Recent research from the University of Southern California explored the old troupe that the gender pay gap exists in part because of women’s poorer negotiating skills.  The study found that men and women are generally as bad as each other, but it fits part of a wider narrative that suggests that women are not as assertive as men in the workplace.

This seam is mined again in a second study from Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business, which explores the prickly topic of requesting extensions of deadlines on projects at work.  The study suggests that women often feel uncomfortable asking for such an extension in the belief that they might be burdening others with their request, or alternatively, be looked on as incompetent.

“Women understandably feel like they have too many things to do and not enough time to do them. We found that not asking for more time to complete tasks undermines women’s well-being and also their performance,” the researchers say.

“But we also found a possible solution: Women were as likely to ask for deadline extensions as men when organizations had formal policies on making deadline extension requests.”

Seeking an extension

The researchers conducted nine experiments, which involved around 5,000 volunteers that contained a mixture of working professionals and undergraduate students.  For instance, in one experiment, participants were given one week to submit a project but were each told that they could request an extension without risk of any penalty.

The results revealed that male participants were around twice as likely to request the extension as their female peers.  When the projects were then assessed, those who had asked for the extension universally scored higher than those who had not.

“What we found is that when students requested an extension, they made good use of that time and performed better on the task,” the researchers say. “Women may hurt themselves by not requesting additional time.”

This narrative played out across the studies, with women seeming to place far more emphasis on the wellbeing of other people, which made them uncomfortable asking for deadline extensions.  Some of the experiments also highlighted the fear among women that asking for an extension would influence how their competence is perceived.

“It was their concern about burdening their team and manager with more work that most strongly predicted women’s discomfort with asking for more time on adjustable deadlines,” the researchers say.  “Perceived burden and emotions like shame, embarrassment and guilt explained why women experienced more discomfort with asking for extensions than men did.”

Real implications

These findings have considerable implications in the workplace, as the researchers highlight how previous work has shown that women often feel more pressed for time at work, which can result in higher levels of burnout than men.

On the positive side, the researchers believe that organizations can help to redress this balance by creating more formal ways for employees to request extensions.  This was shown in subsequent experiments where each person was entitled to request an extension and this was done via an online form.  This simple change equalized the extension requests by men and women.  It’s something the researchers hope that organizations will take on board.

“It’s a structural issue. When organizations have formal policies about deadlines, it creates the opportunity for men and women to have equal experiences for requesting additional time,” the researchers conclude.  “And we found evidence that allowing deadline extensions, when possible, can result in better work. That’s helpful for employers and employees.”