Attitudes toward women as managers: sex versus culture

Abstract

This paper examines attitudes toward women managers in Chile (n=194) and the USA (n=218) using the women as managers scale (WAMS) and a Spanish version of WAMS developed for this study. Across both cultures, two coherent measures were labeled “acceptance” and “ability”. No cultural differences in the acceptance of women as managers were discovered. The differences in acceptance were divided solely according to sex. There were differences in the perceived ability of women managers for both the sex and culture variables. The paper then compares the impact of the sex and culture variables. Results show that sex explained approximately three times more variance than culture. These findings can inform both the expatriate woman manager who is likely to encounter friction in interactions with males in many cultures and the human resource manager interested in improving the success of women managers working overseas.