Research: Why Gender Bias Persists, Even When Organizations Try to Curb It

New research provides insight into why there’s been little progress on advancing women to leadership positions. The authors worked with a professional services firm, which implemented training to reduce manager bias in performance evaluations. They found that although managers were able to curb differences in how they described employees’ traits and behaviors (“viewing biases”), they were unlikely to catch differences in how they rewarded employees for those traits and behaviors (“valuing biases”). They explore why those biases persist and provide strategies for company leaders to mitigate those biases throughout the employee life cycle.