Gen Z Is Biased Against Women Leaders, New Data Shows

By Jasmine Browley· Updated January 9, 2023

Being in a leadership position is tough for a woman. Turns out, according to new data, it’s even tougher than we thought.

The Reykjavik Index for Leadership, an annual international study, takes a look at how people perceive female leaders. Their recent study included opinions from 10,000 people in 14 countries and uncovered incredibly disappointing views.

Perceptions of female leaders declined last year across the G7 countries, which include Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the U.K. and the U.S. with less than half of respondents (47%) saying they were very comfortable having a woman as the CEO of a major company in their country.

The results also revealed bias in younger generations against women leaders.

Participants aged 18-34 held the least progressive views toward gender and leadership. According to the results, millennial and Gen Z surveyees are significantly less likely to think that men and women are equally suited for leadership positions.

 “We know that during times of economic hardship, you tend to see people regressing to safer places,” said Michelle Harrison, global CEO of Kantar Public in an interview with Forbes.

This plays into other data that reveals inherent prejudices against women in leadership, even among their subordinates.

ESSENCE previously reported that according to a recent report, workers are more likely to refuse overtime when deployed by a female leader.

The July study revealed that workers did not expect female bosses to insist on long hours, and do not respond well when more work is requested from them.

“Even if we supply women with funding and put them through incubators or accelerators, there’s a bias on the part of employees that determines whether their new venture is ultimately successful,” Olenka Kacperczyk told Bloomberg. She is the study’s lead author and a professor of strategy and entrepreneurship at Imperial College Business School in the UK.

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