Helping Girls Become Strong Women

In the last post, I talked about raising strong girls/women, noting that we don’t have to ban “girly” things to raise strong women, anymore than we have to ban “manly” things to raise nurturing boys. Today, I’ll talk about what that has to do with women’s leadership.

When women first began assuming leadership roles in Corporate America, they tried to be like men, even to the point of wearing a suit and tie (albeit a modified one). However, the “command and control” model wasn’t really working for women, because that’s not how women typically work. Not that women never use that model, and not that they can’t; it’s just that when you analyze women’s leadership style over a large population, that’s not the model that stands out.

Women tend to be more collaborative, and have what is now referred to as a more transformative style of leadership. The interesting thing is, research is showing that this type of leadership can, in many cases, be more successful than the traditional command-and-control model. Strength of leadership is demonstrated most clearly in successful leadership.

All of this leads to the conclusion that if we allow girls to develop their natural strengths and interests (whether that means playing Barbies or baseball), while encouraging them to try new things, we will help them to naturally develop into strong leaders. Trying to force them into a model that does not suit them creates only weakness.

So relax. Introduce your daughter to a wide variety of experiences, and then let her take the lead in developing her interests and gifts.