Shared leadership and gender: all members are equal … but some more than others Maria J. Mendez Judd Leighton School of Business and Economics, Indiana University South Bend, South Bend, Indiana, USA, and John R. Busenbark Kelley School of Business, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, Indianapolis, Indiana, USA Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the effect of shared leadership on the gap between male and female leadership influence in groups. Design/methodology/approach – The leadership influence of 231 members from 28 committees was studied using a social networks methodology. Gender differences in committee members’ directive and supportive leadership influence were analyzed through two ANCOVA tests. Findings – Results confirm significant differences between men and women’s leadership influence, as rated by their peers, using directive and supportive leader behaviors. Surprisingly, shared leadership has no significant effect on reducing this gender gap. Research limitations/implications – Results cannot be extrapolated to all other types of groups, since the committees studied have very unique characteristics due to their low typical mutual interaction. Practical implications – Organizations may need to consider complementary strategies in their group leadership design to prevent the emergence of strong gender gaps when leadership is shared. These strategies could involve training members to recognize gender inequalities in leadership status and assigning leadership roles formally to ensure more equal participation in leadership. Originality/value – This paper examines the promise of gender equality in shared leadership and provides empirical data that shows that this promise is not being realized. Keywords Social networks, Gender, Directive leadership, Network centrality, Shared leadership, Supportive leadership Paper type Research paper Despite of the steady growth of female representation in leadership positions, mainly at lower levels of responsibility (Catalyst, 2004, 2010), gender inequalities continue to be found in leadership. Particularly in group settings, men emerge as leaders more often, are attributed greater competence and influence than women, and are more likely to play leadership roles (Anderson and Blanchard, 1982; Bass, 1990; Eagly and Karau, 1991; Heilman and Haynes, 2005). Prior literature predicts that shared leadership will generate more equally distributed patterns of leadership influence, resulting in higher levels of egalitarianism (Barry, 1991; Neubert and Taggar, 2004; Pearce and Conger, 2003). Shared leadership involves multiple individuals collaborating in a group’s leadership toward the attainment of their common goals (Pearce and Conger, 2003), contrasting with more traditional forms of group leadership in which the leader role rests on a single individual (who either is appointed to the role or emerges from within the group). However, the effect of shared leadership on leadership gender egalitarianism has not yet been empirically tested. This paper aims at addressing this gap in the literature. Leadership & Organization Development Journal Vol. 36 No. 1, 2015 pp. 17-34 © Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0143-7739 DOI 10.1108/LODJ-11-2012-0147 Received 13 November 2012 Revised 19 April 2013 15 August 2013 Accepted 16 August 2013 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/0143-7739.htm 17 Shared leadership and gender Downloaded by Indiana University South Bend At 09:39 21 April 2015 (PT)