Women Leadership during Crisis: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Revealed Leadership Effectiveness of Women Leaders in the UAE

Abstract

COVID-19 constitutes one of the major crises that managers have had to face in recent times. Managing businesses during a crisis requires effective Leadership guided by specific behaviors and mindsets. Research by Harvard Business Review recently claimed that women leaders outperformed men leaders on most leadership attributes during the pandemic (Post et al., 2019). However, not enough studies show how leadership styles are portrayed between men and women during the pandemic. This study explores the differences between women's and men's leadership practices during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UAE context. In this research, we explore employees' perceptions of the Leadership styles their leaders demonstrated during COVID-19 within different organizations in the UAE. Four meta-categories were tested to differentiate men's and women's leadership behaviors during the pandemic crisis. Specifically, the task-oriented, relations-oriented, change-oriented, and external categories of leadership practices are assessed among the respondents. T-tests are used to determine the differences in managerial practices between men and women during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UAE context.  Moreover, ANOVA, correlation analysis, and multiple regression analysis are used to compare women and men leader behaviors and their relation to leadership effectiveness based on the meta-categories of leadership practices. Results showed significant differences in leadership behaviors between men and women. Women demonstrated higher task-oriented management practices than men during the COVID-19 pandemic.