Did you know that female leaders are neither confident and educated, or caring and pretty?

In a recent study, college students were asked to pick adjectives they associate with female politicians, male politicians, and women overall. (Research: Political Psychology – April 2014)

• “Confident,” “educated,” and “determined” were chosen 20% less often for female politicians than male. 

You probably saw that coming.

• But here’s the kicker: The adjectives “feminine” and “compassionate” were chosen 50-70% less often when describing female politicians than women overall. 

Women in leadership roles aren’t naturally seen as assertive and determined, OR motherly and beautiful. At first glance, this can be deflating.

Instead of discouraging, I’m beginning to see this as motivation. I’ve been feeling drawn to lead as a woman would, as I would. Not as a man would. I’m feeling freedom to lead as myself and not needing to put maleness on to do so.

To quote a brilliant woman, Kathy Keller has said that a woman’s root calling is being a woman. We are called by God to be a reflection of Him, both male and female. She further explained that we need to recover how to be women, to accept God’s calling to be a woman, and be the female half of a gendered humanity.

“We don’t need more maleness in the world. Nor do we need an anemic genderless world. We need to recover how to be women,” she said (watch more).

Women should be encouraged to lean into parts of their personalities, whatever those may be. Some of us are nurturing, compassionate, quiet, intellectual, or strong-willed, and in one way or another we’ve been told that there’s not a place for those traits when you’re a women in leadership. But there is!

It means putting on natural feminine traits and not being afraid to thrive in them. Caring, motherly, or beauty might not seem like they have appeal in the boardroom, but when those are genuine parts of our personalities we shouldn’t be afraid to activate them.

In male-dominated professions, women have become accustomed to “putting on” maleness. I believe many of us are shoving down natural, God-given traits because that don’t seem to fit in the contexts of our business, church, or workplace.

As Kathy Keller has said, God has gifted us gender roles. It’s a gift! The world doesn’t need more maleness. It needs the strengths women have been gifted with and may, until now, felt like they didn’t fit.