, etc.
- Take care of your physical wellness: regular exercise, healthy diet and hydration, good sleep, etc.
- Consider changing your wardrobe: my favorite one. The colors and the pieces. When I started embracing my femininity, I decided to ditch dark-colored male tailored-look suits for more dresses and skirts in happier (for me) colors. They make me feel more relaxed. In my 20 years as an expert witness in court, I would only wear dark pants ensembles. The day I wore a dress was the only day I got showered with compliments by the judge about the great work we were doing. Not that I needed them, but go figure.😁
Dr. Shibu Selatole
Dr Shibu Selatole is a Femininity Mindset and Lifestyle Coach certified in NLP Life Transformation Coaching. She helps women leaders embrace their womanhood and femininity so they can attain harmonious success at work and at home. She firmly believes that it's unnatural and unhealthy for women to continue succeeding in hyper-masculine patriarchal ways, and that this is why they experience more burnout than men. She has 20 years of forensic pathology practice, holds an MBA(cum laude) and is an award-winning Head of Unit, also overseeing clinical governance in her province and training of residents. In her dreams, her memoir is titled ‘Renewal, Decaff & Dresses’.
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