Is innovation too masculine? New essay says gender bias is cutting into profits

Roughly half the world’s population identifies as female, and yet many businesses rely almost entirely on male approaches and ideas. So what do we lose? And what can be done? A new essay aims to spark change — and success.

For most companies, innovation is a holy grail. After all, new ideas can set businesses apart from their competitors, lead to more desirable products and services, and help companies transform from small upstarts to major players. But according to Dr. Angèle Beausoleil, Assistant Professor at the UBC Sauder School of Business and Academic Director of the UBC’s W. Maurice Young Centre for Entrepreneur and Venture Capital Research, many businesses are missing out on innovation because of something that’s far from new: gender bias. For the recently released Encyclopedia of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Spirituality, Beausoleil wrote a chapter about gender and innovation — and in this Q&A she explores why innovation is often seen as masculine, what companies are losing when they don’t challenge gender biases, and what changes can boost their bottom lines. 
 

In what ways do we see innovation being gendered?

AB: I don’t think we’ve thought enough about where gender intersects with innovation, and that’s a bigger question: Why haven’t we? Because gender plays a huge role and has historically. The relationship we have with gender and innovation has been passed down generation after generation as a very masculine construct. For example, we can attribute this gendered construct to the great economist-influencers of the 19th century, who characterized the entrepreneur as a male business owner or male inventor whose innovation has been brought to market and adopted by many. This masculine archetype has permeated society, where even today most people associate innovation with scientific or computer technology — reflective of male-dominated industries. 

So why aren’t we thinking of gender and innovation more often? We have inherent and societal perspectives that we haven’t just inherited; we’ve been consumed by them. For example, if you put “inventor” or “innovator” into Generative AI platform, it will almost always present a male construct. That’s pretty insightful and harmful at the same time. 

We need to ask, “What are we missing when we don’t have different perspectives?” That’s where a conversation about innovation and gender gets very interesting for organizations and individuals, to think beyond masculine traits such as risk-taking and power dynamics. There should be debate and discussion, and ideally a little bit of friction, to get to innovations that are novel, relevant and impactful, in addition to being profitable.
 

What role do existing societal structures play in reinforcing these stereotypes?

AB: Companies are designed and built around notions of gender bias without us being aware of it or questioning them. For example, technology tends to dominate in conversations around innovation, and at their centre are research and development labs. For many centuries the idea of R&D has been where males dominate, where they lead, and where they hire. Societally, women were not necessarily encouraged to pursue trades or engineering — and simply by not having a more balanced gender representation, over many, many years, men have dominated the conversations, and have been leading the experiments for a very long time. So even in the research and development labs there has been an inherent single-gender perspective, and that’s where we really need to rethink. 
 

What kinds of shifts are we already seeing?

AB: We’re seeing more changes in R&D labs, and we’re reducing the stereotype of the male, likely caucasian, in a lab coat, running a series of experiments. We’re doing away with the lab coats, and with the idea that everyone is under observation, and we’re seeing research and development open up and invite in different disciplines, different cultures, different ethnicities and different genders. We’re also seeing them open up to end users and prospective customers. That's a big difference; we've seen that before in clinical trials, but not in large manufacturing and technology companies. That change in organizational design is powerful, because the more you distribute this idea of R&D, which was protected and led by a masculine orientation, the more you start bringing research into the marketing department, into the sales team, even into the finance department. That distribution, in turn, affords and enables even more innovation. 
 

What happens when companies don’t do this?

AB: If you’re not poking at these gender biases, if you’re not challenging the status quo, you’re going to have a repeat of an existing system that is not being questioned nor responding to new market needs. Ultimately, the organizations that aren’t able to evolve and change are the ones that either don’t survive, or they’re forced to move their R&D out of that closed loop.

And questioning isn’t just a verb; it’s a skill — and it’s essential to question what you do, how you do it, why you're doing it, and how you're impacting society. Without those questions, you are making a set of assumptions, and those assumptions can be fatal. More than 95 per cent of new products that have entered the marketplace over the past 30 years have failed, which means a lot of individuals are making decisions thinking they know whether the product is something the customer needs or wants. That equates to billions of dollars in losses. 

Small and large companies are learning to engage in more experimentation due to these losses. There's definitely some trial and error, and with startups we talk about “failing fast,” but that’s not a very strategic failure; it's a tactical failure. Here both investors and customers lose. And they’re losses that don’t have to happen. 
 

How are female entrepreneurs changing the game?

AB: We are influenced by behavioural modeling, and the roles we aspire to are sometimes inherent and intrinsic; however, the research has suggested that most of the time humans mimic, and that is deeply practiced in organizations and companies. So rather than asking, “Who’s here?” I’m always asking, “Who’s missing?” 

Over the last 30 years, women could finally start picturing themselves in a variety of roles, because we have success stories. We saw a woman CEO at IBM, and at HP. In the technology realm, we saw women not just in startups, but hired into senior leadership roles, and that’s significant. When you think of an “inventor” or “innovator” you should think of a beautiful plethora of individuals, from different races and genders and ages — and now more research is finally looking at age and gender, which we hadn’t seen until the last 10 or 15 years.
 

What would you like to see happen?

AB: Of course, there should always be a meritocracy. However, meritocracy also comes with certain advantages that men have had for many generations. In a workplace setting, you have some organizations that inherently believe in more balance and diversity; they don’t have a special DEI approach because they have seen the impact and success of diverse perspectives. 

There is intrinsic value when hiring a new or promoting an employee to go beyond the typical, “This person has X years of experience and they’re very qualified.” We need to give ourselves permission to say, “Hang on, have we looked far enough? Have we reached out and identified a more diverse set of candidates that we believe can bring a different perspective?” We need to put in more work, as opposed to only what’s at hand — and the people in leadership positions, whether they’re from the C-suite or talent development, need to actively pursue this diversity, because it’s beneficial and profitable. 

You also need a bit of friction, some debate. You need to explore more ideas before anchoring on a single solution. Some people avoid that because they perceive it as conflict, but to get to a really thoughtful and strategic outcome, you have to welcome constructive discussions. People have profit margin concerns and hiring concerns, so they make decisions really quickly, as opposed to taking the time to be more thoughtful and get a better result.
 

When they go this route, what do companies gain?

AB: There’s great research on how having a female perspective at the board level or in product development positively impacts a company and its culture. We need those perspectives throughout an organization and across all departments — and not only in more traditionally female-oriented roles like marketing. 

Especially for organizations, when you have individuals who ask who your intended target market is, what your customers need and explores creative ways to resolve those needs, that's pretty darn important. And even if your customer base is 100 per cent male, and you’re developing something from an entirely male perspective, it's still rich to bring in a female perspective because they know males from a different perspective. 

We also forget that employees are internal customers. You have diversity there, whether it’s a balance or not. So how well do you know them? Do you even take time to understand their perspectives? Do you have researchers who want to understand their perspectives? 

Representation alone is powerful because it gives you those different perspectives, and generally, the more representation, the more you increase your odds of success and of reaching customers more effectively. Of course, this is a core business principle that results in profits, and you see success in talent retention and in customer acquisition. 

Peter Drucker, a highly respected management guru, said it best: there are only two roles for any company at any time — innovation and marketing. Everything else supports those. Therefore, if you're not consistently investing in understanding your market, and what they need and want, which in turn triggers your new products or services (aka innovation), you are setting yourself up for failure. You simply aren’t able to respond strategically or competitively. 
 

What role do women in smaller businesses play?

AB: Women often run cottage industries, small service-based industries, and they haven't been talked about simply because their businesses have not scaled or grown at a level that we love to talk about — and yet they are exactly who we need to talk about, because small- and medium-sized organizations keep nations, especially Western nations, afloat. 

I do hope to ignite a conversation around why we haven't been having conversations and sharing case studies on women-led, service-based businesses that so many other companies, small and large, could learn from. They’re just large enough to make a really good living, because women still take on the majority of roles at home, and they are making a positive impact and generating profits. But the drive is different: the aim is not to do a 10x or 20x return to investors. Most of them are self-funded and they are profitable — and now finally they are getting some attention. 

We need more of this research and case studies that can help inform the role models for the next generation of female entrepreneurs and innovators, and hopefully influence organizations to be more inclusive.
 

What do women need to do?

AB: Women need to give themselves permission to think about their own perception of self — what is your authentic self, do you acknowledge and celebrate where you come from, what are your core values and beliefs, and allow yourself to experiment and explore your relationship with innovation. Ask yourself if that relationship is socially constructed? If so, can you push these potentially manufactured boundaries to try new things? 

I just finished a series of data analyses on the individual innovativeness levels on a set of MBAs and executives. As I was measuring traits and exploring patterns, I reflected on the fact that it was a self-reporting instrument. Females were matching, if not exceeding, men across all ages and across all roles — so they were reporting a strong self-confidence and openness with innovative thinking. And yet the societal constructs suggest we are not tapping into this wealth of talent. Perhaps women need to truly “lean in,” be more vocal and keep asking questions. They need to actively participate and contribute. And there’s so much evidence of the benefits when women are heard and of course, invited into the labs and the boardrooms.