Women, leadership, and empowerment

This paper is a review of leadership research, focusing primarily on women as leaders. The more recent perspective of studying leaders by examining followers is included; but research is sparse as to how leaders are perceived as empowering by their subordinates. A study in progress, conducted by Denmark, Nielson, and Scholl, indicates that stereotypes were more typically held by women against female leaders. However, a leader’s ability to be empowering varies with status. The higher the status, the more empowering that individual is perceived, whether fe-male or male. Yet, more men than women held higher status positions. More women are needed in high-level positions to better assess leader-ship and empowerment. Leadership has many definitions. There is no clearcut agreement on the meaning of leadership to include all circumstances, particularly because the emergence of leaders is often situational, sometimes temporary and sometimes permanent (Spotts, 1976). Leadership was defined by Miche-ner, DeLamater, and Schwartz (1990) as a process that takes place in groups in which one member influences and controls the behavior of the other members toward some common goal. Key elements for successful group performance include the leader’s ability to plan, organize, and con-trol the activities of the group (Michener et al., 1990). Others have stated that leaders possess certain innate personality traits or particular skills that make them leaders. Despite the many attempts at definition, all leadership theories have one element in common, that is, a leader is one who exert