Table of Contents
Is Your Organization Collegiality-Challenged?
A Case Study Demonstrating
The Effect of Unconscious Gender Bias
Deborah Campbell
Master’s Candidate
University of Bergen
Bergen, Norway
deborah-campbell@comcast.net
Peter S. Hovmand, Ph.D.
George Warren Brown School of Social Work
Washington University in St. Louis
Campus Box 1196
One Brookings Drive
St. Louis, MO 63130
phovmand@wustl.edu
Most people conceptualize gender bias in terms of individual behavior —
men discriminating against women. This creates a tendency for men to feel
personally blamed for gender bias. Yet feminist theories emphasize that gender
bias is the resulting behavior of a cultural system, not individuals, and this system
influences the behavior of both men and women. System dynamics has often been
used to understand the systemic nature of social problems and clarify social
theory, but has not yet been applied to a feminist theory of gender bias. Using a
simple organizational case study, we describe and explore a feminist theory of the
systemic nature of gender bias with system dynamics. The paper introduces key
concepts, demonstrates how system dynamics clarifies the theory’s systemic issues
and potential solutions, and suggests how this new way to view gender bias might
improve the collegiality of our personal and professional relationships for the long
term.
Despite progress in the United States toward the goal of achieving social and
economic equality between women and men during the last 30 years, women
continue to be underrepresented in the majority of higher paying occupations,
politics, and corporate leadership. Women still face a wage gap relative to men, in
the year 2000 earning on average 73% of what men earn, up from 61% in 1960
(Census Bureau, 2001). Even women who enter higher paying occupations with
comparable levels of education and skills to men still earn less, even in professions
with more women such as accounting (Census Bureau, 2001). In 2004, women hold
14% of the seats in the U. S. Congress, 25% of state executive offices, 22% of state
legislator positions, and 15% of mayoral positions for cities with populations over
100,000 (Center for American Women and Politics, 2004).
1 Job Discrimination as a Dynamic and Systemic Problem
Direct or indirect discrimination has been cited as one contributing
explanation for why the wage gap between women and men persists (U. S. General
Accounting Office, 2003) and why women are not proportionately represented in
leadership positions and higher paying occupations. Job discrimination is
commonly understood in terms of biased attitudes and behaviors, and though
flagrant discrimination still happens, discriminatory conduct is often hidden and
sometimes unintentional (United States Commission on Civil Rights, 1981). Such
acts build on and reinforce stereotypes, deny educational and economic
opportunities to certain groups, and perpetuate discrimination independently of
whether or not the acts were intentional (United States Commission on Civil
Rights). Discrimination in this sense can take many forms, including differences in
societal expectations, preferences to hire and promote men, policies that
disadvantage women, and workplace practices that favor the ideal worker norms of
men (U. S. General Accounting Office, 2003).
Yet, societal attitudes toward women’s social and economic participation in
the United States have changed significantly over the last 30 years. This would
seem to present a paradox of sorts: Why does job discrimination persist despite
enlightened attitudes toward women’s participation in professional occupations?
There are various arguments offered for this. One popular argument is that
U.S. culture is not so enlightened after all, and that what was once overt sex
discrimination has now taken on a more subtle and covert form. What men learned
from feminists, sexual harassment policies and litigation, and mass media, the
argument goes, was not how to stop discriminating against women, but how to
conceal discrimination more effectively. Hence, men are still intentionally
promoting and endorsing discrimination against women. Another argument points
to innate differences between women and men that “naturally” structure gender
roles within work and family. Thus they argue that biology has been the major
constraint, and changes in societal attitudes have simply added to the unrealistic
social expectations that women can succeed at work while having a family. Still
others simply argue that while attitudes have changed relatively quickly, changing
the demographics of occupations will take much longer.
All of these arguments rely on an oversimplified mental model of
discrimination, where discrimination is solely the outcome of individual attitudes.
Change the individual attitudes and the pattern will eventually change. If the
pattern is not changing, then the problem must be that (a) individual attitudes are
not really changing, (b) individual attitudes are not changing fast enough, or (c)
people had unrealistic expectations. What all of these options fail to recognize is
the possibility that most discrimination happens not because of individual attitudes,
but primarily as the result of social structure -- a system of social mechanisms.
Specifically, patterns of inequality can persist over time through seemingly neutral
social mechanisms or feedback loops, a theory that has been extensively written
about by feminists such as MacKinnon (1989), but largely ignored in the dominant
discourse on individual attitudes. Individuals can have all the right attitudes, make
apparently all the right individual choices, while the collective action continues to
result in persistent discrimination. Job discrimination is
often reinforced by the well-established rules, policies, and practices of
organizations. These actions are often regarded simply as part of the
organization's way of doing business and are carried out by individuals as just
part of their day’s work. (United States Commission on Civil Rights, p. 11)
Such discrimination is not a static or an isolated phenomenon, but feeds on itself in
self-perpetuating cycles (United States Commission on Civil Rights). Thus,
discrimination is an inherently dynamic and systemic social phenomenon.
This paper has two goals. The first is a research goal: to determine if the
social structure driving gender bias, as described by feminist theory, can be
represented using system dynamics, and if so (or even if not), can we learn
something beneficial about the theory? To achieve this goal, we have described a
problem that drives feminist theory, the disproportionate pay and representation of
women in traditionally male occupations. The paper continues by presenting core
concepts of feminist theory, including examples of gender bias, how gender bias is
manifested in social structure, and how social structure creates the problem
behavior. To facilitate this, we have chosen a particular problem context on which
to focus: job discrimination based on gender bias in an organization.
Specifically, we represent in the form of causal loop diagrams a feminist
theory that job discrimination can be explained in terms of systemic processes
without the need to use variables representing malevolent intentions. That is, the
theory argues that job discrimination can be understood strictly as a structural
phenomenon without having to include individual agents who deliberately intend
to subordinate women and curtail their economic opportunities. More broadly, we
hope to show through this case study of job discrimination that feminist theory of
gender bias, described in terms of patriarchy, is compatible with a system
dynamics representation.
The second goal of our paper is both a professional and personal one: to
raise awareness of the systemic nature of gender bias as described by feminist
theory. As feminists, we believe systemic gender bias is a major barrier to
collegiality in organizations, and that the first step to overcoming this barrier is to
construct new mental models of gender bias as primarily systemic in origin, to
eliminate the pitfalls of current mental models that reduce aggregate patterns of
behavior to individual behavior and intents. Therefore, the implications of gender
bias on collegiality are surfaced at different points within the paper, to add
generally to the constructive dialogue on collegiality during this conference, and
more specifically to our consideration of women’s participation in the System
Dynamics Society.
2 Representing Feminist Theory using System Dynamics
It is not obvious whether one can adequately represent feminist theories
using system dynamics. Feminist theory is arguably a biased theory with a
particular political outcome in mind, which might generally be described as the
improvement of women’s political, economic, and social lives from the perspective
that women are, and should be treated as, full members of society. Thus, much of
feminist theory is concerned with understanding in what ways and how women are
not being treated as full participants, as well as developing and evaluating possible
solutions. Feminist theory does not exist as a single unified framework, but as a
constellation of theories across a wide range of participants, from feminist activists
in developing nations to academic feminists in nearly every discipline. Some
would thus prefer referring to feminist theory as feminist theories, and feminism as
feminisms.
That a theory is biased should not be confused with a theory not being
objective. In system dynamics, theories or models! are useful simplifications of
reality because they help us focus in on the essential aspects of some problem. All
system dynamics models are therefore biased in some way. The question is
therefore not whether a theory is biased, but whether or not a theory helps us see
the aspects of some problem essential to finding a solution. But all system
dynamics models are, in their formal expression as a computer simulation,
objective in the sense that others can evaluate the conclusions based on the model
by replicating and extending the simulation experiments.
Theories can be biased in any number of ways, from their ontological
assumptions through the selection criteria of supporting and disconfirming cases.
In system dynamics, one might tend to think of biases in terms of some feedback
loops being explicitly included while others are ignored. To address this, one
' The terms theory and model will be used interchangeably throughout this paper. Some might object to this,
pointing to differences between theories and models. However, in system dynamics a theory is usually thought of
and evaluated as a formal system dynamics model.
would seek to include a more complete’ set of feedback loops and evaluate their
relative impact on the qualitative behavior of a system. Other biases would include
the stock-flow ontology, endogenous perspective, and assumptions involved with
representing concepts as quantified variables. All of these biases pertain to
concepts entailed within system dynamics (as opposed to prejudices of its
practitioners). If it is more difficult to represent feminist theories of job
discrimination in system dynamics than organizational theories of business
problems because of such biases, then it points to potential limitations in how we
evaluate system dynamics in organizational theory.
The aim of this paper is not to compare and contrast a feminist theory of job
discrimination with other theories of job discrimination using system dynamics.
Such a comparison would assume that one could fairly and adequately represent
terms from feminist theory in system dynamics. Lane (2001) has noted the
difficulty of translating terms from social theory into formal system dynamics
models. Rather, the aim is more modest and exploratory: to simply understand
what issues arise as one takes a problem pressing to feminists (job discrimination)
and tries to model that problem in system dynamics. Thus, we are not seeking to
prove feminist theory (as the authors, we already align ourselves as feminists), but
to understand the possibilities and limitations of system dynamics for developing
better feminist social theories. Concepts in the remainder of the paper are therefore
defined from this decidedly feminist perspective.
3 Structure, Individual Attitudes, and Individual Agency
In this paper, we are primarily interested in understanding to what extent job
discrimination can be understood only in terms of structure. That is, we are
interested in pushing what we think is a structural theory to its limits. Social
structure is a set of social mechanisms that gives rise to a pattern in aggregated
individual behavior. Social structure is in this sense an abstraction, and only exists
to the extent that individuals behave in ways that collectively generate the larger
pattern.
A case in point is the chivalrous act of a man holding a door open for a
woman. There is an individual act by a man with usually benign intentions. Then
there is the aggregate behavior pattern that women experience that has the effect of
communicating gender role expectations and their associated capabilities. No
individual man is required to think that he is reinforcing a stereotype of women as
? The notion of completeness operating here presupposes that key feedback mechanisms have been excluded. That
is, if someone has not included all of the relevant feedback loops, then a model is incomplete and biased. However,
system dynamics does not have a general notion of completeness because system dynamics does not employ a
concept like the set of all feedback loops. Instead, the set of all relevant feedback loops is evaluated pragmatically
with respect to a particular problem.
needing the assistance of men to reproduce the pattern. He might do so out of
respectful intentions or unconscious habit. However, focusing on individual
motivations or actions represents a basic misunderstanding of the pattern and its
consequences for women.
One can point to other examples as well. A neighbor might not recycle
plastics, papers, glass, and other materials. Perhaps the person’s intentions are to
fill up the landfills faster and contribute to global destruction. However, it’s
probably more likely that the person is either indifferent or unaware of how their
individual actions contribute to an aggregate pattern of behavior that will have
environmental consequences. Again, focusing on the individual motivations or
actions misses the point one is usually trying to raise when focusing on the
consequences of the aggregated behaviors.
This does not mean that individual attitudes, choices, and actions do not
come into play. Individuals can and do influence structure through collective
action. And individuals do make a difference in their local environments by how
they behave. It does, after all, make a difference in some people’s lives whether or
not a man confronts a male colleague’s sexist joke or views a promotion decision
fairly. Thus, there is still a role for individual responsibility. The problem arises,
however, when people believe that paying attention to one’s own individual
attitudes is sufficient.
What this means is that one can no longer simply assume that changing
attitudes will be sufficient for eliminating discrimination or bringing parity to the
organization’s demographics. Moreover, enthusiastically recruiting women into an
organization, while necessary, might be insufficient for transforming the actual
practices within the organization. One can have, without a structural analysis, the
best of intentions and yet fail miserably as an organization in working toward the
goal of increasing women’s participation. Consider then the following case study
of an organization wanting to increase the participation of women in a male
dominated field such as engineering, business, or system dynamics. The
organization’s leaders want to know: “How can we increase the percentage of
women employees in our organization?”
4 A Note on Language in Feminist Theories
J. L. Austin once noted about language that while philosophers might want
to develop their own meanings for words such as ‘real’ and ‘truth’ and express
disdain at the lay person’s use of such terms, all philosophers must start with the
ordinary use. A similar thing can be said about the language for naming
discrimination for the organization wanting to increase the number of female
employees. Inevitably, one might want to use (or avoid for obverse reasons) words
like ‘sexism’ and ‘patriarchy’ to describe aspects of discrimination. Such terms
arrive loaded with negative content in their ordinary use. To either ignore the
words or ignore the fact that people come with preconceived meanings for them
would be a mistake. Thus, it is helpful to both acknowledge the potential
differences in associated meanings and be explicit about how the terms are used
within this paper.
Gender-based discrimination is usually discussed in conjunction with
concepts like sexism and the oppression of women by men. The terms ‘women’
and ‘men’ in this context are aggregates and refer to social groups (Young, 1990).
Social groups are constructions. While there might be various objective ways of
differentiating people into two categories (e.g. blue eyes and brown eyes), there is
no assumed relationship between the categories. But with socially constructed
categories, there is a relationship attached (e.g., male/female, white/black, upper-
class/lower-class). One finds oneself in a social group, as opposed to choosing a
group. There is, as Young points out, a quality of thrown-ness.
The oppression of women by men is not at the level of an individual man
oppressing an individual woman, but at the level of men as a social group defining
and participating in a pattern of behaviors that collectively subordinate women as a
social group. An individual woman will find herself having to contend with the
pattern of behaviors of the group, from men holding doors to sexist humor, to
threat of rape and domestic violence. Sexism is thus a structural power relationship
between women as a group and men as a group.
Johnson describes a society as not just a collection of men and women, but
also the system structure of shared meanings and relationships in which they
participate (1997). He and others refer to this system structure as culture -- “the
system of values, beliefs, shared meanings, norms and traditions that distinguish
one group of people from another” (Cox, 1994, p. 161; Thomas, 1991). Lane,
summarizing and quoting Giddens’ structuration theory, states that this system
structure “is the term used to describe the rules that shape social actions” (2001, p.
297). While culture is only manifested in and through the activities of individual
men and women, it is the observable patterns of interaction, the meaning that is
attributed to them, and the fact that they become perceived as objective rules of
behavior that separates culture from individuals within society (Lane, 2001). A
fundamental characteristic of culture is that most of the rules (shared meanings,
assumptions) are invisible and unexamined (Johnson, 1997; Thomas, 1991). This
makes culture like water to fish — a social environment that we take for granted.
The term ‘patriarchy’ is often closely associated with the term ‘sexism’, as
sexist behavior is a result of patriarchy. A patriarchy is a kind of society in which
the cultural rules for the behavior of both women and men favor men. A
patriarchal society is one in which positions of leadership and influence are held
primarily by men. This results in power differences between men and women and
“promotes the idea that men are superior to women ... because we don’t
distinguish between the superiority of positions in a hierarchy and the kinds of
people who usually occupy them” (Johnson, 1997, p. 5). A patriarchal society is
also one in which the core societal values closely resemble the cultural definitions
of masculinity and the ideal man. As a result, qualities that are culturally defined
as masculine (e.g. control, strength, efficiency, toughness, competitiveness,
decisiveness, and self-sufficiency) are valued, and qualities that are culturally
defined as feminine (e.g. cooperation, equality, sharing, compassion, vulnerability,
emotional expressiveness, and intuitive ways of thinking) are devalued (Johnson,
1997). Thus, a patriarchal society establishes a differentiation between men and
women that perpetuates a deeply rooted cultural assumption that men are superior
to women. Sexism results from mental models built on that assumption.
The idea that men are superior to women is perpetuated by stereotypes --
oversimplified mental models held in common by members of one group about
members of another group. As humans, pattern recognition and categorization are
valuable tools for processing information. Stereotypes are a distorted extension of
this categorization process because they are oversimplified and evaluative. We
have opinions associated with these categories. Stereotypes are not objective (Cox,
1994).
In patriarchal cultures there are stereotypes for both women and men. These
are multi-faceted and complex, yet we can use a collection of personality
characteristics as an example. If we revisit the masculine ideal, we see that the
stereotype for men includes characteristics such as strong, in control, efficient,
tough, competitive, decisive, and self-sufficient. Patriarchal culture is inherently
dualistic. Masculinity and femininity are not defined separately, but as opposites of
each other (see for example, Daly, 1990). Men are the standard, and women are
defined in relationship to men. As a result, the stereotype characteristics for
women include the opposites of the characteristics for men, such as weak, out of
* Note, however, that not all aspects of the feminine are devalued. Women are often prized for their beauty or as
caregivers to children, men and the elderly. As such, they are valued “primarily for their usefulness to men”
(Johnson, 1997, p. 87).
control, inefficient, soft, cooperative, indecisive, and dependent, as well as
characteristics that we devalue (so we do not associate them with men), such as
compassion, caring, and vulnerability. Where women can excel within patriarchy is
the stereotype of the ideal woman, defined by characteristics that identify her in
relationship to men, such as attractive, sexy, and nurturing (all characteristics, by
the way, that are not typically of value in the workplace).
Just as we use any categorization scheme to help us assimilate information,
we use stereotypes as filters to help us respond to distinctions in people. The
problem is that they are mostly inaccurate and they carry opinions with them that
influence our objectivity. “/W]e tend to invoke and act on these categories
automatically, with little awareness of how these assumptions are actually driving
our perceptions and actions” (Senge, 1996, p. 10). Ultimately, both women and
men are injured by such stereotypes.
Feminists, in a movement to end the oppression of women, have sought to
eradicate such stereotypes because of their role in limiting women’s economic and
social opportunities. This emphasis on stereotypes has often been misunderstood
and dismissed as minor. What feminists have identified, however, is the link
between stereotypes as flawed mental models and the underlying social structure
that generates discrimination. The next section will illustrate this relationship
through the case study of an organization within a male dominated field wanting to
increase the number of its women employees.
Collegiality has been defined by the System Dynamics Society’s Call for
Papers as “a harmony that achieves consensus on the issues” and “the congeniality
shared among colleagues”. Webster’s takes it further and based on the historical
meaning of the word, defines collegiality as “the relationship of colleagues” in
which each colleague has approximate equal power and authority. While
collegiality is not a term used regularly in feminist literature, the goal of all
feminist work is to ensure equal power and authority for women in all spheres of
their lives. In the view of feminists, it is the systemic nature of gender bias that
deprives women of equal power and authority. Not until our cultures are bias-free
will we experience collegiality.
5 Case Study of an Organization
Until this point, the paper has provided necessary background for feminist
theories of discrimination: the problems that drive their formation, the terminology
used in describing them, as well as a general description of the theories themselves.
In this section the paper represents these theories using system dynamics, in the
problem context of job discrimination.
The leaders of an organization in some male dominated field want to know:
“How can we increase the percentage of women employees in our organization?”
In combining feminist theory and system dynamics to help us answer this question,
we start with the basics of bringing employees into the organization — the
recruiting and hiring process — and then explore how patriarchy may influence this
process. Afterwards, we look into how employees leave the organization — the
turnover process — exploring the influence of patriarchy on the organization’s
culture, its collegiality, and the potential effect on turnover.
5.1 Hiring
The generic hiring process begins with open positions (see Figure 1). As a
result, the organization begins recruiting. In our example, recruiting is done by
word of mouth (current employees encouraging colleagues from other
organizations or their professional networks to apply), so employees are needed for
recruiting. Recruiting generates a pool of applicants. Applicants are hired and
become employees. This completes the first loop, the recruiting/hiring loop. In
addition, hiring fills open positions. This completes the second loop, the filling
open positions loop. The recruiting/hiring loop is a reinforcing loop which would
continue to generate applicants and add employees if it were not controlled by the
filling open positions loop, a balancing loop, which turns off the recruiting/hiring
mechanism when all the open positions have been filled.
hiring
+
+ fit
rectuiting/hiring
loop
Employees| Applicants
a ¥
+
recruiting filing open
positions loop
+
Open Positions
Figure 1. Generic Hiring with Word of Mouth Recruiting Process
10
actual perceived
characteristics ———— characteristics
attractiveness
of applicants of applicants ———_,._
i s -
of applicants tiring:
cultural filtering desired = -———"
:
system
” characteristics
of applicants Fo icsan
loop
rie Employees| Applicants
Organization's Cultural
Bias to Certain i I
Characteristics
recruiting filing open
positions loop
+
+
Open Positions
Figure 2. Generic Hiring with Attractiveness
Applicants are not generally hired though, just because they apply. It is
important to the organization to hire applicants who they perceive as attractive,
who have the characteristics the organization believes are important for both the
applicant and the organization to be successful. As shown in Figure 2, this
attractiveness is determined by comparing the organization’s desired
characteristics with the perceived characteristics of the applicant. The desired
characteristics of applicants are defined by the cultural bias of the organization
(e.g. they are an engineering-centric organization). Perceived characteristics are
the result of the applicant’s actual characteristics (gleaned from a resume,
interviews, references, etc.) filtered by the organization’s cultural filtering system.
The hiring manager views the applicant’s actual characteristics using filters of
beliefs, values, norms, and shared meanings she and her organization have about
similar people.
While the variables desired, actual, and perceived characteristics, as well as
cultural filtering system may not appear to be labeled dynamically (they do not
increase and decrease naturally), they are defined to be dynamic in an alternative
way. We imagine that each of these variables is an array of generic characteristics,
similar to the personality characteristics described in section 4. The value of the
organization’s cultural bias determines which characteristics are the desired
characteristics and sets those array elements to a value, while the remaining
undesired array elements remain zero. The organization’s cultural bias
additionally weights how accurately the actual characteristics of the applicant are
perceived. The higher the bias, the more likely the applicant’s actual
characteristics will be affected by the cultural filtering system, causing potential
11
misperception (modeled by replacing actual characteristics with stereotype
characteristics). The lower the bias, the more likely the applicant’s actual
characteristics will be perceived as they are. The attractiveness of the applicant is
then determined by the closeness of fit of the two arrays, perceived characteristics
and desired characteristics.
hiring male
Lo employees +
*
Male Male
Employees} Applicants
+
ca sae ¥;
\ eect male
applicants
ie)
% of workforce Positions
that is female >
recruiting female
A applicants
+
Female Female
Employees Applicants
+
%
hiring female
employees
Figure 3. Effect of Gender on Word of Mouth Recruiting and Hiring
To evaluate the effect of gender on hiring, we now split the organization’s
employee pool into male and female employees (see Figure 3). As their goal is to
increase the percentage of their workforce that is female, because currently it is
quite low, we also include this key measurement variable. Here we have
duplicated the original hiring loops, creating one structure for recruiting and hiring
male employees and a mirror structure for recruiting and hiring female employees.
One result of this structure split is an increased awareness to the fact that as
the organization is attempting to recruit female applicants in a male-dominated
field, there will be many fewer females available to recruit. Even if the female
employees have slightly more access to female recruits than the male employees,
for example through professional networks, the organization will be limited by the
number of women in the field their employees know.
The organization’s out-of-balance workforce will likely perpetuate itself
using the current recruiting process. With this problem identified in the word of
mouth recruiting process, the organization will want to consider ways to increase
the female applicant pool or change the hiring process so more women are hired.
This conclusion is consistent with the literature, as this is one use of affirmative
action programs, to increase the applicant pool by using targeted outreach
programs and increase the number of women hired by using hiring goals (Cox,
1994).
stereotype
characteristics of male
applicants ee ae male.
actual characteristics perceived . employees +
of male applicants. > characteristics of __» Attractiveness of
male applicant male applicants a
Male Male
Employees} Applicants|
F,
+
desired recruiting male
characteristics of applicants
_—® applicants
Organization's j
Cultural Bias Open
— % of workforce Portions
that is female -
recruiting female
applicants
‘
Female Female
Employees| Applicants
+
stereotype . .
characteristics of ———____&_ perceive .
female applicants characteristics of Paces ot hiring female
__— female applicants female applicants employees,
actual characteristics
of female applicants
Figure 4. Effect of Gender Bias and Stereotypes on Attractiveness and Hiring
Just as we did in the generic case, let’s now look at the impact of
attractiveness on hiring (the left side of Figure 4). As before, hiring is driven by
the attractiveness of the applicants, based on the match between desired
characteristics and perceived characteristics. But now we have something
different— the potential for the attractiveness of female applicants to be different
from the attractiveness of male applicants. This is due to the possibility of our
cultural filtering system manifesting itself as gender-biased stereotypes. These
stereotypes, different for men and women as discussed earlier, create differences in
13
the perceived characteristics of male and female applicants (Johnson, 1997; Cox,
1994). We say this is possible because it is not a given that this will be true or to
what degree. It depends, just as it did previously, on the bias of the organization
and whether the weight it gives to stereotypes impacts the perception of the
applicant’s actual characteristics. Let’s walk through some various scenarios.
Suppose that an organization’s culture is patriarchal, or biased in favor of
men. Then the desired characteristics of the organization would map closely to the
ideal characteristics of society, or the ideal man. This culture would also reinforce
the use of patriarchal stereotypes. A positive male stereotype, automatically
reinforcing the view that a male will embody certain attractive characteristics,
would increase the attractiveness of the male applicants. And this would be true
whether the hiring manager is a man or a woman, because both are socialized to
follow the same cultural rules. A negative female stereotype, automatically
reinforcing the view that a woman will embody certain unattractive characteristics,
would decrease the attractiveness of the female applicants —especially true if the
desired characteristics of the organization map closely to the ideal characteristics
of society, or the ideal man. Again, this would be true regardless of the gender of
the hiring manager (Johnson 1997; Cox, 1994). * If stereotypes are in play in this
organization, then the possibility exists that a female applicant whose actual
characteristics match the desired characteristics of the organization would be
overlooked because her desirable characteristics would be filtered out by the
stereotype’s influence on perception.
Now suppose that the organization has no cultural bias favoring men or
women. Then the desired characteristics will reflect a set of inclusive traits, and
stereotypes will not play a role in filtering actual characteristics. Stereotypes are
only active when bias exists. As a result, both women and men with actual
characteristics more closely matching the desired characteristics will be hired.
We could also walk through an example of cultural bias in favor of women —
and in the model in Figure 4, the results would be consistent and in favor of
women. A positive female and negative male stereotype would be used and
weighted by the cultural bias favoring women, and the outcome would be a higher
percentage of females hired than males. The next section will explain why
feminist theory believes this is unlikely to happen in actuality, by discussing the
relationship between an organization’s cultural bias and society’s cultural bias.
* Cox cites a specific example of women using gender-biased stereotyping that is illustrative. He describes
interviewing six women randomly chosen for a focus group. All six stated that men made better supervisors than
women. When asked why, they described stereotypical characteristics of women they felt limited a woman’s ability
to be a good supervisor (too emotional, unable to be objective, etc.) (Cox, 1994, p. 97).
14
5.2 Effect of Gender Bias on Collegiality and Turnover
relative status of
; women and men Average Individual
Society's Awareness, Desire,
Cultural Bias Knowedge, and Ability to
Act without Bias
Organization's
Support for Acting
without Bias
e
Organization's
Cultural Bias
Figure 5. The Origins of an Organization’s Cultural Bias
So where does an organization’s cultural bias come from? Denison defines
organizational culture as the “underlying values, beliefs and principles that serve
as a foundation for the organization’s management system, as well as the set of
management practices and behaviors that both exemplify and reinforce those
principles” (quoted in Cox, 1994, p. 161). Cox goes on to describe organizational
cultures as microcultures within larger societal cultures, saying that, for example,
American companies have organizational cultures that are distinctly American. If
we focus on the gender aspects of organizational culture, we can see from Figure 5
that an organization’s cultural bias regarding gender could easily be the same as its
society’s cultural bias regarding gender, if neither the organization’s management
systems or the individuals within the organization were attempting to create any
different behavior. (In this case the relative status of women and men would also
be stable, as will be shown in a moment.)
There are four important influences on an organization’s cultural bias:
society’s cultural bias, the relative status of women and men in the organization,
organizational support for acting without bias, and the average individual’s state of
awareness, desire, knowledge and ability to act without bias (based on Johnson,
1997; Cox, 1994). This relationship is key to the systemic description of feminist
15
theory, because it helps us describe the persistent nature of gender bias even while
individual attitudes have changed. The causal effect of society’s cultural bias and
the current relative status of women to men on the organization’s cultural bias
represents the status quo. Society’s cultural bias and the relative status of women
and men act as controlling forces to keep the organization’s cultural bias within an
acceptable range of variation from society’s cultural bias (based on Johnson,
1997). “Institutions ... control human conduct by setting up predefined patterns of
conduct, which channel in one direction as against the many other directions that
would theoretically be possible” (Berger and Luckmann, quoted in Lane, 2001, p.
295). To affect change requires the increased awareness, desire, knowledge and
ability to act of many individuals as well as the organizational support for them to
act (Cox, 1994).
For example, progress has been made in the last 30 years in raising the
average individual’s awareness to sexual harassment and acts of blatant gender
bias. As there has been organizational support as well, through the creation of
institutions like the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, policy programs
like Affirmative Action, and laws in support of both, cases of sexual harassment
have decreased and blatant workplace discrimination has stabilized (U.S. Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission, 2004). But gender bias is much more than
sexual harassment or the number of women in leadership positions. Gender bias is
incredibly complex, subtle, and ubiquitous in our culture, manifesting itself in our
everyday language, our everyday interactions, and our self-concepts, without us
being aware of it. Addressing gender bias in organizations is like peeling an onion.
It takes a critical mass of individuals with awareness, desire, knowledge and ability
to act, plus organizational support, to begin removing a particular layer, a
particular component of gender bias. The organization will need to go through this
process on each successive layer. In the meantime, resistance from society’s
cultural bias, in the nature of customers or competitors or suppliers who put
pressure on the organization to abide by society’s rules, makes it difficult to
change. It is the ubiquitous nature of gender bias in society, embedded within the
institutions of our patriarchal culture (in our definitions of family, of economics, of
politics and religion), that makes this a chronic, systemic problem, even for
organizations (Johnson, 1997).
We have discussed the potential impact of patriarchy and the resulting
organizational gender bias on the recruiting and hiring process, and now we
discuss the potential effect of patriarchy on women already in the organization.
For this we have developed a separate diagram from our recruiting and hiring
model that connects to that model as we describe below (see Figure 6).
16
Status of Status of
atus of & - ane
+ | Women +
relative status of
women and men Average Individual
Society's Awareness, Desire,
Cultural Bias Knowedge, and Ability to
Act without Bias
Organization's
Support for Acting
Impact of Bias on W's without Bias
perceived
Perceived Performance
Loop
perceived
performance of oy os i
women stereotypes of + 3 performance of
¥— women's performance . stereotypes of men
i p Organization's | men's performance — +
Cultural Bias #
actual performace
of women
Impact of Bias on M's
Perceived Performance
Loop
actual performance
of men
Figure 6. Effect of Gender Bias on Perceived Performance
This portion of the model is connected to the hiring portion of the model by
the variable Organization’s Cultural Bias. The organization’s cultural bias affects
the way women’s and men’s actual performance is perceived by weighting the
stereotypes of performance when the bias is high or low and removing the impact
of stereotypes if the bias is neutral, much like it does to the stereotypes in the
hiring portion of the model. If an organization’s cultural bias favors the perception
of men, the research of Deaux and Emswiller demonstrates that stereotypes are
used in the performance evaluation process, and one of these stereotypes is what a
person’s accomplishments are attributed to, their own ability or external
circumstances. They “found that successful performance by women on tasks
traditionally done by men was attributed to luck, whereas for men it was attributed
more to ability” (quoted in Cox, 1994, p. 96). Since performance ratings based on
ability rather than external circumstance are more likely to lead to promotion, these
attribution stereotypes negatively impact a woman’s potential for promotion.
Stereotypes impact not only the perceived performance of past accomplishments,
but the “preconceptions about the ability or suitability of persons of certain culture
groups [including women] to lead” (Cox, 1994, p. 97). This may be based on or
reinforced by the finding that “both men and women define good management in
ways that are decidedly biased toward traditional male traits” (Cox, 1994, p. 221).
17
The perceived performance variables influence the respective status variables of
the men and women, which represent concepts like average job level, amount of
training, and percentage of promotions (based on Frohman, Morgan, and Pugh,
1978). And finally, as mentioned before, the relative status of women and men in
the organization influences the organization’s cultural bias. These loops, the
impact of bias on perceived performance loops, are reinforcing. Therefore, the
organization’s cultural bias (whether it is high, low, or neutral) is self-perpetuating.
Status of
Status of
+ | Women ay Men! 4
relative status of
_ women and men ‘Average Individual
Society's Awareness, Desire,
Cultural Bias Knowledge, and Ability to
Act without Bias
Organization's
Support for Acting
iced RUSS without Bias Impact of Bias on M's
Parneked Padormence Perceived Performance
. Loop Loop
perceived
performance of <* 7 perceived
women stereotypes of + performance of
S¥— women's performance a stereotypes of inen
* Organization's | men's performance —™ *
Cultural Bias a
actual performace
of women impact of Biason M's actual performance
Actual Performance of men
Loop
Impact of Bias on W's
Actual Performance
+ Loop
+
resources
available to women resources
available to men
Figure 7. Effect of Gender Bias on Actual Performance
In addition to the organization’s cultural bias and its influence on the use of
stereotypes, perceived performance is based on actual performance, which is
heavily impacted by the availability of resources (see Figure 7). Resources within
an organization can range from tangible resources such as money and people, to
the intangible but equally important resources such as cooperation, mentoring, and
access to informal networks. Inequitable resource allocation has been a long-
standing outcome of gender bias throughout the world (see for example, Jacobson,
1992). Exclusion from informal networks or the old boys network is a widely
acknowledged barrier to women’s career success (Cox, 1994).
Allocation and availability of resources to men or women in the organization
is based on the organization’s cultural bias, which is reinforced by their status
18
within the organization. But, their status within the organization is based on their
perceived performance, so again, we have dynamics that are strongly self-
perpetuating. These loops, the impact of cultural bias on actual performance loops,
are also reinforcing. This structure, when societal and organizational cultural
biases are not neutral, is a success to the successful structure (Senge, 1994). Asa
result, if women begin with a low(er) status in this organization, without deliberate
action by the organization their status will not change over time no matter how
well they perform. The structure is designed to reinforce the status quo.
Additionally, even if the status of women were to be rapidly increased (by rapidly
promoting women or hiring into management from the outside, for example), if the
organization’s cultural bias remains high (due to society’s cultural bias or time
delays) it would continue to negatively influence the perceptions of performance.
This, as we describe next, would have repercussions on the goal to increase the
number of women in the organization.
19
Status of
Men
Status of
‘Women
relative status of
women and men ‘Average Individual
Society's Awareness, Desire,
Cultural Bias Knowedge, and Ability to
Act without Bias
Organization's
‘Support for Acting
Impact of Bias on W's without Bias Impact of Bias on Ms
Perceived Performance Perceived Performance
Loop Loop
perceived
performance of aye perceived
women stereotypes of # ? performance of,
stereotypes of neh a
yf TPN xe woinnte poarnes ;
Ps Organization's men's performance —™" *, A
performance gap Cultural Bias + performance gaj
‘experienced by ‘experienced b’
women , en
actual performace
Impact of Bias on W's impact of Bias on M's actual performance
‘of women
Actual Performance Actual Performance of men
+ Loop Loop is
resources
atiractiveness of the available to women 7 __ resources attractiveness of the
organization to available to men organization to men
women
turnover rate
tumover rate for
for men
women
Figure 8. Effect of Gender Bias on Collegiality and Turnover
In addition to the reinforcing structure, there are measurement variables that
employees use to evaluate the attractiveness of the organization to them:
performance gap experienced by women, performance gap experienced by men,
status of women, status of men, and relative status of women and men (see Figure
8). Ifan employee perceives a large gap between his actual performance and the
perception of his performance by management, and this gap continues over time,
he will be dissatisfied. If another employee sees big differences between her status
and the status of others in the organization, especially if she perceives there are no
performance differences, she will be dissatisfied.
This is where we are pressed to wonder, how can ‘collegiality’ exist in an
organization with any cultural bias favoring the perception of men? The answer,
of course, is that it cannot. These models make clear that in an environment with a
cultural bias favoring the perception of men, it will be difficult for women to feel
harmonious and congenial with their male counterparts and certainly impossible
for them to feel they have equal power and authority. Therefore, any gender bias
in an organization reduces that organization’s collegiality, regardless of whether
the bias is intentional or unintentional (based on Johnson, 1997; Cox, 1994).
In addition to the negative impact of an organization’s cultural bias on the
collegiality in the organization, there are implications to the organization’s
20
strategic goal of increasing the number of women in the organization. If the
organization’s cultural bias favors the perception of men and it stays the same, it
maintains an unattractiveness of the organization to women that has an impact on
the number of women leaving, or the female employee turnover. Thus, the
organization’s cultural bias favoring the perception of men can also have an impact
on turnover, which connects the two model portions together again (see the middle
of Figure 9).
stereotype
characteristics of male
applicants agg _ ae hiring male
actual characteristics perceived ‘employees
‘of male applicants. > characteristics of __» attractiveness of
male applicant male applicants -
Male Male
pe Employees| lApplicants|
+
<male employee
tumover>
*
recruiting male
desired
characteristics of applicants
applicants desired number of
ompoes 2
Cultural Bias staffing ga| Open
‘eat wonktoree Positions
that is female -
recruiting female
” applicants
<female employee :
turnover>
~~ _, | Female Female
Employees |Applicants|
+
stereotype *
characteristics of ——___&_ perceived aURSBRVORBESTE Sia frais
female applicants characteristics of
__— female applicants female applicants employees
actual characteristics
of female applicants
Figure 9. Effect of Gender Bias on Recruiting, Hiring and Turnover
This leads us to recognize that the organization needs to be concerned not
only about how its gender bias may affect the inflow of women to the organization,
but also how it will affect the outflow. And it appears, as the feminist literature on
the systemic basis for gender bias posits, that the organization’s cultural bias is a
key leverage point to addressing this problem.
21
stereotype
characteristics of male
applicants rs hiring male.
actual characteristics perceived ; | employees
‘of male applicants. = characteristics of __p-_ altractivenesg of
male applicant male applicahts +
Male Male
Employees| [Applicants
Fi
<male employee
tumover>
desired
characteristics of
applicants
recruiting male
applicants
Positions
recruiting female
applicants
+
desired number of
employees
staffing gal
% of workforce
that is female
<female employe
turnover>
Female Female
| —>|Employees| |Applicants|
+
stereotype ; +
characteristics ofp ————_____ perceiver atractweneecar
female applicants characteristics of female appifeants hiring female
__-—— female applicants Ss employees
actual characteristics
of female applicants
Figure 10. Two Main Leverage Points
One of the most important insights of modeling this case is the clarity with
which we see the two main leverage points of addressing gender bias as described
by feminist theory — there are numbers and norms. In the right-hand box of Figure
10 we have the numbers portion of the model — the place where most emphasis is
traditionally placed in organizations for bringing about change. ““We need more
women in our organization.” And yet, if only the numbers are addressed and not
the norms, not the culture, all we succeed in doing is increasing the number of
women flowing through the organization, not staying and contributing. For all our
effort, we would be right back where we started. And so we must also address the
left-hand box, the norms portion of the model, the organization’s cultural bias.
6 Conclusion
In section 1, we articulated two goals for this paper. First, a research goal:
to determine if the social structure driving gender bias, as described by feminist
theory, can be represented using system dynamics. Second, a professional and
personal goal: to raise awareness of the systemic nature of gender bias as described
by feminist theory — and the significant barrier it is to collegiality. We conclude by
reviewing our progress in achieving these goals.
22
So what were some of the issues that arose when trying to represent feminist
theories in system dynamics for understanding the problem of job discrimination?
What might be some of the possibilities and limitations of using system dynamics
for developing better feminist social theories? The dynamics described in this
paper have been written about extensively in feminist literature, diversity literature,
and government documents on civil rights. However, in the process of developing
these causal loop diagrams, it became apparent that many terms within the
literature were more ambiguous than expected and subject to multiple, conflicting
interpretations. Terms like ‘patriarchal culture’ or ‘sexism’ did not lend themselves
easily to operational definitions within a causal loop diagram. There were also
times when the theory suggested retaining distinctions between concepts that
tended to be indistinguishable in their operational definitions. For example, we
often wanted to distinguish individual bias from organizational bias and cultural
bias, but ran into difficulties when we tried to develop distinct operational
definitions. Both of these issues raise questions about the extent that one can
adequately represent social theory using system dynamics.
The problem here could be (a) the terms being problematically ambiguous,
(b) us (the authors) not adequately grasping the definitions of the terms, or (c) the
additional constraints imposed by system dynamics in an effort to develop a more
rigorous mental model of job discrimination. That there is not a single unified
framework within feminist theory makes it even more difficult to assess to what
extent one is using the terms correctly within a particular discourse. Describing job
discrimination, one writer might emphasize ‘patriarchal culture’, and another might
stress the dynamics of ‘sexism’ and ‘oppression’. One might hope that there is a
way of synthesizing these different terms within a unified system dynamics model.
However, it appears that there are enough differences to make such a synthesis
difficult if not impossible.
It is entirely possible that we did not get the feminist theory right. It could be
that if one has a clear understanding of a term like ‘patriarchal culture’, then the
problems we mentioned disappear. For example, one might then be able to readily
provide operational definitions for ‘patriarchal culture’ and ‘sexism’ that are
distinct from each other. This is always a risk and the topic of frequent critiques.
What is perhaps more interesting here is how we become aware of our need to
define terms more precisely or resolve confusions as the authors trying to
formulate a feminist theory within system dynamics. That is, one does not know
how ambiguous one’s concepts are until one really tries to model them more
formally. And this seems very much in line with one of the strengths of system
dynamics.
23
But, one should be cautious and recognize that a model that results from
creating operational definitions that do not exist in the literature is no longer a
representation of the original theory. Rather it’s something else, namely, a revised
or new theory. Though it would be unreasonable to expect feminist theory to be
expressed in systems of differential equations, one could hope that there would be
a reasonable correspondence between system concepts in feminist theory and
system dynamics. What we found in this exercise, though, was that the very
process of developing a system dynamics model of job discrimination essentially
led us to develop a different theory with a basis in feminist scholarship and other
literature. This would suggest that social theories cannot be meaningfully tested
and compared using system dynamics unless they have already been specified
within the language of system dynamics.
Perhaps the more interesting issue for future research is then to develop and
explore feminist theory using system dynamics. That is, instead of using system
dynamics as a tool for comparative analyses of social theory, which relies on being
able to adequately represent one theory within another framework, one should
focus on developing social theories as system dynamics models. Thus, one might
have a feminist system dynamics theory of job discrimination, or a feminist system
dynamics theory of domestic violence. Such approaches seem both more to the
point of solving specific problems and more promising in terms of opening up new
insights and terrain for future studies.
What progress have we made with our second goal? We cannot know fora
while. Yet, ifthe systemic effect of gender bias enters the discourse on collegiality
at the conference this week, we will know we are on the right track.
24
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