A Truth About the Glass Ceiling No One Wants to Talk About

I'm slightly apprehensive (terrified) about commenting on this topic or any relating to gender/race because it seems like the bar for public crucifixion is somewhat low, even to those who just want to add data or other side-points to a discussion.

Anyway, and I apologize in advance if I derail the topic, but I think there's a semi important distinction to qualify this discussion, because I do think the discussion applies just as much to men as it does to women.

Casually attraction does seem like less important of a factor for men, but in data that seems to be because height is vastly important instead. So much so that a woman's attractiveness is not congruent to a man's attractiveness, but his height.

I find this to be true casually and it certainly has some scientific backing[1]. In online forum threads (okay fine, AskReddit) and female friends have nearly universally expressed less interest in short males precisely because they are short.

In fact, I think if you replace "attractive women" with "tall men" you have a slightly better scientific basis for this article, because we can base it on studies and not the author's perceptions of attractiveness.

10% of Russel 3000 CEOs are women, and similarly 10% of (original source doesn't say) CEOs are below average height. Wikipedia says[1]:

> A survey of Fortune 500 CEO height in 2005 revealed that they were on average 6 ft 0 in (1.83 m) tall, which is approximately 2.5 inches (6.4 cm) taller than the average American man. 30% were 6 ft 2 in (1.88 m) tall or more; in comparison only 3.9% of the overall United States population is of this height.[11] Similar surveys have uncovered that less than 3% of CEOs were below 5 ft 7 in (1.70 m) in height. Ninety percent of CEOs are of above average height.

[1] See especially the "unsolicited messages per week, by height" graph: http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-biggest-lies-in-online...

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_discrimination#In_busine...

Interestingly, I just spoke with a colleague yesterday who admitted (without shame) that he recently campaigned (successfully) to have an attractive female hired into his group. I asked him about her qualifications, and he said she seemed capable, but not exceptional. He stressed that, at least to him, her appearance outweighted her abilities.

Incidents like this make me wonder if some sort of anonymous interviewing could be implemented in certain industries, and whether the benefits associated with mitigating prejudices would outweigh the intangible benefits associated with getting to know someone as a whole person during the hiring process.

Here are the female CEO's of the fortune 500.

Meg Whitman, HP (#10)

Virginia Rometty, IBM (#19)

Patricia A. Woertz, Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM) (#28)

Indra K. Nooyi, PepsiCo, Inc. (#41)

Irene B. Rosenfeld, Mondelez International

Marillyn Hewson, Lockheed Martin (#58)

Ellen J. Kullman, DuPont (#72)

Phebe Novakovic, General Dynamics (#92)

Carol M. Meyrowitz, The TJX Companies, Inc. (#125)

Ursula M. Burns, Xerox Corporation (#127)

Sheri S. McCoy, Avon Products Inc. (#234)

Deanna M. Mulligan, Guardian (#250)

Debra L. Reed, Sempra Energy (#266)

Denise M. Morrison, Campbell Soup (#334)

Ilene Gordon, Ingredion Incorproated (#390)

Heather Bresch, Mylan (#396)

Kathleen M. Mazzarella, Graybar Electric (#451)

Mary Agnes (Maggie) Wilderotter, Frontier Communications (#464)

Gracia C. Martore, Gannett (#465)

Marissa Mayer, Yahoo (#483)

Beth E. Mooney, KeyCorp (#499)

Ironically despite being low on this list Marissa Mayer is by far one of the most recognisable, probably because as an attractive woman it's a good brand for Yahoo.

Just in my opinion, but the most interesting thing the article brought up is the attractive lawyer being fired for being incompetent. It seems like a company could get great talent by assessing women independently of their looks and hiring appropriately.

Is the author here? If so, a note:

> What does this have to do with the glut of female leaders?

"Glut" is the wrong word; it means too many. You might replace it with "lack", "dearth", or "paucity".

Another funny fact about the 'halo effect' discussed here: when rating individuals for aptitude on a variety of tasks, straight men have a positive bias towards attractive women, whereas straight women have a negative bias towards attractive women (a kind of 'jealousy' phenomenon). This jealousy phenomenon seems less apparent when it's straight men rating men.

I recall reading about a similar prejudice in the promotion of men. In the case of men it's height not prettiness.

EDIT: simonsarris beat me by 3 minutes wit better data, so I'll throw in another data point. In the past 25 presidential elections the taller or tying candidate won 19 times. Before that it is more even, perhaps because it was harder to see the differences.

Does anyone know of a study on this that breaks down the effect between different types of leadership positions? In particular, I am wondering if positions that involve sales or otherwise interacting with the customers or general public exhibit this phenomenon more strongly than engineering or "internal" positions.

The reason I say this is that it would help identify where the problem really lies. If it affects all categories of work equally, then I would be more likely to say that organizations themselves are basing decisions on attractiveness. On the other hand, if this is affecting people who interact with the public to a greater degree than those who do not, I would point to a broader problem: that perhaps such people are simply more successful at their jobs, because their attractiveness is an asset in their work (which would make a solution pretty tricky).

"What does this have to do with the glut of female leaders?"

"glut" means the opposite of what you think it means.

So the theory presented here is:

=

Attractive women are disproportionately hired and promoted.

Many of these attractive women are not intelligent enough for upper management therefore there is a limit to how high these women reach in an organization.

At the same time, less attractive women languish in the lower rungs, far below their intellectual potential.

Furthermore, this phenomena does not affect men because they are judged based on their ability.

=

Well, there seems to be a lot of assumptions baked into this theory, but one I think is most likely to sink it is this one: Attractive women are, on average, less intelligent and capable than their less attractive counterparts. Seems a bit prejudicial to me.

Edit: You all are right, of course -- I shot from the hip. While it would be relatively easy to fill a single position with someone who is both attractive and intelligent, when taken across a workforce (assuming it is a widespread practice -- widespread enough to skew the curve) you would end up with a smaller pool when taking anything but intelligence into account.

I've got to wonder, though, how ubiquitous it is when hiring for skilled positions that can eventually lead to management and how much those types of factors differ compared to men?

Couple hidden assumptions:

1) Intelligence is a single digit number which can be optimized for, and (even more incredibly unlikely) the interview / hiring process is capable of properly determining and ranking applicants in a ridiculously short amount of time and effort.

2) Beauty (see above, although this isn't as strong of an argument).

I would say based on decades of observation, other than eliminating perhaps the absolute bottom 10% of the population, the overall hiring process especially the interview process is utterly ineffective at determining intelligence or effectiveness. On the other hand, internal promotions either select for that, or brown nosing.

This made the original article rather comical when it claimed hundred of women applied and they seriously think they'll be able to select the smartest?

Clearly, given the proven ineffectiveness overall of corporate hiring process, the average IQ of new hires is going to average 100 or so, regardless if the women are hot or not. So the question becomes given two individuals both IQ of 100 or whatever other ranking system you'd prefer, why do the hot women not get promoted but the men are promoted?

I have a suspicion that there's a cognitive bias at play here, whereby men unconsciously overrate the competence of attractive women and underrate the competence of unattractive women. While I have no evidence to back it up, it does a better job of passing the sniff test than the implicit assertion that men are consciously hiring unqualified women simply because they're attractive.

I feel compelled to include a link to Roy Baumeister's "Is There Anything Good About Men?": http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm. It is possible that there are fewer women in the upper echelons of business because evolutionarily women didn't have to take as many risks as men in order to reproduce. So men are biologically programmed to take risks, and either spectacularly succeed or spectacularly fail. Hence there are more male CEOs, but there are also more male homeless, for example.

Born into the most visible of minorities, I grew up comfortably and amongst the majority while being unable to change how I looked, or pick the family I was born into, or the color of my skin.

The single thing I've seen over and over:

The only way ignorance is destroyed is when we take a minute to turn a stranger into a person by first acknowledging their existence as a member of our human family, and if possible learning a little about them and realizing, they're not that different than us.

Some truths I've yet to disprove about Glass Ceilings:

You can generally only bet on people to pay attention to glass ceilings that also affect them. Too many people don't understand, nor can they empathize very well with those who do.

I've learned to generally ignore every word anyone ever says about diversity of any kind in an organization and only pay attention to the actions.

If their diversity isn't already reflected in management, there's little chance they'll get there.

Discovering Glass Ceilings:

It doesn't seem misleading to feel those who are equally capable but an identifiable minority have to be twice as good in as twice as many ways as others to get half the respect. You get the idea.

I've spoken as an expert for a particular enterprise and government grade tool across North America. Imagine the biggest corporations and government departments in one room. Get some nice exposure, recognition, people even keep in touch..

Still, my oldest clients are the best, teach me so much about life and living, and I couldn't ask for anything more as I move forward.

Glass ceilings as fuel:

I figure getting where you want to go with hardwork is fine. It only helps build my entrepreneurial hustle.

Sometimes there's a few more bridges for me to build if someone hasn't dealt with someone who is "like them".

On the whole, I find this helps me build my ability to connect to people's needs that much better

To those who find glass ceilings:

Decide if you want to break through it. You can. (Often if you're not the first, you will be the last to try).

On the other hand, if you're that high caliber, you can probably start your own organization (and probably should). It's not to say going on your own is any easier -- you just have more ability to find the people who see life and the world like you do. Life is crazy anyways, having better people around makes the extremely tough balance out with the extremely good.

I understand this may be heavy maybe for some, but life with depth is where meaning and fulfillment is.

If anyone wants to chat about this and is afraid of being painted as a *-ist, feel free to contact me offline or reply here. If it makes you feel more comfortable, I can offer immunity/protection for what may seem like poorly worded questions (but are often well intended).

To me, the main point has to do with the unseen consequences / victims. It's similar to situations where the government creates winners in an industry, where people applaud the act of job creations, but nobody sees the lost opportunities elsewhere because they are not easily identifiable.

>In reality, she was not qualified for the job. Literally hundreds of other women had applied, many of whom would have been more competent. The real injustice was not hiring one of them in the first place.

I'm no expert, but this hasn't convinced me yet:

1. The author shows one anecdotal example of the effect being claimed, and then claims that it's a large factor based again, on wholly anecdotal factors. 2. The author uses as evidence that two CEOs that they can think of are attractive. I don't need to go into the statistics to point out how ridiculous this is. 3. Of CEOs who are women, there aren't any exceptional levels of beauty present, v everywhere else in the world. 4. There are several more likely explanations for this effect than this one. 5. That attractiveness is correlated with pay doesn't mean that attractiveness is being selected for. It can also imply that self-confident people are more likely to be successful, which I believe studies have shown in the past. 6. While claiming not to, this article feeds into the narrative of 'attractive women must be stupid,' by implying that attractive women, having clearly been selected for their attractiveness, will tend to be less intelligent.

I'm not saying this isn't something that happens. I'm stating that I'm not convinced attractive women getting hired is a primary problem, rather than, perhaps, sexism in hiring and promoting practices, which has been demonstrated at just about every level of employment.

This is a ridiculously hard issue to discuss, especially with anyone who identifies with a group they feel has been victimized. Which can stretch to almost anyone these days.

The only thing I wanted to add here is that the article & subsequent discussion seems to be about whether or not it's acceptable for men/women/other to be judged based on anything except their competence. I think that's what can make this topic tricky - because companies, in my (admittedly limited) experience don't just hire based on competence.

Most people would think it was acceptable not to hire someone because they didn't "fit" with the company's culture. Maybe they were a jerk, maybe they were hugely arrogant, maybe they didn't shower, maybe they showed up in a three-piece suit to your shorts and flip-flops interview, whatever it is. So really this whole discussion ought to be about what things are acceptable to discriminate against to determine "fit" and what things aren't.

Which I think requires taking a look at what it means to assess someone for "fit" - because I can see how easy it is for "attractiveness" to be a part of that definition. So should it not be? What should - and on what grounds? I think the discussion becomes subjective quite quickly...which is what makes it all so hard to discuss.

The author mentioned only two top females Marissa Mayer and Belinda Stronach. How about the very successful Chanda Zaveri we just had a post about? http://www.telegraphindia.com/1130126/jsp/calcutta/story_164...

I'm not saying looks don't affect interviews, I think they do, but I'd like to see a little more investigation and a little less assumption.

I haven't had a long career but I've heard quite a few times "Hey, we'll have a girl onboard!". My initial concern is usually, I'll admit (is she cute?) but I don't like to look like an asshole so I ask "Is she good?". Almost everytime, someone tells me that "it doesn't matter".

So yes, the article is right, some women get hired for their looks regardless of what they do.

I think change will be exponential. For example, look at the change in the makeup of Canadian provincial premiers. All 10 premiers were men 20 years ago, but now: Ontario: Kathleen Wynn (Last weekend) Quebec: Pauline Marois (September 2012) Alberta: Alison Redford (October 2011) British Columbia: Rita Johnston (1991), Christy Clark (March 2011)

In my experience, all women that could advance and take a senior/executive/managerial positions declined to do so,because the increased responsibilities that would come with their new position were too much, especially since most of them were young and had a child within the last 5-6 years. It was the case for 100% women I know, both my friends and in my family.

Part of the problem is that we mostly don't know how good managers do what they do (and they don't either).

Their knowledge is tacit. And we have to make a tacit judgement when hiring -- which means that memes about gender necessarily exert an unquantifiable influence.

What's the point of hiring based on attractiveness? What's the probability of one actually getting the drawers? Everyone can't be Keith Rabois you know....

250 words and he said nothing.

I'm getting so sick of tripe like this that thinks men and women want the same things in their lives and careers. I would like to know:

- Of the working men and women, how many actually want these executive positions?

Anecdotal, but in my experience smart girls are uglier and cute girls are stupider.

This is verified by comparing 2 groups: nightclub girls and science research nerd girls.

As a group the nerd girls are uglier on average, because there are several severely plain nerd girls, though an individual nerd girl may be very attractive.

As a group the disco girls are stupider on average, because there are several severely ditzy disco girls, though an individual disco girl may have brains.

I believe the reason for this is that it takes effort to make yourself attractive, just as it takes effort to make yourself smart, so there is a trade off.

Explain Meg Whitman...

If you do a google image search for "pictures of fortune 500 ceos" you will see that most of the women coming up are just as ugly as the men. I think this has more to do with the industry attracting people who are ugly on the inside and by the time they get to the top they just say "fuck it" and let their monstrousness show.