Women Are Great Leaders
by Colle Davis
It’s true, woman are great leaders. Paying women differently (usually less) when they are more qualified and make excellent leaders is a travesty. Make sure your company is not guilty of this type of discrimination.
Recruit, train, retain, and pay women for leadership roles, and reap the benefits of having the most dedicated, resourceful, and loyal people running your company.
In my forty years as an Executive Coach, I have watched the number of women in leadership grow consistently year after year.
My suggestion for start-ups and small companies is to find women who have experience running a household or a business, even a nonprofit or church group, for a few years and then hire them to be a manager for a group or team for your company to groom them for more responsibility.
When a qualified woman succeeds and shows herself as a leader and a consensus builder, consider promoting her to a position at the C-suite level within two or three years. By then, she will know how to run the organization, so provide her with the resources to assume more responsibility. You will rarely be disappointed and may be overwhelmed by her contributions to your company’s growth. Be prepared to let her make good decisions without running them past you first.
I am not saying men cannot run companies; some can, and some do a good job. However, hire and promote women to leadership positions to create a balance of talent in your ranks.
Women are often negotiators because they understand the art of compromise while getting their outcomes. When both sides feel they win as part of the bargain, women grasp intuitive ways to structure the deal, so everyone is included and feel they won something, and the result is fair.
Some history. I started coaching in 1981, and over 80% of my clients were women. The remaining 20% were chiropractors and doctors. I am unsure how that happened, but the ratio of women to men remained consistent for about three years. At that point, I realized that businesses paid better, so I shifted my practice to corporate structures, and my clients shifted to 75% of men.
From my early decades of coaching to the present, the percentage of women has gone from around 20% of my clients to the nearly 75% today. An interesting trend has developed over the years; the challenges and issues women and men now face are similar. All leaders, regardless of gender, are faced with letting go of the past by letting go of the problems but keeping the learning and then focusing on getting their outcomes soon.
The significant difference in coaching men and women is that women are open to discussing many problems in our sessions, ranging from gynecological situations to misogynist bosses to corporate bias in hiring and promotions and dealing with specific reports or bosses. Corporate politics is rife with powerful cliques and petty pecking orders, once referred to as the old boys club.
Interesting factoid: In a weird turn of events, and because in the early days of my coaching practice, I would work with anyone who could pay for a coaching session, I became a rape counselor to many women in my community of Ithaca, NY. Many had been through experiences related to nonconsensual and often violent acts of sex. My opening line in my coaching sessions at that time was, “What is the last thing you want to tell me?” The number of women who pointed to the trauma of rape was alarming.
To help these women, I used an astute technique to reduce the emotional impact of the traumatic experience and let the event stay in the past. The process freed up the woman to re-engage in life and eventually develop sexual intimacy with loving partners and make peace with where she was now instead of being in the past and suffering from the event.
Here is a related factoid: The local rape counseling center called me and asked what technique I used to help these women. Unfortunately, their client load had dropped dramatically in the previous year, and many who did show up wanted to use ‘that guy’s method’ in their recovery process. So, I taught their counselors how to use the method, and they never used it—sad fact.
Back to women as excellent leaders. Women recover faster from setbacks and encourage others to get back on the horse or into life and make important things happen.
Odd aside: This article does not take anything away from good men. Instead, I wrote this MyCoach’s Note to encourage companies to hire, groom, mentor, coach, and support the best people to leverage their organization’s capital.
Whatever issues you may have, now is the time to let go of the trauma, retain the learning, and arrive at your goals quickly and elegantly. Sign up for a FREE chat and a Free coaching session.
Book a free session with me, and I guarantee you will learn one valuable tool for influencing people—all that in thirty minutes or less. Sign up today. Set up a complimentary meeting via Zoom.
For more suggestions about hiring and training women for leadership positions or coaching insights, contact me, Colle Davis, cdavis@mycoach.com or 804-467-1536 (EST).
