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Yet despite this clear emphasis on innovation as a defining leadership trait, when carrying out a comprehensive analysis of articles covering 750 CEOs across the FTSE 200, S&P 500, and Euronext 100 companies, it found that men CEOs were twice as likely to be described as innovators in the media, while women CEOs were 72% more likely to be described as inspirational.
This description reflects and reinforces fundamental biases about leadership capability. The "innovator" designation brings with it assumptions of strategic vision, calculated risk-taking, and transformative thinking—all qualities boards actively seek when selecting CEOs. When women are systematically excluded from this characterization, it creates an invisible barrier to CEO and C-suite positions that has nothing to do with capability and everything to do with perception.
The innovator label matters significantly. When we look at the most celebrated CEOs, particularly in tech and industry-disrupting sectors, their ability to drive innovation often defines their legacy and secures their position. When media and society consistently associate men with innovation, it reinforces a narrative that men are the natural architects of transformation.
Our research found that the top five men CEOs by coverage level shows four of them operate in the social media and industrial tech space, businesses built on innovation. This association creates a self-reinforcing cycle: men are seen as innovators, innovators are celebrated and promoted, and the cycle continues.
This perception gap also extends beyond media coverage. Our research found that in general terms, descriptions of women CEOs focused on their personal attributes, whereas men CEOs tend to be positioned around their impact on business and industry. We grouped attributes like innovating, agile, risk-taking, strategic, and results-oriented into task-oriented descriptors, while placing empathetic, ambitious, articulate, emotionally intelligent, inspirational, and micromanaging under the people-oriented banner. Our research found that women CEOs are significantly more likely to be described by their people-oriented skills—and men CEOs by their task-oriented skills.
As Laura Sanderson, RRA's EMEIA co-lead, notes: “The Innovation/Inspiration Dichotomy is evidence of gender stereotypes holding women back. Society—the media included—often expects men to embody agentic qualities such as being competitive and task-focused, but when it comes to women, this expectation shifts to communal qualities such as being supportive and relationship-focused. This perception—whether based in reality, bias, or a combination of the two—is very likely having an impact on how women leaders are perceived and the opportunities available to them. What we need is an even-handed assessment which levels the playing field for CEOs and those who are keen to follow in their footsteps.”
What's particularly striking about this perception gap is that a number of women leaders have consistently demonstrated remarkable innovation capacity. Lynn Good, former president and CEO at Duke Energy, transformed the company into a sustainability leader, positioning it at the forefront of the clean energy transition. Mary Barra, CEO at General Motors, led GM's aggressive push into electric vehicles, investing $35 billion in electric and autonomous vehicles and announcing plans to become carbon neutral by 2040. Reshma Saujani founded Girls Who Code, creating the world's largest pipeline of future female engineers and fundamentally changing how we approach gender diversity in tech. These are just a handful of examples which demonstrate the innovative capacity of women leaders.
When you examine research on gendered leadership abilities, while some studies suggest differences in leadership skills between men and women, others, including our own research, find no significant variations in core capabilities.
In addition, when we look at women leaders' capacity to enable innovation in others, our research found that there's no meaningful difference between how men and women leaders are perceived at enabling change innovation by their direct reports. The gap, evidently, is in society and the media’s representation of men and women CEOs.
Creating lasting change requires awareness of these perceptions and conscious effort to disrupt them. Organizations have a crucial role to play in creating environments where all leaders can thrive authentically. They can do this in three key ways:
Organizations must audit how innovation opportunities are distributed. This means examining who gets assigned to lead digital transformation initiatives and high-profile strategic assignments that create a track record of innovative leadership.
When assigning these innovation initiatives, organizations must use an opt-out, rather than an opt-in process. When all qualified applicants are in the running, it sends the message that everyone is qualified and under consideration for the project.
Boards should particularly scrutinize CEO succession pipelines to ensure high potential men and women leaders are being given the transformational assignments that build the innovation portfolio expected of future CEOs. Without equal access to these career-defining opportunities, the perception gap will persist regardless of individual capability.
Organizations should develop clear, objective measures of innovative contribution that can be applied consistently, regardless of a leader’s gender. This means establishing specific metrics around successful implementation of strategic initiatives, measurable transformation outcomes, and quantifiable innovation impacts.
Rather than relying on subjective assessments that can be influenced by unconscious bias, organizations need frameworks that evaluate innovation through concrete achievements and measurable results. For CEO succession planning specifically, boards should ensure innovation criteria are explicitly defined.
Organizations should deliberately highlight all leaders' roles in driving transformation, regardless of gender, focusing on specific innovations and their business impact rather than stylistic elements of their leadership. This requires intentional communication strategies that position both men and women leaders as the architects of business transformation, emphasizing their strategic decision-making, risk-taking, and innovative thinking in both internal recognition and external thought leadership opportunities.
By recognizing all leaders' innovative contributions and describing them accurately, organizations can begin to dismantle the artificial dichotomy between "innovative" men and "inspirational" women, Critically, the goal is not to diminish the value of inspiration—which remains a crucial leadership quality—but to ensure that both men and women leaders receive appropriate recognition for their innovative contributions and strategic impact.
Organizations that succeed in making this shift will be able to access the full spectrum of innovative thinking and transformative leadership that exists across their talent pool. In an era where innovation and adaptability define competitive advantage, organizations cannot afford to overlook or mislabel the innovative capacity of any of their leaders.
Margot McShane co-leads Russell Reynolds Associates’ Board & CEO Advisory practice, and is the co-founder of RRA Artemis. She is based in San Francisco.
Laura Sanderson co-leads the firm’s operations in Europe, Middle East and India. She is based in London.
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