Shutterstock.com

A Lack of Confidence Isn't What’s Holding Back Working Women

Women are hesitant to talk up their accomplishments because they are often penalized when they do.

This much we know: There’s a wide and stubborn gender gap, both in terms of pay and leadership opportunities. What we still can’t figure out are the causes. Some argue that inflexible workplaces are to blame. Others point to sexist cultural norms and even outright discrimination.

While the truth is probably a combination of all these factors, and more, another theory has gained ground in recent years. Sometimes referred to as the “confidence gap,” the theory holds that women feel less confident than men in their own abilities, and in a corporate world that rewards horn tooters more than the humble, women’s tendency to avoid promoting themselves and their accomplishments means they’re passed over for big projects, leadership roles, and pay raises. The solution, women are told, is simple: Go forth with the confidence of a man, and that corner office will be yours. If sales of books like Lean In and The Confidence Code are any indication, many women have swallowed this interpretation hook, line, and sinker.

There’s just one problem: There’s a strong body of research suggesting that women feel just as confident in their abilities and leadership skills as their male peers. The confidence gap seems to be a classic case of mistaking the symptom—women’s apparent inability to promote themselves—for the cause. “Women do seem to toot their horns less than their male colleagues,” says Hannah Riley Bowles, a senior lecturer in public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School who studies women’s leadership. “The problem is when you stop there and say, ‘Okay, well, women just need to be more like men.’ The story of why women are more modest than men is much more complicated than that.”

Together, two new pieces of research are helping identify why it’s so hard for women to boast about their accomplishments. The first study, conducted by researchers at three European business schools, confirms what many working women instinctively know: While they might be told confidence is the key to professional success, that’s rarely the case in practice. Unless women can temper their assertiveness with more stereotypically feminine traits like empathy and altruism, confidence will do little to advance their careers.

Analyzing data from an unnamed global-technology company, the researchers found that the appearance of self-confidence was not equally rewarded for men and women. “The more confident male engineers in our sample appeared to be, the more influence they had in the organization,” the researchers concluded. “Women were able to translate their self-confident image into influence only when they also displayed high prosocial orientation, or the motivation to benefit others.”

While all that most men seem to need in order to succeed in the workplace is a little bit of spunk, women must learn how to master the art of appearing bothsure of themselves and modest. Too much of the latter, and women’s achievements get overlooked. Too much of the former, and they can face what experts refer to as the “backlash effect”—social and professional sanctions for failing to conform to gender norms. For example, confident women are often perceived as less likable and hireable.

According to another recent study, it’s most often a fear of this backlash, and not a lack of confidence, that prevents many women from self-promoting. Researchers at Northern Illinois University had a group of female students write scholarship application essays explaining why their skills and achievements made them the most deserving recipient. Some women were told the essay would be anonymous while others were told their name would be included. When the exercise was over, the participants were asked to say how well they’d performed. The anonymous essayists, who didn’t have to worry about a backlash, rated their achievements higher than those who were told their name would be included. For Meghan I. H. Lindeman, one of the researchers who conducted the study, the implications are clear: Without any changes to women’s fear of backlash, “they are unlikely to successfully self-promote, no matter how confident they feel,” she says.

As with most misdiagnoses, the prescribed treatments for women’s supposed lack of confidence—practicing power posesbanishing vocal habits like “upspeak,” eliminating negative thoughts—don’t seem to have had any impact. In fact, some experts think that the fearmongering about the confidence gap might perversely have otherwise self-assured women internalizing the idea that they’re lacking in confidence. “I’m starting to wonder if we could be creating the phenomenon that we’re supposed to be studying,” says Riley Bowles, the Harvard professor.  

Ultimately, the biggest problem with the confidence-gap theory is that it places the responsibility for closing the gender gap on individual women when the solution might instead lie beyond their control. “The focus on the confidence gap is troubling as it suggests something is wrong with women, and that we need to ‘fix’ them and have them act more like men,” says Jessi L. Smith, a professor of psychology at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. “This misplaces the responsibility and the burden.” Smith, who has studiedgender norms in the workplace, says that the strategies that make the biggest difference in women’s lack of self-promotion put the onus on companies, not the women who work in them. One simple tactic is for workplaces to normalize the practice of self-promotion, so that when women talk about their achievements, they are less likely to face the well-documented backlash. “Start each meeting by asking everyone to share one thing they’ve achieved since you last met,” Smith recommends. “It could be big or small; it might be work related or personal. The idea is that everyone gets a turn, and that everyone gets to define what counts as an accomplishment.”

Companies should also hold workshops that highlight for employees the research on the backlash that confident women often experience in the workplace, Smith adds. Not only would these trainings make people more aware of their deeply ingrained but often implicit gender biases, but they would also help otherwise-confident women understand why they might feel uncomfortable self-promoting.

Women can also take matters into their own hands, for example by trying to frame their achievements in communal terms. “You don’t want to overdo the ‘we’ so that you disappear entirely, but you do want to make it clear that the work you do and the ideas you have are good for the company,” says Riley Bowles. She also recommended that women track and verbalize their contributions at work, especially when working as part of a mixed-gender group. “People are more likely to rely on their preconceived notions and stereotypes in ambiguous situations,” Riley Bowles said. “The less transparency there is about the actual contributions a woman made, the more potential there is to discount her work.”

Normalizing that kind of transparency in the workplace, with specific policies and collective structural changes, would do far more to help women get their work recognized than any pep talks aimed at boosting their personal confidence.

X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.