Gender

Rethink What You “Know” About High-Achieving Women

A survey of Harvard Business School graduates sheds new light on what happens to women—and men—after business school.

by

and

Colleen Ammerman

by

and

Colleen Ammerman

From the Magazine (December 2014) · Long read

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM SWISS-IMAGE.CH/PHOTO BY JOLANDA FLUBACHER

Summary.

On the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the admission of women to Harvard Business School’s MBA program, the authors, who have spent more than 20 years studying professional women, set out to learn what HBS graduates had to say about work and family and how their experiences, attitudes, and decisions might shed light on prevailing controversies. What their comprehensive survey revealed suggests that the conventional wisdom about women’s careers doesn’t always square with reality.

The survey showed, for instance, that:

The highly educated, ambitious women and men of HBS don’t differ much in terms of what they value and hope for in their lives and careers.

It simply isn’t true that a large proportion of HBS alumnae have “opted out” to care for children.

Going part-time or taking a career break to care for children doesn’t explain the gender gap in senior management.

The vast majority of women anticipated that their careers would rank equally with those of their partners. Many of them were disappointed.

It is now time, the authors write, for companies to consider how they can institutionalize a level playing field for all employees, including caregivers of both genders. The misguided assumption that high-potential women are “riskier” hires than their male peers because they are apt to discard their careers after parenthood has become yet another bias for women to contend with.

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Idea in Brief

The Research

A comprehensive survey of Harvard Business School graduates—men and women—suggests that the conventional wisdom about women and leadership needs to be rethought.

Some Findings

Men and women start out with similar goals, which are adjusted over time—but men are likelier to achieve them.

Few women are “opting out,” but men and women alike believe that women advance more slowly because they prioritize family over career.

Most men expect that their careers will take precedence over their partners’—which they usually do. Most women expect their careers to be as important as their partners’—and they are often disappointed.

Women are consistently less satisfied than men with their careers and with the compatibility of work and family.

As researchers who have spent more than 20 years studying professional women, we have watched with interest the recent surge in attention paid to women’s careers, work-family conflict, and the gender gap in leadership. Among the most visible contributions to this public conversation have been Anne-Marie Slaughter’s 2012 Atlantic article “Why Women Still Can’t Have it All” and Sheryl Sandberg’s book Lean In, both of which ignited fierce public debate.

A version of this article appeared in the December 2014 issue of Harvard Business Review.

RE

Robin J. Ely is the Diane Doerge Wilson Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School and the faculty chair of the HBS Gender Initiative.
Pamela Stone is a professor of sociology at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and the author of Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home.
Colleen Ammerman is the director of the Race, Gender & Equity Initiative at Harvard Business School and the coauthor, with Boris Groysberg, of Glass Half-Broken: Shattering the Barriers That Still Hold Women Back at Work (Harvard Business Review Press, 2021).

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Rethink What You “Know” About High-Achieving Women

Idea in Brief

The Research

Some Findings

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