Upcoming research from UCL School of Management reveals that “dissonant ties” – relationships characterised by conflicting feelings, such as liking but not respecting someone, or disliking yet respecting them – disproportionately harm women in the workplace.
The paper’s authors, Associate Professor Raina Brands and Professor Martin Kilduff, demonstrate that these complex dynamics often intersect with preexisting gender stereotypes, exacerbating their negative effects on a woman’s career.
Due to be published in the Academy of Management Review, the research investigates the ways in which gender stereotypes overlap with dissonant ties, finding that the “warm but incompetent” typecast of women overlaps with the like/disrespect dissonant tie, while the “cold but competent” stereotype aligns with the dislike/respect tie.
The research finds that this overlap of stereotyping and dissonant ties – in what the authors term “multiplex jeopardy” – not only affects women directly but ripples outward through workplace networks, shaping how others perceive and interact with them, even if they never work together. This distorts reputations, can restrict the flow of information and limits women’s access to career opportunities.
Women who are liked but not respected may be excluded from strategic conversations due to assumptions and prejudice about their competence. Women who are respected but disliked may be undermined or penalised for violating stereotypes of warmth and communality.
Crucially, dissonant ties are not found to overlap with stereotypes about men and do not therefore reinforce negative perceptions to the same level. When disliked in the workplace, the research shows that women are seen to be violating their prescribed stereotypes, when men are not.
Over time these patterns can push women to the periphery of workplace networks and reinforce gender dynamics by grouping women together out of need for support and consolidating men together in more powerful positions, reinforcing a cycle of exclusion and perpetuating these stereotypes.
Dr. Brands and Dr. Kilduff argue that these gender biases operate in organisations as a phenomenon that accumulates and consolidates over time, rather than in individual instances.
Speaking on the findings of the paper, Dr. Kilduff commented:
“I think the key insight of the whole paper is this pernicious overlap between a prevalent type of relationship among colleagues in the workplace, one that involves mixed feelings of liking and respect; and a prevalent gender bias that afflicts women but not men.
“This overlap between relationship type and gender bias is an everyday phenomenon but hasn’t been recognised and its damaging effects have not been countered.”
Organisations that look to improve gender equality commonly target formal power structures through initiatives such as unconscious bias training and leadership initiatives for women. The researchers, however, propose that more work needs to be done to address the informal social fabric of the workplace and the multiplex jeopardy that harms women in these spaces.
Dr. Brands commented:
“Leaders lament the slow pace of progress towards gender inequality, even with a battery of thoughtful policies in place. Our research suggests the sticking point lies in the informal, everyday exchanges where entrenched gender bias quietly endures.”
