Leadership on the Quiet

 It’s International Woman’s Month and it was International Woman’s Day a few days ago (8 March) and aside from covering the ongoing crisis in the Ukraine and the Covid pandemic, the world’s media has been focused on women and the achievements of women in a number of fields. The Economist even went as far as to run a story that “Societies that treat women badly are poorer and less stable.”

https://www.economist.com/international/2021/09/11/societies-that-treat-women-badly-are-poorer-and-less-stable

 

 Given that I live an advanced economy, much of the conversation on women, centered around the need to continue shattering the glass ceiling. In my Linkedin feed, most of the stories on “women” were from women in corporate positions who were either talking about how they were either treated as nothing better than the secretary or stories about how people assume they’re most junior person in the room when they are in fact the most senior.

To give credit where credit is due, women in Singapore have made great strides in the corporate sector. Whilst my grandfather’s generation considered degrading for the husband if the wife worked. In my generation, it’s understood that both parties hold jobs and only those earning extreme amounts of money can afford to have wives that don’t work. So, in modern Singapore its understood that women will earn their own money. When we talk about women in work force, its more of a question of providing opportunities for advancement rather than opportunities per se.

In an advanced economy, the issue is about getting used to the idea that women can be bosses. One of the tragedies of Covid is that it didn’t force us out of the assumption about women not being able to lead, despite the obvious fact that places run by women (Germany under Angela Merkel, New Zealand under Jacinda Ardern and Finland under Sanna Marin) did considerably much better than places run by men – specifically the chest thumping macho variety (Donald Trump in the USA, Narendra Modi in India and Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil.) Despite the obvious, there are people who still see “bluster” as “strength.” Modern global culture tends to prioritize the show of strength rather than actual strength. Hence, you get a system where weaklings yell and scream to show strength but flee the moment cat meows in their direction.

Whilst women are generally expected to “look pretty,” they are spared the expectation of having to create a lot of noise. Hence, women, when given the chance to, get to focus on getting things done. Interestingly enough, this is most obvious in developing countries. I take Vietnam as an example. Walk along the streets of Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City and you will notice a hive of entrepreneurial activity. Every street corner will have noodle stall or a mini-spa. Upon further observation, one will note that all this entrepreneurial activity is done by women:

 

 Copyright – World Travel Connector

I don’t believe this is particularly unique to Vietnam. If you watch enough travel videos, you will notice that it’s the women trying to make a living in the market place in most developing nations.

Telling generations of women to look after the household has also extends beyond the material. As anyone who has traveled from Singapore into Malaysia accompanied by someone with a non-Singaporean or Malaysian passport will tell you, you will run the risk of being shaken down for a bribe on the Malaysian side of the border. The people doing the shaking down are inevitably men. The women, particularly the ones wearing the “Tudong” (Headscarf worn by devout Muslim women) never ask for a bribe.  

 

Copyright – The Phnom Penh Post

This is not to say that women are intrinsically more honest. As any Bangladeshi or Pakistani will tell you, women in power like the two Begums of Bangladesh or Benazir Bhutto in Pakistan are capable of corruption.

However, it seems that at the ground level, it’s the women who do their jobs and earn their money without taking short cuts. It’s often stated that the Malaysian officers are tempted to look for bribes because they’re not paid very much and are placed in a position of power of traveling Singaporeans who inevitably earn much more (a bribe is around RM 50, which is around SG$16 – the cynical might call this a win-win – a decent subsidy for the Malaysian officer and pocket change or the thrill of being able to use money to solve problems for the Singaporean without being punitive). However, one has to wonder. The women face the same temptations as their male counterparts yet they are never the ones to shake you down for bribe?

It's been said that for women to advance the corporate ladder, they need to become more “showy” or openly “aggressive” in the same way that men are supposed to be. Think of the “successful” women leaders like Margaret Thatcher and how masculine hardness is prescribed to her (“Iron Lady.”)

Whilst there is some truth to this in the short term, the more sustainable way to promote women is to recognize them for the qualities that they bring to the table. If you look at Mrs. Thatcher as an example, you’ll find that her behavior was not that of a “macho-man” but that of an effective housewife. One could argue that her success as Prime Minister came from the fact that she ran the country like how she ran the household.

Instead of trying to make women more like men, we should be promoting women for being very good at what they do as women. Women have shown themselves to be good at doing things like holding down a job and keeping the house in order at the same time. We should be celebrating these qualities and promoting them rather than pushing women be more like men.