The under-representation of women in leadership roles continues despite concerted efforts to improve matters.  Researchers from the University of Toronto suggest that the situation could be helped if self-nomination was removed from the selection process.

Indeed, the redesign of the selection process could, they argue, do more to improve gender diversity in leadership roles than trying to control for gender bias or by encouraging women to “lean in”.

“Initiatives that aim to “fix the women” or control bias in people’s minds have been really popular but we haven’t seen much effectiveness,” the researchers say.

Improving diversity

The study involved three experiments with over 1,500 participants.  The experiments revealed that women were around 25% less likely to choose the riskier option when given the opportunity to self-nominate themselves, even if that path promised a better pay-off.

By contrast, when everyone was signed up for the selection process automatically, with the option to drop out if they wished, then it emerged that women participated in almost equal numbers to men.  What’s more, this resulted in them earning more money as a result.

“A lot of research says that women are dispositionally not competitive. Our research shows this isn’t the case,” the researchers explain.

Removing self-nomination

Removing self-nomination is a fairly subtle change to the standard way of selecting leaders, but the research highlights the significant difference doing so can make to both the diversity of the leadership team and the prospects of female leaders.

The authors argue that the availability of the opt-out condition removed any uncertainty women felt regarding their suitability to compete, and indeed sent the signal that it is both expected and perfectly okay to do so.

The study provides some pointers for how organizations can work to level the playing field in their recruitment processes and work to ensure that capable and talented women don’t remove themselves from the process unnecessarily.

“It’s a sign for organizations to think about how to redesign their promotion systems to make it fair for everyone, regardless of their identities,” the researchers conclude.