Why it pays to have a narcissistic boss: Companies run by women with a ‘little ego’ are more successful (but the same isn’t true for men!), research shows

From YouTube’s Susan Wojcicki to Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg, over the years many bosses of the biggest companies have been women.

Now a study has shed light on the secret to their success – and it comes down to their ego.

Researchers from Aarhus University in Denmark examined the personality traits of CEOs and found that higher levels of narcissism in female CEOs were linked to better business performance.

However, the same effect was not found for narcissism in male bosses.

“We find that narcissistic female CEOs beat their male colleagues when it comes to business performance,” the researchers said.

The researchers suggested that narcissism could improve the performance of female CEOs because they would be better able to harness “the positive sides” of the trait, “while moderating its dark side.”

That is, they may be able to use their narcissism to appear as an impressive leader, while at the same time curbing the narcissistic tendency to exploit others.

The study’s co-author, Dr. Tom Aabo, explained that narcissism has three facets: grandiose exhibitionism – which includes vanity, self-righteousness and superiority; leadership/authority – the “good side” that includes a desire to lead, a desire for power, and a belief in one’s power to influence; and exploitation/entitlement (E/E), the really dark side.

“The E/E facet is the most troubling facet because it is linked to aggression, counterproductive work behavior and an unwillingness to forgive,” says Dr. Aabo.

‘The E/E facet is generally associated with the ‘dark triad’ personality, including impulsive antisociality and Machiavellianism.

‘What is interesting in our case is that other studies have shown that the E/E facet has the largest gender difference.

“Women are generally friendlier than men, and higher friendliness is also the case when comparing female and male executives.”

The research design was unable to separate the three sides of narcissism in the individual participants, but it is likely that the ‘higher agreeableness of female CEOs’ created a ‘superior balance between the three facets of the traits, especially a less dominant E /E-facet’. for a certain degree of narcissism,” said Dr. Aabo.

Social role expectations can also limit the behavior of female CEOs, he said, because women are expected to be more caring and warm-hearted.

“So while CEO narcissism is associated with unethical and questionable behavior, this is likely to be less severe in the case of narcissistic female CEOs,” he said.

And third, women “show more empathy-related evolutionary traits than men, which could further curb the dark sides of narcissism,” he said.

“Evolutionarily, when we were hunters and gatherers, women took care of the family – especially children – and gathered fruit, etc., while men were hunters and warriors,” he said.

‘Recent evidence paints this picture as not so black and white, but women needed more empathy in their roles than men.

“Psychological literature says that we are still born with a brain that is attuned to our time as hunters and gatherers.”

For the study, researchers studied the CEOs who led 859 non-financial and non-utility companies in the Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 1,500 stock market index between 2007 and 2020.

They analyzed the CEOs’ language during four separate question and answer sessions during quarterly earnings conference calls, spanning their tenures.

They focused on leaders’ use of first-person singular pronouns, i.e. “I, me, my” versus first-person plural pronouns – we, us, our – because research has shown that people who are more narcissistic tend to have more first person singular pronouns and fewer first person plural pronouns.

They studied question-and-answer sessions instead of presentations because the former are “unscripted and more likely to reveal the CEO’s true personality,” she added.

And they found that companies led by female CEOs who are 25 percent more narcissistic than the average female CEO were significantly more successful.

Dr. Aabo said: “If a woman is in the middle of the top half of narcissism among female CEOs, she is associated with – and likely causes – a 13.9 percent increase in profitability and a 13.5 percent increase in appreciation than an average woman. general manager.’

Comparing men and women, the researchers found that narcissistic female CEOs are associated with 10-20 percent better business performance – 10 percent better profitability and 20 percent better valuation – than equally narcissistic male CEOs.

The research has been published in the journal Finance Research Letters.