Most senior executives pick proteges just like them

Few willing to take risks in #MeToo era

The #MeToo movement has led to the ouster of powerful men, the revelation of long-secret bad behaviour and the emergence of an empowering social movement.

But it has also led to unintended consequences.

As several media reports have chronicled, the movement has struck fear in the hearts of some professional men, leading them to avoid close relationships with or distance themselves from women at work in a way that could hinder their female colleagues’ careers.

Nowhere is this more important than at the top, where leadership consultants have long touted the importance of being “sponsored” by a senior executive who’s willing to do more than just offer informal “mentoring” advice, and instead put their own reputation on the line and advocate on behalf of a more junior rising star.

A new report from the Center for Talent Innovation, a think tank focused on research about leadership and diversity issues, offers a reminder of just how rare it is for people to choose proteges who don’t look like them.

In a new report released Tuesday that surveyed more than 3,200 college educated employees in the U.S. who work in white-collar jobs, it found that 71 per cent of those who identified as sponsors said their protege was the same race or gender as their own. It built on past research that had found 58 per cent of women and 54 per cent of men admitted to choosing a protege because they “make me feel comfortable.”

The report was the first time CTI had asked sponsors whether their protege was a different race and gender than they are, so there is no historical trend to compare it with.

Yet while it does not say the #MeToo movement is leading to more or fewer sponsorships between senior men and junior women, it does cite research from Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In organization, which found that male managers have become three times as likely to report being uncomfortable mentoring women and twice as likely to say they’re uneasy working alone with a woman.

The new research “reinforces what we’ve known on a gut level for years,” said Julia Taylor Kennedy, senior vicepresident at the Center for Talent Innovation. “People transfer power to others who make them feel comfortable.”

Even though many companies are trying to improve diversity, she said, “our unconscious biases draw us to people like ourselves.”

The survey did not just look at top executives, but at people across all levels of white-collar jobs, so she says it’s unlikely that the results are simply the result of there being a lopsided demographic — namely, white men — at the top of the org chart.

She said some companies, such as Johnson & Johnson and Cisco, have built “sponsorship” programs that either require or at least urge executives to pledge they’ll choose prote- ges who are different than their own demographic.

“Companies are getting better at designing these programs,” she said, and helping executives understand there’s a “really broad set of dividends” when they choose someone unlike themselves.

But too few executives are willing to take those risks in the #MeToo era, Taylor Kennedy and others said.

She’s heard from companies in their network that some men are being cautious of developing close mentorship relationships with female colleagues, even if they don’t realize they’re doing it.

“Not wanting to be one-onone with women, or not want- ing to be in a room with a woman — I don’t think a lot of male leaders consciously connect that obstacle with career advancement for women,” she said in a recent interview.

One problem, said Taylor Kennedy, is that some executives look for proteges who will help them get an ear to the ground and understand more about the business via junior professionals who will be candid with them.

Yet to get that to happen, people need the kind of trust that can only be built from spending time one-on-one.

One CEO, she recalled, said, “’I choose my proteges based on people who are going to be straight with me; who are really going to tell me when I have a bad idea.’ But no one is going to tell a CEO in front of someone else they have a bad idea.”

Jonathan Segal, an employment lawyer in Philadelphia, said he’s had clients suggest that some of their male managers have asked if they can travel separately from female colleagues, and heard of another manager who won’t close his door when he’s alone with a female co-worker.

“How do we tell him that’s not OK?” the client has asked him. He’s even held training programs with clients he calls “safe mentoring.”

If men back away too much, “number 1, you’re denying her opportunities, and number 2, you’re also creating circumstances where you’re trying to avoid a claim but you’re actually setting yourself up for one,” he said. Another client in the non-profit sector, he said, is actively monitoring whether any senior leaders seem to be avoiding women to mentor or sponsor.

If male leaders disengage from their female colleagues, said CTI’s Taylor Kennedy, they won’t be able to build the trust that’s needed to make a bet on their career.

“Stepping back from a close professional relationship with a colleague — that can really damage women’s access to those positions,” she said.