Benevolent Sexism and The Glass Cliff of Katie Zacharia

Five days.

That’s how long Katie Zacharia lasted as Donald Trump’s White House press secretary. Five days in one of the most visible communications positions in the world. One press briefing, lasting 14 minutes, a disastrous round of public scrutiny, and questions about professional credentials that should have been settled before anyone handed her the microphone.

During her briefing, Zacharia took questions from just three publications. Her performance was widely criticised for its lack of substance and preparation. Then came questions about her legal background. Despite having been presented as an attorney, she admitted that she had never passed the California bar examination.

I watched this story with two uncomfortable thoughts in my head.

First, how does someone end up accepting a position of such enormous responsibility without apparently having the competency required?

And second, why do I have a feeling that somewhere, someone is already using her performance as another argument against women in positions of power? Because this is what happens when an incompetent woman becomes extremely visible. Suddenly, the competence of other women becomes part of the conversation.

And yes, I freely allow myself to defend women’s right to occupy the highest positions in politics, business, science and every other field. And I also freely defend the right to question if a particular woman has any competence to occupy a particular position. I think feminism requires both.

What Happens When a Woman Really Does Perform Badly

Imagine a man being appointed to a high political position, showing poor judgement and losing his job quickly. Would anyone conclude that maybe men aren’t suitable for politics? Of course not. We have centuries of rather convincing evidence that men can make very bad decisions while continuing to dominate in their roles.

Men do get laughed at when they fail. Some become famous precisely because of their failures. But their mistakes are generally allowed to remain their own.

Women have a less comfortable relationship with collective representation. Psychologists Alice Eagly and Steven Karau (2002), in their role congruity theory, explain how prejudice against female leaders shows off when society notices a mismatch between traditional expectations of femininity and the characteristics associated with leadership. Women may be considered less suitable before they even begin. Their behaviour can also be evaluated more negatively when they demonstrate qualities associated with authority.

Now imagine what happens when a woman really does perform badly. For anyone already convinced that women do not belong in leadership, she becomes wonderfully convenient evidence.

The danger is that one woman’s incompetence gets turned into a collective female deficiency, while a man’s incompetence remains an individual professional failure.

And to be honest, this should annoy every woman who has spent years developing the skills, knowledge and experience required to be taken seriously.

Who Hired Her, and What Qualities Were They Actually Looking For?

Here’s the question I find much more interesting than Zacharia’s story. Because when an appointment goes this awfully wrong, we tend to focus on the person who accepted the job. But there is another person, or in this case an entire team, who decided she should take it.

Zacharia had worked in conservative media and communications. She wasn’t someone who had never encountered politics. Yet her experience was obviously different from the demands of handling questioning from the national press on behalf of the American presidency.

And there’s more here. Her appearance became part of the public discussion almost immediately. Commentator Megyn Kelly, for example, criticised Zacharia’s style, makeup and clothing following her debut, we all know how easy this gets for people to make their opinions about other women by only their looks.

I am personally not so much into discussing the looks, really. I am way more interested in what happens when powerful men surround themselves with attractive, publicly loyal women. A woman who is pleasant to look at, young and enthusiastic. I wonder how this might be seen as a useful political function? Can it be that she can make a confrontational man look more approachable? And his messages coming from a beautiful young women sound less sharp?

Was she selected for her loyalty and not her professional independence? Was she appointed because she was expected to soften the tone, and maybe to absorb some criticism? Was she selected because she showed best skills that are needed to defend her employer, regardless of the circumstances?

There is a psychological concept called benevolent sexism, which describes a set of patronising attitudes that look positive yet reinforce women’s subordinate status. Research by Sümer and colleagues (2018) examined how hostile and benevolent sexist attitudes influence perceptions of men and women in leadership positions. The researchers found that sexist attitudes formed evaluations of leadership suitability, although the different forms of sexism operated differently.

An organisation can publicly celebrate a woman’s appointment while giving her limited independence, unrealistic expectations or insufficient preparation. And when things go wrong, the powerful people who selected her may remain comfortably in place.

To be clear, Zacharia accepted the appointment and remains responsible for her own statements, preparation and representations of her qualifications. But professional responsibility should go in both directions: towards the person accepting the position and towards the people deciding who deserves it.

In 2005, Michelle Ryan and Alexander Haslam introduced the concept of the glass cliff a phenomenon where women, and other marginalised groups, are more likely to be appointed to leadership or board positions during times of crisis, decline, or high risk, making their chances of failure significantly higher and reversing the blame on them after all.

I wouldn’t automatically call Zacharia’s appointment a glass-cliff case. I don’t have evidence proving that she was chosen because the role was precarious. But the knowledge of a glass cliff gives us some second thoughts analising this position and the conditions surrounding some other high-profile female appointment before deciding that the entire outcome reflects one person’s abilities.

But why women would accept such difficult positions, you might ask. Well, some women exaggerate their abilities. Some accept positions they are insufficiently prepared for. Some become so excited by access to power that they stop questioning of why this so called power suddenly became so accessible.

The Dunning–Kruger Effect And How to Know If You Are Overestimating Yourself?

This brings me to a question I find more interesting than American politics: How do we know when we’re being courageous by accepting a bigger opportunity and when we’re overestimating ourselves?

I have personally taken risks that, on paper, could have looked ridiculous. Changing countries, working in another language, entering new professional fields, speaking publicly in front of international audiences. There have been situations in which I was certainly not the most experienced person in the room. Was I delusional or brave?

There is another psychological phenomenon I find potentially explaining that, it’s the Dunning–Kruger effect. In 1999, psychologists Justin Kruger and David Dunning found that some of the lowest-performing participants in tests of logic, grammar and humour considerably overestimated their abilities. Conversely, people with high competence tend to underestimate their relative skill level.

Imagine confidently explaining something to a room full of experts, really believing you’re the smartest person there, while everyone else is thinking where to begin correcting you. Sometimes we lack the knowledge needed to understand how much knowledge we’re missing.

Then comes ego and social approval. If you are the person invited into an extraordinary position by someone extremely powerful, your colleagues congratulate you, your family is proud. Everyone tells you what an incredible opportunity you’ve got. At some point you stop asking whether you’re capable of doing the job and the fact that your are being selected becomes psychological evidence that you deserved to be selected. A powerful person’s confidence in you can feel like proof of competence. Unfortunately, someone’s decision to hire you is evidence that they chose you, but not an evidence that you are professionally qualified to serve them.

How to Recognise When You’re Taking a Risk and When You’re Becoming Professionally Delusional

I want ambitious women to apply for positions that feel slightly beyond their current abilities. I want women to negotiate salaries they have never earned before, enter industries where they have no connections, and stop waiting until they tick every imaginary box before making a move. I really, truly do. But I also want us to have the judgement to separate ambition from fantasy.

Here are few questions that can be useful to ask yourself before filling in the big shoes:

Can you explain what the job actually demands, beyond its title and prestige?

A senior role sounds attractive until you understand the decisions, responsibility, specialist knowledge and consequences involved.

Can you identify your existing competence with evidence?

Previous results, transferable expertise, professional qualifications and demonstrated judgement are more reliable indicators than enthusiasm or compliments. Fake it till you make it maybe works on some starting positions, but not a thing if you are aiming for mid to senior roles, where professionals are expected to make mid to senior level decisions on spot.

Do you understand what you don’t know?

This may be the most important one. When someone asks you a difficult question about your profession, and you don’t know the answer, do you become interested in finding it, or somewhat defensive because your authority feels threatened?

Who is willing to tell you that you’re wrong?

If every person around you benefits from keeping you pleased, admired or dependent, you may be receiving very poor information about your abilities.

What would happen if you had to perform independently tomorrow?

Without the powerful person who recommended you. Without a carefully prepared introduction. Without friendly questions. Could you still prove why you deserve the position?

And finally, why do you want this role?

For the work itself? For the opportunity to contribute something meaningful? Or because being associated with an impressive title promises the social recognition you’ve been wanting forever?

These motivations can coexist. That’s fine, we all want to be influencers and we all have egos. Important is to be able to identify them.

A courageous professional accepts a challenge, understands the risks, prepares and remains open to correction.
A professionally delusional person may begin treating their ambitions as evidence of their abilities.

And there is one wonderfully practical test: ask someone knowledgeable who has absolutely nothing to gain from flattering you to evaluate your readiness. And be ready to listen.

Female Solidarity Should Not Require Defending Incompetence

I’ve spoken before about female competition, how women respond to other women’s visibility and why we sometimes treat another woman’s success as a threat to our own. But I feel that female solidarity sometimes also gets misunderstood. We are sometimes defending women just because they are women, even when their actions deserve criticism.

I can criticise Zacharia’s performance without speaking about her appearance. I can question the competence of the team responsible for appointing her without pretending that she had no responsibility for accepting the opportunity. And I also can refuse to turn her individual failure into a convenient lesson about the limitations of women.

When powerful institutions appoint visibly underprepared people to prestigious roles, they undermine public trust. When those appointees are women, existing gender stereotypes can make the consequences extend beyond the individuals concerned. And here I keep coming back to the same question: When Katie Zacharia was offered one of the most visible communications jobs in the world, who was responsible for deciding she was ready? She needed five days for everyone to understand that she wasn’t. The people who made that decision should have learned that long before those five days even began.

The next time a woman publicly fails in a position of power, maybe we should spend a little less time discussing what she wore and a little more time questioning who gave her that responsibility, what they expected of her, and how many other women around us might be climbing that same glass cliff right now.