Women of Vision: Understanding the Ways Women Lead Change

Abstract

In the midst of numerous global uncertainties, leaders are expected to have the ability to articulate a compelling vision of a preferred future that energizes and engages followers. In fact, Kouzes and Posner (2009) have argued that “Being forward-looking—envisioning exciting possibilities and enlisting others in a shared view of the future—is the attribute that most distinguishes leaders from nonleaders” (p. 20). Given that context, it is notable that research by Ibarra and Obodaru (2009) that involved 360-degree evaluations of 2,816 leaders in the corporate sector concluded that male raters of executive performance viewed women as being less visionary than men. In contrast, women were rated by both male and female raters as being as effective or more effective than male executives on 9 of 10 other “critical components of leadership” (Ibarra & Obodaru, 2009, p. 66). The authors offer three potential explanations for this anomaly, including the possibility that the collaborative leadership style of many women gives credit to the group for visionary thinking and actions rather than taking individual credit. In the male-normed culture of Christian higher education (Longman & Anderson, 2016), the perception that women are less “visionary” may contribute to their underrepresentation in senior leadership positions. This article reports the findings of a qualitative, grounded theory study that explored how 12 female leaders at Christian colleges and universities successfully developed and implemented a vision that resulted in institutional change. The participants were asked to describe their process of envisioning and the internal drivers that motivated them to persevere through challenges related to the institutional change process. Data analysis led to the identification of four primary themes: (a) the role of internal drivers such as confidence, a sense of purpose, and calling; (b) evidence of a strong orientation toward people throughout the process; (c) language barriers that often seemed to inhibit envisioning; and (d) the importance of the change aligning with the institutional mission and values.