Only 16 percent of the people we interviewed said that they think
women make better negotiators than men. Because beliefs can be such
powerful determinants of behavior, when translated into practice this
belief will lead many people, if not most, to expect that they’ll be able
to reach better agreements (agreements that are more advantageous
to their own side) when they’re negotiating with women than when
they’re negotiating with men. This expectation, consciously or subcon-
sciously, will lead them to set higher targets against women, make
tougher first offers, press harder for concessions, and resist conceding
more than they would if they were negotiating with men. In other
words, they will make negotiations more difficult for women. As we’ve
already shown, in many cases people aren’t even aware that they’re
doing this. And when their tougher stance prevents women from
achieving good results, this perpetuates the notion that women make
worse negotiators than men.
Even the most successful professional women can find themselves
hampered by the widespread tendency to grant inferior agreements to
women than to men. Elsbeth, 56, is the founder and artistic director of
a regional arts conservatory that regularly gets its dancers accepted into
prestigious international competitions. Thoroughly self-confident and
savvy, Elsbeth is well-respected in the performing arts world and a
major force in the cultural life of her state. Her conservatory has also
been a major engine of economic recovery in its small rust-belt city.
Nonetheless, she struggles against entrenched attitudes toward women
in business every day—so much so that she has developed a favorite
expression: “I’m going to have my guys deal with that.” Time after time,
dealing with a contractor, a banker, or a politician, “some man in a
man’s job,” she has found that “the guy who is on my building commit-
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tee who is a window washer will get further with this guy than I will.”
During one major initiative, in which her conservatory bought a historic
building, restored it, and expanded it to include dormitories, practice
rooms, offices, and a radio station, “there were a bunch of men around
and a couple of women involved and the women were definitely the
brains of the outfit, but the men were able to go out and do things with
people in this town that the women were not.”
Elsbeth believes that people’s attitudes slow down women’s progress
in business to such a degree that “the average male has a ten-year advan-
tage—at least in our country—a minimum of a ten-year advantage on a
female. In other words, I’m 56. Most males now in their late forties
are experiencing in their businesses the kind of growth I’m experi-
encing now.”
Power Prohibitions
As Elsbeth’s experience shows, even successful women can find them-
selves blocked from achieving the same levels of business success
achieved by their male peers. How and why does this happen? In addi-
tion to the many reasons we’ve already explored, extensive research by
organizational sociologists and organizational behaviorists has demon-
strated the value in business of “social networks”—connections to oth-
ers within one’s organization and at other organizations. Networks, this
research has shown, provide broad access to advice, early news of
emerging opportunities, and a privileged view of the way an organiza-
tion works. Networks also position members to be considered as key
prospects for advancement.3 Although building social networks sounds
like something women would be good at, sizable barriers frequently
prevent them from taking full advantage of this skill. For one thing,
workplace networks tend to be relatively gender-segregated: Men net-
work with other men and women network with other women.4 Because
access to men’s networks can be extremely important, especially in or-
ganizations where men control promotion and salary decisions (most
organizations), this gender segregation can leave women without the
same access to connections and information that men in their organiza-
Social scientists have identified two principal types of networks: “in-
strumental” networks and “friendship” networks. “Instrumental” net-
works are based on exchanges of advice and information and on a readi-
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ness to help each other out, whereas “friendship” networks have a more
social function. Typically, men’s “instrumental” networks and their
“friendship” networks are predominantly male. Women’s “instrumen-
tal” networks, in contrast, are usually made up of both men and women
but their “friendship” networks tend to be predominantly female.5 As
a result, women’s ties to the men in their “instrumental” networks—
frequently the more powerful members of the group—can be less strong
and therefore less valuable. Compounding the problem, in workplace
situations in which women are a minority, women are more likely to
be marginal members of any informal friendship networks of which
they do become members, a marginalization that appears to result
“more from exclusionary pressures than from their preferences.”6 This
lack of strong personal ties to the men in their “instrumental” networks
can make those ties less useful.
Adding another wrinkle, research has shown that men benefit
considerably from maintaining numerous ties that are relatively weak,
but women and other minorities in an organization (any group of peo-
ple who need to overcome negative stereotypes) derive little benefit
from weak ties.7 A weak tie is a relationship with someone you’d con-
sider an acquaintance but not a friend—it’s a connection based on
goodwill and generally positive impressions but not much intimate
knowledge of one another. Since women are in the minority at many
organizations, especially at the higher levels, research suggests that
women need stronger ties than men need because “strong ties may help
women to counteract the effects of bias, gender-typed expectations, and
contested legitimacy.”8
A man may be comfortable doing a favor or providing a reference for
another man he doesn’t know especially well, for example, but negative
stereotypes about women’s competence and the widespread tendency
to devalue women’s performance may make him less comfortable doing
the same thing for a woman he doesn’t know well. As a result, for a
man to do a favor for a woman, he usually needs to know her well
enough to feel completely confident in her abilities—his ties to her need
to be strong. In an article in the Harvard Business Review titled “When the Mentor Is a Man and the Prote´geé Is a Woman,” the authors, Lawton
Whehle Fitt and Derek Newton, reported that “two of the men we
talked to said that, to protect themselves, they maintain higher stan-
dards for female prote´geś than for male prote´geś.�
�9 Another one of their
interview subjects admitted: “In the case of women, many people have
to be convinced. When you’re trying to present a woman to your superi-
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ors, you often feel you have to explain everything.”10 Knowing that there
will be more resistance to a woman, many men choose the easier path
and recommend a man they know will be acceptable. In addition, if a
man has to “explain everything”—meaning, presumably, everything a
woman has accomplished and everything she can do—this by itself
would seem to require a strong tie. Otherwise, the man may not know
“everything” he needs to explain. And, as we’ve said, women rarely have
such strong ties to men in their “instrumental” networks who may be
in a position to help promote their careers.
Another way in which women can be cut off from exercising power
and influence involves a potentially powerful position in a network
called a “structural hole.” A person who occupies a structural hole main-
tains connections to people in his or her organization who are not them-
selves connected to one another. This position can be a very powerful
one for men, giving them access to information not necessarily shared
by everybody, allowing them to draw on the skills and points of view of
a diverse population, and enabling them to be effective at many different
levels of an organization. But this position turns out to be less helpful
for women.11 Far more important and useful for women, it turns out, is
having a strong advocate in a powerful position in the network: having
someone, in other words, with the power and inclination to direct plum
assignments their way, push their advancement, and make sure they
get appropriate recognition for their achievements. Not to put too fine
a point on it, women thrive when they have someone powerful to do a
lot of their “asking” for them.
Why the difference? One persuasive theory postulates that it is ap-
propriate for men to use their power directly but less acceptable for
women to do so. This means that it can be a gender-role violation for
women to take advantage of their position in a “structural hole.” Instead,
they must rely on a strategic partner or mentor—who must be male—to
do so for them.12 Unfortunately, the subconscious devaluing of women’s
ability and performance that afflicts so many people, and the pervasive
assumption that women are less capable than men at more senior and
management-level jobs, makes it much harder for women to find men
willing to play this role for them.13 Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, in her paper
“Constraints on Excellence: Structural and Cultural Barriers to the Rec-
ognition and Demonstration of Achievement,” offers this explanation:
“Stratification and ghettoization are . . . characteristic of most profes-
sional domains. Institutions position women, and powerful individuals
within these institutions do not commonly challenge tradition by cross-
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ing these lines by personally sponsoring women.”14 Thus, cut off from
using their positions of power and influence directly, prohibited by
gender prejudice from negotiating aggressively on their own behalf, and
without a strong advocate, women often find themselves stymied, un-
able to progress as rapidly or as far in their careers as their abilities
should dictate.
Supporting Others
If the world were populated only by women who feel trapped by gender
norms and unable to act powerfully and forcefully, it would be a differ-
ent place from the world in which we all live. For of course there are
plenty of women who behave confidently and assertively—we see them
every day. In certain situations this kind of behavior by women can
even be expected. Looking at those situations can help us to better
understand the barriers that hold women back the rest of the time.
So where is this far and distant land, the place where women can
freely assert themselves and negotiate and push and ask? It is the land
of advocacy—of asking on behalf of others. Helena, 38, an advertising
executive, confessed that she feels perfectly comfortable asking her boss
for things on behalf of the younger people in her office even though
she has a terrible time doing the same for herself:
You know, asking for them to go on [photo] shoots . . . and asking
for them to be paid more money. And then I got Zoeä raise when
she was hired back because I said to my boss that I thought it was
wrong that the man he hired who had less experience was making
more money than she was. . . . So when he hired her back, she was
making more money than both of the young guys. . . . I’m better at
asking for other people, and I can be really direct . . . but not so much
for myself.
Susannah, the political strategist, said that she still has trouble asking
for things for herself, even though she has learned that this is necessary.
When Sara pointed out that her difficulty with asking was particularly
ironic since her job involves asking for things—votes, favorable legisla-
tion—on a daily basis, Susannah laughed. “Oh, but those things aren’t
for me,” she said. “Those are for the children!” Mary Wade speculates
that women feel more comfortable asking on behalf of others because
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this activity feels consistent with existing gender norms for women,
which require women to take responsibility for other people’s interests
and needs: “Assertion connotes promoting the self and demanding rec-
ognition, rewards, or resources for the self. . . . Men have traditionally
functioned in roles that are enhanced by assertiveness (e.g., aggressive
breadwinner, powerful boss, authoritative father), whereas women
have traditionally acted as advocates (e.g., supportive assistant, encour-
aging wife, prodding mother). These expectations remain surprisingly
current.”15
Wade believes that the persistence of these expectations continues
to influence the types of assertive behavior that women can safely em-
ploy in our society today. In the earliest study of this issue, which we
described in chapter 2, male and female students completed a task and
then decided either the amount they should be paid for their work or
the amount another person who completed the same task should be
paid.16 Confirming expectations, women paid others significantly more
than they paid themselves (48 percent more) and men paid others sig-
nificantly less than they paid themselves (20 percent less).
In a recent study, Mary Wade looked more closely at this difference
between men and women.17 She informed 178 undergraduate student
volunteers that they were participating in a study to evaluate students’
business skills. Each student was given a job description about a cam-
pus internship and asked to write a letter accepting the internship. The
students were told to include in the letter what they felt would be an
appropriate salary for the position, with the salary falling somewhere
between 900 and 3,000 dollars. Half the students were told to accept
the position for themselves and the other half were told to accept it on
behalf of someone else. Also, some of the students were told that a
counselor from the career center would evaluate their letters with their
names attached and the rest were told that their letters would not be
linked with their names.
Wade suspected that female students who believed an evaluator
would connect their letters with their names (and therefore would know
they were women) would feel compelled to act according to society’s
expectations for women. This is exactly what happened. Among the
students who were told that evaluators would know their names when
they read their letters, women made lower requests for themselves
than men made (8 percent lower). But, true to Wade’s expectations,
those women who wrote the letter on someone else’s behalf (and
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knew it would be read by someone who could tell a woman had written
it) actually made larger payment requests than the men made (9 percent larger).
These results clearly indicate that women know they can campaign
strongly for the welfare of others (and may even be expected to do
so). They also illuminate the constraints women feel when asking for
something for themselves. The power of these constraints was con-
firmed by the behavior of the students who believed their names would
not be linked to their letters. In this condition, women actually made
larger requests for themselves than the men made (8 percent larger).
When they knew that their letters would not be linked with their names
and that the evaluators would not know whether they were male or
female, the women were able to express a healthy sense of entitlement
and advocate well on their own behalf. This suggests that among
younger women at least (this study used only undergraduates and was
completed in 2002) entitlement issues may play a smaller part than
gender-norm pressures in women’s reluctance to make strong requests
for themselves. As Wade concluded, women’s well-founded concerns
about provoking negative reactions in others may play a larger role than
“self-esteem deficits” in discouraging them from asking for big things