The queen bee: A myth? The effect of top-level female leadership on subordinate females

We investigate the effect of female leadership on gender differences in public and private organizations. Our research used a sample of 8.3 million organizations distributed over 5600 Brazilian municipalities. Our main results show that when municipalities in which a woman was elected leader (treatment group) are compared with municipalities in which a male was elected leader (control group) there was an increase in the number of top and middle managers in public organizations. Two aspects contribute to the results: time and command/role model. Our work contributes to the literature on leadership by addressing some specific issues: an empirical investigation with a causal effect between the variables (regression-discontinuity design – a non-parametric estimation), the importance of role models, and how the observed effects are time-dependent. Insofar as public organizations are concerned, the evidence from our large-scale study suggests that the queen bee phenomenon may be a myth; instead, of keeping subordinate women at bay, our results show that women leaders who are afforded much managerial discretion behave in a benevolent manner toward subordinate women. The term “Regal Leader” instead of “Queen Bee” is thus a more appropriate characterization of women in top positions of power.

本研究旨在探讨女性领导力对公共与私营组织内性别差异的影响。本研究的样本覆盖巴西5600个市镇的830万家组织。核心研究结果表明：将女性当选为领导者的市镇（处理组（treatment group））与男性当选为领导者的市镇（对照组（control group））进行对比后发现，公共组织中的高层与中层管理人员数量均有所提升。该结果可归因于两大核心因素：时间效应与指挥示范及角色榜样效应。本研究通过以下三方面具体议题丰富了领导力领域的研究文献：一是采用断点回归设计（Regression Discontinuity Design，RDD）——一种非参数估计方法——开展变量间因果效应的实证研究；二是验证了角色榜样的重要性；三是揭示了观测效应的时间依赖性。针对公共组织而言，本大规模研究的证据表明，"蜂王现象"（Queen Bee Phenomenon）或仅为一种迷思：研究结果显示，拥有充分管理自主权的女性领导者并不会排挤下属女性，反而会对其施以善意。因此，用"君王型领导者"（Regal Leader）而非"蜂王型领导者"来形容身处高层权力岗位的女性，是更为恰当的表述。