In the battle of the boss, stereotypes are the real winners. While much effort has been put into trying to break down these false perceptions, when it comes to male v female bosses, nearly every workplace still see the following differences in how identical behaviours are judged.
Action |
Male stereotypes |
Female stereotypes |
| Slamming their fists on the table;“I need this done now!” | Authoritative and commanding. His employees know not to mess around with the intentions he has for his business. | Overbearing and agitated. Employees feel ordered around and not an asset to her company |
| Disregarding discussion involving the personal life of an employee.“We can talk about this later, let’s just get the job done.” | Too busy to listen. His work is more important then listening to the personal lives of his employees. There is a time and a place for this sort of chatter. | Doesn’t care about the lives of her employees. She isn’t nurturing enough to care about her employees’ events, engagements, births or birthdays. All she cares about is work. |
| Holding meetings that are short. | Extremely busy and needs to get back to work fast. He still needs to update his employees about the progress of the business as well as assigning his employees with tasks. | Doesn’t take time to brief her employees properly. She is inconsiderate and doesn’t want to allocate sufficient periods of time to her employees. |
| Requiring small details of every job to be impeccable. | Ensuring the business is running smoothly. He wants even the smallest of cracks to be plastered over. His employees are willing to do whatever task he sets them giving the task their full attention. | Micromanaging. She wants everything perfect and has no room for mistakes in her workplace. It’s annoying to her employees, and the result they want to give her is half-hearted. |
