Article You, Me, or Her: Leaders ’ Perceptions of Responsibility for Increasing Gender Diversity in STEM Departments

We examined how university leaders described what and who needed to change in order to increase the representation of female faculty in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) departments. Thirty-one (28 men and 3 women) STEM departmental chairs and deans at a large, public university participated in semi-structured interviews. Data were examined using both qualitative and quantitative procedures. Analysis focused on participants ’ descriptions of responsibility for changes related to gender equity. Using the distinction of high versus low responsibility, themes were examined for their qualitative characteristics as well as their frequency. Leaders who exhibited high personal responsibility most frequently saw themselves as needing to change and also named their male colleagues as concurrently responsible for diversity. Conversely, leaders who exhibited low personal responsibility most frequently described female faculty as responsible and described women’s attitudes and their ‘‘choice’ ’ to have a family as obstacles to gender diversity in STEM. We argue that the dimensions of high and low responsibility are useful additions to discussions of leadership, workplace diversity initiatives, and gender equity more broadly. To this end, we provide several methodological tools to examine these subtle, yet essential, aspects of how diversity and change efforts are imagined and discussed. Keywords sexism, employment discrimination, leadership, responsibility, attribution, diversity in the workplace Women can only do so much. We can teach and mentor well, open doors when we have some institutional power, advocate for change in admission and harassment policies, for example. But nothing will really change unless and until more of our male col-leagues begin to use their male privilege in very different ways. The burden clearly rests with them, and I hope that they assume the responsibility. Professor of Philosophy Peg O’Connor, 2013 Research has helped us understand the various attitudes, struc-tures, and biases that systematically reduce the number of women and/or the importance of women in workplace envir