Although the trend is slowly, slowly reversing since 1953 when Gallup first asked this question, there’s still a 2-to-1 ratio of people who say they would rather have a male boss than a female boss. Much of this is attributed to the stereotypes and double-standards women face in leadership positions.
Gender Watch
“When you know better you do better.” ― Maya Angelou
Dr. Johnson,
Interesting post! As a tennis player, I have had many different tennis coaches throughout my career (which is much like having a boss.) These coaches have been both male and female. Some of these coaches I have liked and others I have not. Without naming any specific names, I had a male coach who was a phenomenal player in his younger days and had many accomplishments. I thought he would be an amazing coach as well. Unfortunately, I was wrong. He was very quiet, did not pump me up and didn’t seem to want to help me get better. It was very frustrating, just like having a bad boss would be. This begin said, I had a female coach at one point who was also an amazing college tennis player and she was an amazing coach. I worked with her for several months and could see improvement in my game and I really enjoyed her (she then had to leave because she found another job). So, I have given the exact opposite response to an article like this or that most Americans may give. I didn’t enjoy my male coach while I enjoyed my female coach. I would like to add that I did have male coaches in the past that I really did enjoy so I am not being biased in anyway just giving an example. In closing, I think we need to look past whether the person is male or female and look at their credentials and then accept that they are the boss. If you get in there and they are crazy, who says you have to stay? There are other jobs, but don’t judge someone based on their biological gender and think you know exactly how they will be, because you don’t. Not until you work for them (or get coached).
I thought this was an interesting post because something along the same lines happened with my soccer team.
In the spring of 2013, Steve Brdarski, more commonly known around Longwood as Coach Steve, got an amazing opportunity to become the head coach at St. Bonaventure University in New York State. But this could only mean one other thing: the women’s soccer team needed a new coach. But no one could replace Steve. But after a few cries and hugs goodbye, we, as a team stated searching for a new coach. The women’s soccer team is like one big family so this would be a family democratic assessment. Well, almost. Dyer would make the final decision but he wanted everyone’s input. So there came the basic questions: do we want a male or female? Do we want old or young? On and on these questions came from coach but the one that had the most controversy was the one about having a male or female coach. A lot of us wanted a male coach because with Steve and Dyer that was what was normal to us. But when Dyer started asking us if we would mind a female coach, we said yes. Like in this article, we were afraid that a female coach or boss would micromanage everything or would be passive aggressive, just simple things like that. This seems to be a more popular theme than I realized. Another thing we felt was that we wouldn’t respect a female coach as we would a male one because we knew (being females) that females, when in a leadership role, sometimes become a little aggressive when proving dominance. We didn’t want a female coach to have to do that; because there were a few of us who would make it extremely tough on her. But Dyer said we might have to make an acceptation because a lot of the applicants were females. Dyer also pointed out to us that we wouldn’t want to be discriminated against later in our lives simply because we were female. We hadn’t thought about it this way, we were simply thinking about soccer. So we had a few female coaches come and visit with the team and all of them were really nice, but they just didn’t quite click with the WOSO family.
In the end, we got Coach Rich, who is not passive-aggressive, but he does micromanage, but we’ve found it’s a good thing because if he didn’t some of us would not have eaten on away trips. The simplest, yet comical, way this situation was broken down was by a teammate when she said, “We just want a crazy uncle who hangs out with dad, not an evil stepmother.”
I thought this was an interesting post because something along the same lines happened with my soccer team.
In the spring of 2013, Steve Brdarski, more commonly known around Longwood as Coach Steve, got an amazing opportunity to become the head coach at St. Bonaventure University in New York State. But this could only mean one other thing: the women’s soccer team needed a new coach. But no one could replace Steve. But after a few cries and hugs goodbye, we, as a team stated searching for a new coach. The women’s soccer team is like one big family so this would be a family democratic assessment. Well, almost. Dyer would make the final decision but he wanted everyone’s input. So there came the basic questions: do we want a male or female? Do we want old or young? On and on these questions came from coach but the one that had the most controversy was the one about having a male or female coach. A lot of us wanted a male coach because with Steve and Dyer that was what was normal to us. But when Dyer started asking us if we would mind a female coach, we said yes. Like in this article, we were afraid that a female coach or boss would micromanage everything or would be passive aggressive, just simple things like that. This seems to be a more popular theme than I realized. Another thing we felt was that we wouldn’t respect a female coach as we would a male one because we knew (being females) that females, when in a leadership role, sometimes become a little aggressive when proving dominance. We didn’t want a female coach to have to do that; because there were a few of us who would make it extremely tough on her. But Dyer said we might have to make an acceptation because a lot of the applicants were females. But instead we ended up with Coach Rich, who is not passive-aggressive, he does micromanage, but it’s good because if he didn’t some of us would not have eaten on away trips. The simplest, yet comical, way this situation was broken down was by a teammate when she said, “We just want a crazy uncle who hangs out with dad, not an evil stepmother.”