Here is an excerpt from an article written byTomas Chamorro-Premuzic and Cindy Gallop for Harvard Business Review and the HBR Blog Network. To read the complete article, check out the wealth of free resources, obtain subscription information, and receive HBR email alerts, please click here.

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Although there is a great deal of public interest in ensuring more women become leaders, thereby reversing their under-representation in the ranks of power, too many suggested solutions are founded on the misconception that women ought to emulate men. The thinking is: “If men have most of the top roles, they must be doing something right, so why not get women to act like them?”

But this logic fails to account for the relatively dismal performance of most leaders — who are overwhelmingly male. As we have argued before, the real problem is not a lack of competent females; it is too few obstacles for incompetent males, which explains the surplus of overconfident, narcissistic, and unethical people in charge.

As a consequence, gender differences in leadership effectiveness (what it takes to perform well) are out of sync with gender differences in leadership emergence (what it takes to make it to the top). Indeed, research shows that the prevalence of male senior leaders is not a product of superior leadership talent in men. Rather, large quantitative studies, including meta-analyses, indicate that gender differences in leadership talent are either nonexistent, or they actually favor women.

With this in mind, it would be more logical to flip the suggested remedy: instead of encouraging women to act like male leaders (many of whom are incompetent), we should be asking men in power to adopt some of the more effective leadership behaviors more commonly found in women. This would create a pool of better role models who could pave the way for both competent men and women to advance.

Leadership Lessons for Men

Here are [the first two of] some critical leadership lessons that most men can learn from the average woman.

Don’t lean in when you’ve got nothing to lean in about. There is a trend of telling women to “lean in” to qualities like assertiveness, boldness, or confidence. In men, such qualities can manifest as self-promotion, taking credit for others’ achievements, and acting in aggressive ways. Since there has never been a strong correlation between leaning in and being good at something — especially for men —a better option would be to stop falling for people who lean in when they lack the talents to back it up. In a logical world, we would promote people into leadership roles when they are competent rather than confident, vetting them for their expertise, track record, and relevant leadership competencies (e.g., intelligence, curiosity, empathy, integrity, and coachability). Note that all these attributes are far better evaluated with science-based assessments than via the typical job interview.

Know your own limitations. We live in a world that celebrates self-belief, but it is far more important to have self-awareness. And often there is a conflict between the two. For instance, awareness of your limitations (flaws and weaknesses) is incompatible with skyrocketing levels of self-belief, and the only reason to be utterly devoid of self-doubt and insecurities is delusion. Although women are not as insecure as they are portrayed to be in the self-help literature (and much of the popular media), studies do show that they are generally less overconfident than men. This is good news because it enables them to understand how people see them and gives them the capacity to spot gaps between where they want to be and where they actually are.  People who see themselves in a more critical way than others do are better able to prepare, even if it means overpreparing, and that’s a solid way to increase your competence and performance.

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