How Women Lead: Tips for Female Business Owners to be Strong Leaders
Female small business owners face their own set of challenges, as we discussed in this recent post in the Financial Pantry. And while we’re working harder and harder to close the gender wage gap and level the playing field for the women out there, it’s also important to focus on how women can be strong leaders. Today we’ll cover off on tips for female business owners to help them succeed even more in their industry—as a woman, as a leader, and as a role model.
In general, what females have tended to do in the workplace is mimic what their male counterparts have been able to do so successfully. And men, by virtue of being men, have been able to blaze trails and conquer leadership roles far more successfully than women. We need to change the mindset that simply “following the male lead” is the key to business greatness. Great female leaders got that way not because they copied their male leads, but because they did exactly what came naturally to them as females: showing confidence in their abilities, wisdom, patience, and emotion. Emotion can be seen as such a controversial trait in the workplace (and that goes for both men and women). We’re trained that emotion (which can also be considered passion) is a no-no in the boardroom. But where has being stone-cold and cut-throat gotten women in business? A reputation as disagreeable, argumentative, and difficult. They must stay in their lane in order to be accepted. Right? Not anymore.
Great female leaders replicate what they want from their own workplaces—things they likely didn’t get as their careers began. They turned the tables on the misconception that emotion equates to weakness, that acceptance of a work-life balance equates to laziness. In a lot of cases, women are still bearing the brunt of the housework and child rearing in addition to working full-time, for less pay than their male counterparts.
Reshma Saujani founded the organization Girls Who Code, which aims to “close the gender gap in technology and to change the image of what a programmer looks like and does.” She did a TED Talk called “Teach Girls Bravery, Not Perfection” that got to the root of how the business professional world ended up the way it is today: We urge our sons to reach higher, while we urge our daughters to be perfect. Females may not apply for a job unless they meet 100 percent of the qualifications, which cuts out a huge number of female applicants (after all, who really meets all the criteria in a job listing?). Women in leadership positions are great at ignoring self-doubt and tossing their proverbial cap into the ring. It’s called bravery. It’s called overcoming fear. And to overcome fear, we all know you need to acknowledge it first—and then face it.
The single-most important tip to be a strong female leader may actually be the simplest: lead by example. While men may strive to earn the max amount of money as possible, females tend to see their job as an extension of their lives. They can desire a human connection with their employees and value more of a work-life balance. And as the historically primary caregivers of the family unit, these qualities are those that lend themselves nicely to the workplace. They enable women to focus on employee goals and growth, invest in training and mentoring opportunities, and otherwise putting their team first. It’s a beautiful harmony of traits, traits that females are inherently brilliant at.
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