The delegation dilemma: Why women leaders hesitate to hand off tasks

Picture this: you’re a rising star in your company, juggling multiple projects and a growing team. The key to success? Learning to delegate. But what if the simple act of handing off tasks feels like walking a tightrope? For many women leaders, this scenario isn’t just imagination—it’s reality. Research by professors Modupe Akinola, Ashley E. Martin, and Katherine W. Phillips reveals a surprising gender gap in delegation, one that could be holding women back from reaching their full potential as leaders. Across five studies, the authors demonstrate that women have more negative associations with delegation compared to men, leading women to delegate less frequently and have lower quality interactions when they do delegate.

Delegation is both a communal (i.e., relational) and agentic (i.e., assertive) behaviour. The authors argue that although delegation helps subordinates develop (a communal act), women still see assigning tasks as a largely agentic behaviour. Since the assertive nature of delegation looms larger than the communal aspects, this triggers concerns about violating feminine gender role expectations. That is, women leaders may find it more difficult to delegate because they perceive that it conflicts with the expectation for women to act in a way that shows communality.

Not only did this study find that women delegate less, but they delegate differently as well. When women do delegate, they spend less time with subordinates and have lower quality interactions: women who delegated spent an average of 33 seconds interacting with subordinates, compared to 54 seconds for men. Subordinates also rated women as less considerate and supportive during delegation interactions. The study also found that women report more guilt about overburdening subordinates and greater fear of backlash when delegating compared to men.

Women leaders may find it more difficult to delegate because they perceive that it conflicts with the expectation for women to act in a way that shows communality.

As Akinola says, “Delegation is a tricky thing because on one hand, you are passing something on to somebody else and you feel like you are bossing them around. On the other hand, you are helping them learn, develop, and grow. This could be harder for women because they are expected to not boss people around and be more communal. Some of the emotions associated with delegation for women revolve around guilt and anxiety for overburdening their subordinates…if you flip it to make delegation as more a communal part of the job, women will be more likely to do it.”

The authors were able to mitigate women’s negative association with delegating by reminding them of the communal aspects of delegating, that is, reminding them that it helps subordinates to learn and grow. While successful, the intervention plays on existing stereotypes and Akinola would like to explore alternate avenues: “I would like to see other interventions that do not rely on just letting women know that it’s good to be communal. Maybe it’s something like telling them that it does help them get more work done. I want more tools to teach women how to delegate.”

Indeed, the success of their intervention is underscored by their finding that participants who chose to delegate tasks outperformed those who did not delegate. This suggests that women’s reluctance to delegate may hinder their effectiveness and productivity as leaders, and interventions like those the authors tested may be critical for women.

This research has important implications for organizations seeking to develop women leaders and create more equitable workplaces. Leadership development programs can address women’s potential reluctance to delegate and provide strategies to overcome negative associations. For instance, these programs could include role-playing exercises that allow women to practice delegation in a safe environment, helping them build confidence and overcome anxiety. Organizational cultures and performance management systems could recognize and reward the communal, developmental aspects of delegation. This could include setting delegation goals for managers or creating cross-functional projects that necessitate task-sharing. Managers could be encouraged to frame delegation in communal terms, emphasizing how it benefits and develops subordinates.

Organizational cultures and performance management systems could recognize and reward the communal, developmental aspects of delegation.

The authors are excited about the new avenues this opens for future investigation. Further research is needed to identify other critical leadership behaviors that may be misaligned with gendered expectations of women. Additionally, longitudinal studies could examine whether the performance implications of gender differences in delegation compound over time. Importantly, Akinola also wants to explore this phenomenon beyond just gender: “There are a lot of other identities in an organization that would lead one to feeling guilt and anxiety when being agentic. So, I am curious that if you looked at race, sexual orientation, or other marginalized identities, would we see similar effects. And would a similar intervention or a different one [as the one we used in this research] be more effective?”

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Research brief prepared by:

Grusha Agarwal