A Woman's Touch? Gendered Management and Performance in State Administration

Understanding the relationship between organizational performance, gender, and management is crucial to scholars and practitioners alike. In this article, we focus on whether women manage differently than their male counterparts and whether these varied behaviors translate to organizational outcomes. With respect to management activities, we examine internal management as well as external networking patterns with peers and political principals. Through our investigation, we also address a number of theoretical issues related to previous research on management and performance, particularly the work on modeling public management. This analysis offers avenues for expansion, explanation, and evaluation of its theoretical and empirical implications. We find evidence that female managers spend less time on internal management and networking relationships than their male counterparts. We also see that networking with citizens and clientele groups has a positive effect on organization outcomes for men, whereas networking with peers is more beneficial for women.