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Wafaa Younes Alblooshi, MBA Student, University of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates
Mariam Karam Alkaabi, MBA Student, University of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates
Ebtesam Mohamed Al Seraidy, MBA Student, University of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates
Fermin G. Castillo, Jr. (Post-Doc), Associate Professor, MBA Program University of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates E-mail: [email protected] Burton A. Aggabao, Ph. D., Executive Director-QA-IRA University of Fujairah, United Arab Emirates E-mail: [email protected]
ON GENDER LEADERSHIP: THE CASE OF BISO COMPANY
Abstract: Gender leadership remains to be a very interesting topic as far leadership role for both genders. This topic is always debatable if not leads to a different level of arguments or discussions. Whether it is male or female who dominates in an organization, it is very important for us to ask the questions" Who lead us to a more efficient way?" This research case study uncovers the realities of life on how leaders make a difference in their organization.
Keywords: leadership, diversity, gender, organizational effectiveness, leaders.
1. Introduction than male in various positions if given the chance
The leader's role is very important in any orga- and opportunities. We can say female are more
nization because its success and failure lies on its emotional than male but they are decisive in any
leaders and how she/he manages people around. decision making as well as creative and innovative
There are many effective leaders that are really very to some extent. effective and talented leader who can drive and 2. Objectives of the study lead the organization into achieving its goals as The following are the objectives of this research
well as setting new goals and work on achieving it. case study:
But there are many factors to be considered like in- - to find the relationship between the leader's
ternal or external, controllable or non-controlla- gender and the organizational efficiency and it fo-
ble. One of the most challenging things that lead- cuses to answer following questions;
ers may face as a problem is the issue on "gender". - to identify relationship between the gender of
This remains to be a challenge at Biso Company the leader and the organizational;
to date. There are many successful women's who - to what extent can females occupy a leader po-
proved that leadership is not a masculine concept sition?
and not forbidden for ladies to lead at all. Many - To determine the main effects of the genders
ladies has prove that they can be more successful on the overall organizational performance.
Profile of Biso Company
BISO Company established in 1980, and has come a long way in achieving the urban development of UAE by carrying out federal infrastructure projects including government houses, buildings for the interest of various sectors such as health, education, security, culture, agriculture and judiciary in addition to well-developed road network linking the emirates to one another in order to ensure welfare for UAE citizens and residents. Also, working on executing a number of vital federal all over the state to contribute to the international status UAE possesses nowadays."
BISO company strategically goals are to: ensure integration and comprehensiveness in the planning and implementation of infrastructure projects to enhance the state competitiveness and keep pace with global developments in the field of infrastructure. And managing federal infrastructure projects in order to achieve balanced and sustainable development in accordance with the best international standards."
BISO Company Mission:
Achieving sustainable development in planning, establishing and maintaining infrastructure projects and organizing the national housing sector through outstanding organizational performance according the world's highest standards."
BISO Company Vision:
International pioneering in constructing infrastructure projects for a country thatis second to None.
One of the most important and qualified leaders, who built a wide reputation to BISO Company, is Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri. She is a Chief Engineer who has the ability to lead and control the company and to adapt with the situations where men think they only can deal with.
Management style
Diversity in the workplace has being introduced globally in most organization. A gender differentiation is one type of the diversification in BISO Company, where women are facing significant challenges.
With the present of the glass ceiling, women were inhibited from advancing enough leadership roles either contributed in the decision-making roles. Glass ceiling is inevitable limitations that prevent any ambitious women from moving up to a higher position in the organizational hierarchy. Moreover, stereotypes view has built up an image that women are less effective in work compared to men. This bias view of women as manager has contributed to the lower representation of female in the higher leadership positions and effected their evaluation. In addition to that, leadership was linked with strength, which assigned for male only.
Women have the qualities the promote them to be effective leaders in their workplace, such as: many researchers have found that women style of management can be defined as people oriented clear vision and expectation and transformational leadership style [1]. People oriented style is the participative style, where follower and members can participate and join decision-making process. Transformational leadership style is when the leader the position of role modeling, inspiring for the future (optimism) and guide them to the achievement organizational goals. It is emphasis on empowerment and collaboration. Moreover, adopting a clear expectation and vision setting help women to be effective leader. These management styles that were adopted by women help them to add value for the organization they are in as leaders.
On Leadership Role at BISO Company
Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri has a bachelor degree in civil Engineering from UAE University, Master degree in engineering management from Hamdan bin Mohammed smart university. She is qualified to be an effective leader. She trained well to solve technical issues as an Engineer and manage people as a leader. An important key for the effectiveness of leadership is qualification and education. Education is the basis component for the good leader, which would help the contributed in the organization with their knowledge. Women has represent a growing percent-
age of graduated from high education school specialized in management fields globally.
In fact in 2007 [2] 70 percent of the all UAE universities' graduates were Emirates women. It only means that the society are changing and women are now geared towards into education as top priority. Aside from that existence of women in UAE's workplace occupied top position including leadership role. Emirates women experienced an increase in the employment of Emirates women from 5.3% to 13% between (1980-and 1995). In terms of employment, women dispute all the stereotypes that linked leadership efficiency with masculinity. This gives view of lower level of efficiency of female could achieve when they are in high leadership position within the organization. Today women have shown how they could be successful when they have the chance to be in leadership position such as Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri at BISO company. She was promoted to be a leader after interviewing 5 males. This proves that there is no direct relation between the leader's gender and the organizational efficiency (Alshaer.S, 2010). Emirates women represent 59% of UAE labor force market, which show the positive contribution of females in the workplace. UAE has witness some of the bright examples that support the women effective leadership in high positions are:
1. Sheikha Lubna Al Qasimi, the UAE Minister of Foreign Trade.
2. Mariam Mohammed Khalfan Al Roumi, the UAE Minister of Social Affairs.
3. Dr. Maitha Salem Al Shamsi, the UAE Minister of State.
4. Reem Ibrahim Al Hashimi, the UAE Minister of State.
Leadership styles between male and female
The leadership is the ability to inspire confidence and support among people who are needed to achieve a goal or a task. The definition of the leadership shows us that the leading process required the ability and the skills to inspire others and motivate them to reach the success and accomplish the or-
ganization mission, and these requirements doesn't have anything to do with the gender of the person who is supposed to provide the employees with such guidance and support. It is right that the leadership styles and approaches may vary between genders, but this doesn't means that any of the genders or styles is effective more than the other.
Some of the studies that was conducted in the 1980s and at the early 1990s, founded that the female leaders were much more transformational than men's, where men's was much more transac-tional leaders than transformational leaders, which means that the female leaders cared about achieving the goals as well as the employees and relations with people, while the male leaders focused only on achieving the goals. The studies also showed that the women's who are in managerial positions proved the importance of cooperation, nurturing, communication, and affiliation more than men's who are holding managerial positions. In short, the men's in the managerial and leaders positions are more task-oriented, and focus less on relationships than women leaders do. This was a was very challenging task for Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri at BISO Company
However, studies that represented that there is a difference in the leadership styles between both genders does not have the certain answer and do not confirm this point. Many other researches founded that the evidence on confirming or saying that the males and females behavior does really differs are really limited and cannot be considered as a final point. In the year 2011, Hanson and Anderson founded that there is a difference in the decision making style between males and females leaders, but this is not connected and linked to the effectiveness of the leader, they also founded that there is no difference in the degree ofmotivation and the leadership style in general.
Additionally, a survey has conducted by Pew Research Center in US regarding leaders and gender. The survey results showed that 69% out of 2,250 adults who responded agree on the fact that both men and women are equal in terms of making good leaders.
The respondents attributed the potential reason for why there is a lack of women at the top positions to gender discrimination, and only few respondents said that women's lack of experience or family responsibilities prevent them from holding a leading position. According to the same survey, the respondents rated women better on 7 out of 8 of leadership traits than men. Honesty came at the top pyramid ofleadership traits according to the public, and the results showed that about 50% of the respondents said that women are more honest than men. Then comes the Intelligence in the second place, with 38% responded that women outsmart men while only 14% of the audi-
100% 80% 60% 40% 20%
ence said that men are smarter than women, and the rest (about 48%) said that both men and women are equal. The survey also, demonstrated that men and women were equal according to the respondents' view when it comes to ambition and hard work while It wasn't surprising that 80% of respondents said that women are more compassionate due to their emotional characteristics, and on the other hand, it was interesting to know that about 62% to only 11% of respondents acknowledged that women are more creative than men. The only leadership trait that men outperformed women in this survey was decisiveness and having firm decisions [3].
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Figure 1. Leadership Trait Comparison
We need to highlight here that the survey was shared among adults, men and women with more females supporting their fellow gender than men did [3]. The key element of this research paper is to identify the relationship between the genders of leaders and the organizational efficiency in a UAE based company. BISO company serve as an example to explore the effects of having a combination of males and females leaders and how this contribute to the overall organizational efficiency.
The research carried out using a qualitative analysis thru conducting an in-depth interview with a female leader in BISO company, Muna Al Dhaheri -Chief Engineer who has been working as a leader for about ten years and she is one of the most active leaders in the company. Moreover and based on the previous reviews covered in this research paper,
the main elements covered are the leadership style used by leaders, the relation between a leader and his/her team members and the leaders' behavior. Interviews were conducted with some of the managers and staff working under the Chief engineer, and then the results were analyzed using qualitative methods to illustrate how leadership is practiced in BISO Company.
3. Evaluation and discussion:
The analysis was done on the information collected from both the interview with a female leader in BISO Company as well as analyzing the interviews with her team members and people working under her in order to support the subject of this research paper. The interview with the leader and followers included questions related to the main leader characteristics from the leader's and the followers'
perspectives, the leadership styles of her, how she motivates her followers and team members as well as the relationship between leader's gender and the organizational efficiency. After the analysis, the collected data was compared to the findings of the previous work done by previous research papers on the same subject. Results of the interview with Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri revealed that it is not easy for a woman to be a leader in her life or in her workplace, not because she is not capable to reach this stage but due to the patience and persistent required by her to reach her goals and achieve her dreams.
Moreover, from Eng. Muna's point ofview, communicating with male leaders and managers could be a challenge at the beginning, but a female leader can overcome this by time and the way of the higher management specifically males in dealing with her whether it is supportive or directive depends on the individual himself and the situation as well. In addition, the data collected showed that dealing with followers from both genders could be a challenge sometimes but it is not difficult to do so in general, because this depends on the employee who works under you and usually most of them are well educated and understand all the rules and procedures followed in the organization. The results also demonstrated that a leader in general might fail if he or she stopped believing on their visions and they doubt in their selves. Furthermore, Eng. Muna believes that it is very important for a leader to specify a regular time as often as possible and he/she must communicate and listen to them on a regular basis. A leader must also motivate his/her team by encouraging them to work for their future and achieve their dreams. Additionally, feeling responsible about everyone and giving attention to everything might be the most difficult part of being a leader, this indicates that most female leaders are more emotional than men and therefore they might be considered as less capable of controlling their emotions. However, this doesn't mean that females are not good enough to be effective leaders but it is better to have gender
diversity in the workplace to create a larger talent pool and improved performance.
In addition, the Chief Engineer was asked about her personal view on the relation between the leader's gender and the organizational efficiency and how the genders affect the overall performance of a company. She stated that it is very important for any organization to have gender diversity in the workplace whether it is in the top managerial level or the in lower levels, because this diversity will result in having a pool of different talents, expertise, ideas and performance. So both males and females are contributing to the overall organizational efficiency and development and each one of them complement the other.
Moreover and in order to support the title of this research paper regarding the leader's gender and the organizational efficiency, interviews were conducted with some of the followers working under Eng. Muna, who revealed that she is one of the female leaders who reached the chief and top management level in a short period of time. Followers were asked whether they think and consider her as a manager or a leader, almost all of them agreed that she is more to the leader's side since she works continuously to develop skills and leads talents of the people with some kind of innovation, she has a broad horizon associated with large range of perspectives, she has excellent interpersonal skills, she trust her team and respects others' opinions, she is considered as a very good planner, good listener and good communicator.
Additionally, the team members were asked about who is making a better leader, a man or a woman, their answers stated that genders have no direct influence if the leader has the right leadership skills and in most cases this depends on the nature of the work, e. g. military job are more suitable for men. However, women have dominated in the field of education and have proved that they are also as capable to lead such organizations.
Respondents were asked about their personal opinion about being led by a female leader, they
revealed that they look at the individual himself or herself and their characteristics and put the genders aside, the essential concern is related to the manager's traits, behaviors and skills.
Some of them stated that they don't mind working with female leaders or managers because female leaders tend to be more communicative, cautious and polite in their communications. The last question that the followers were asked was in regards to the relationship between the
leaders' genders and the organizational efficiency, the results showed that it's mostly believed that women use relationship oriented leadership styles and men tend to use task oriented leadership styles. Moreover, respondents said that there is no direct relation between the two variables and genders should not have any direct influence on the overall organizational performance and efficiency and there will be no difference between male or female leaders in the presence of the right skills and traits.
Organization efficiency depends on the Leaders and the skills they have so it is recommended to have gender diversity in the workplace. Increase the number of women in leadership positions if she has the ability and quality for this position as what men have. There should be gender diversity in every organization, which will improve and develop the quality of work [4].
4. Findings and Conclusion
Results gathered from both interviews with the Chief Engineer and from her followers, stated that there is no direct relation between the leader's gender on the organizational efficiency. The main finding of this research paper reveal that the leader's success depends on the individual him or herself and the traits and skills they have but not on the gender. Thus, there is a negative relationship between the leader's genders and the organizational efficiency. Moreover, findings of this research paper recommend having gender diversity in the workplace will create a better work environment where more talents, performance and expertise might occur. The
leadership is not about the gender issue but what you can do to manage both genders without any favoritism. This remains to be a challenging tasks to leader and most importantly how to resolve issue and conflict. Due to fact that we rely mostly on the interview, we would like to conduct survey questionnaire for the next study in or to assess further the gender leadership.
Leaders are the fundamental part for the organization success; they lead to achieve the organization's vision and goals by their effective skills and style. There are many factors that affect the organizational efficiency such as internal, external, controllable and non-controllable factors. We thought that leader's gender is the main factor that affects the organization performance. We conclude as far as this study and previous researches, survey and conducting an interview with Eng. Muna Al Dhaheri, Chief Engineer at BISO Company that it depends on the will ofthe leader. We found that female leaders are more successful at their managerial position than men because women focus on achieving organizations tasks as well as building strong relations with others; on the other hand, men focus most on achieving organization's tasks. However, the previous survey that we studied shows that there are no differences between men and women style in leadership and there are another main factor that affects the success of the organization. We conclude that gender is the not main factor that affects the organization's success. But there is more prime factor plays an important role, which are leader's skills and qualities. Leader's talent plays a serious role in leading organization for success by his\her ability to build good relations within and outside the organization and by the ability to achieve the organizations objectives.
5. Recommendation and Future studies
The research case study presented seems to have raised more questions that it has answered. There are several lines of research arising from this work which should be pursued." First, the relationship should be focus on male not only female by having an interview with a male leader. A second line is to
have a questionnaire for the leaders from both genders and their followers to have a clear idea about the reality of this relationship. Both male and female possess leadership traits and characteristics and it is up to the person of how she/he can apply that in the workplace. Knowledge, skills and attitudes of the leader plays important role in the process because the leaders must open-minded as well thinking for the success of the majority. Gender equality is very important in any organization is because employees wants fair and square treatment from the management. As stated in our findings we must be
objective in determining the role of leadership. Either male or female is the leader in the organization, it is still very important to everyone to understand they each one has its role to do. Moreover the employees must do their part as far as work duties and responsibilities. The leader provides direction while employees are the one supporting and following their footsteps.
Future studies on the success and failure of leaders in the organization could be a good future studies. Also in the aspect of challenges and changes that they are facing in the organization.
References:
1. Groysberg B. Gender Differences in Leadership Styles and the Impact within Corporate Boards. Available. - 2013. [Online]. URL: http://www.cpahq.org/cpahq/cpadocs/Genderdiffe.pdf
2. Moran B. (n. d.). Gender Differences in Leadership. Available. [Online]. URL: https://www.ideals.il-linois.edu/bitstream/handle/2142/7791/librarytrendsv40i3h_opt.pdf? sequence=1
3. Leadership and Gender. Trait Approach Leadership - 2012. Available. [Online]. https://www.boundless. com/management/textbooks/boundless-managementtextbook/leadership-9/trait-approach-69/lead-ership-and-gender-347-7292/
4. Patel G Gender differences in leadership styles and the impact within corporate boards. Available - 2013. [Online] URL: http://www.cpahq.org/cpahq/cpadocs/Genderdiffe.pdf
