Summary: New research reveals persistent gender gaps in workplace leadership. The study finds men supervise more employees than women—even when women showed top academic promise—especially among parents.
Source: UNC Charlotte
New evidence on gender inequality shows that women—even those who demonstrate strong academic performance early in life—are less likely than men to reach supervisory roles in the workplace.
Jill Yavorsky, an assistant professor of sociology at UNC Charlotte, co-authored the study titled “The Under-Utilization of Women’s Talent: Academic Achievement and Future Leadership Positions” with Yue Qian, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia.
Published in the academic journal Social Forces, the paper examines how early academic achievement, measured by high school GPA, relates to later leadership responsibilities. The researchers found that men consistently supervise more people than women during their early to mid-careers, and this gap is especially large for parents.
Notably, among individuals who earned a perfect 4.0 GPA in high school, fathers managed an average of 19 supervisees while mothers managed just four. Across the GPA range, higher academic achievement predicted more supervisees for men, but this relationship was almost absent for women. As high school GPA rises from 0.0 to 4.0, the average number of supervisees increases from 4 to 19 for fathers, whereas it rises only slightly for mothers, from 3 to 4.
The research also highlights a striking comparison: fathers with very low academic achievement (1.0 GPA) had, on average, leadership prospects comparable to women who graduated with a 4.0 GPA.
“Our findings underscore the obstacles women—especially mothers—face in advancing to leadership roles,” Yavorsky said. “At the same time, the results point to how little friction men often encounter in attaining managerial positions, even when their academic records are weak.”
The authors investigated explanations for these disparities. One important factor is that high-achieving men gain more leadership returns from having a college or advanced degree, whereas comparable women do not receive the same boost. In other words, among mothers, those with higher education credentials did not show substantially greater leadership opportunities than mothers without a college degree.
Part of this pattern may reflect differences in field selection: men are more likely to enter majors and occupations—such as finance or STEM fields—that historically lead to more managerial roles. However, Yavorsky emphasizes that selection does not explain the whole story. Even within the same occupations, including female-dominated fields, men tend to obtain more leadership positions than women, indicating that advantages for men persist regardless of career path.
The study also found that among top academic achievers, men were more likely than women to work longer hours and accumulate more continuous work experience—advantages that became especially pronounced after becoming parents. Mothers more frequently take on greater household responsibilities, take parental leave, or interrupt their careers to care for children and family members. These patterns reduce mothers’ available time for paid work and limit the accumulation of job experience that often contributes to promotions into managerial roles.
Even after accounting for differences in education, work hours, and experience, a leadership gap between high-achieving mothers and fathers remains, suggesting that bias and discrimination are likely contributors to unequal outcomes.
The analysis used data from roughly 5,000 individuals born between 1957 and 1964. The researchers linked high school transcript GPAs to respondents’ reports of how many people they supervised across a ten-year window, from 1988 to 1998. According to Yavorsky, this data set is the most recent nationally representative survey that includes verified GPA transcript information while tracing respondents from adolescence into their early and mid-careers and recording supervisory responsibilities.
Yavorsky notes that these patterns are likely to persist for younger cohorts. Progress toward workplace gender equality on many measures has stalled or slowed since the mid-1990s. Recent research also suggests the COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately hurt women’s employment and productivity—largely because mothers absorbed more responsibilities related to school and child care closures—potentially deepening gaps in job experience and future advancement.
To better utilize women’s talent, Yavorsky highlights two policy priorities: affordable, reliable subsidized child care and paid parental leave policies that encourage fathers to share caregiving responsibilities early on. She also calls on organizations to standardize promotion practices, address bias and discrimination, and develop clearer pathways to management from female-dominated occupations.
Yavorsky, a nationally recognized researcher on workplace inequality and household divisions of labor, holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from The Ohio State University. Her scholarship has appeared in leading academic journals and has been featured in major media outlets.
About this gender disparity research news
Source: UNC Charlotte
Contact: Jason Vaughan – UNC Charlotte
Image: The image is in the public domain
Original Research: Closed access. “The Under-Utilization of Women’s Talent: Academic Achievement and Future Leadership Positions” by Yue Qian and Jill E. Yavorsky. Social Forces
Abstract
The Under-Utilization of Women’s Talent: Academic Achievement and Future Leadership Positions
Although women have high rates of labor force participation, they remain underrepresented in leadership roles. This study investigates whether adolescents who demonstrate high academic achievement follow similar or different pathways to workplace leadership depending on gender and parental status. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979, the authors find that men supervise more people than women in early-to-mid career stages regardless of high school GPA. Among parents, early academic success predicts future leadership much more strongly for fathers than for mothers, widening leadership gaps among top achievers. For instance, those with a 4.0 GPA see fathers managing nineteen supervisees on average versus four for mothers. Additional analyses suggest these gender gaps are not solely due to different tendencies to seek leadership but are partly explained by unequal returns to education and gender differences in work-related characteristics. Overall, the results reveal that even highly promising women—especially mothers—face reduced opportunities for organizational leadership, pointing to substantial under-utilization of female talent.