The Atlantic: The Confidence Gap

A new feature story in The Atlantic explores troubling evidence that shows that women are less self-assured than men.  Even more, research shows that, to succeed, confidence matters as much as competence.

"The Confidence Gap," written by premiere journalists Katty Kay and Claire Shipman, is lengthy and compelling and worth a read.

Here are a couple paragraphs that really grabbed our attention -

      "Even as our understanding of confidence expanded, however, we found that our original suspicion was dead-on: there is a particular crisis for women—a vast confidence gap that separates the sexes. Compared with men, women don’t consider themselves as ready for promotions, they predict they’ll do worse on tests, and they generally underestimate their abilities. This disparity stems from factors ranging from upbringing to biology.

     A growing body of evidence shows just how devastating this lack of confidence can be. Success, it turns out, correlates just as closely with confidence as it does with competence. No wonder that women, despite all our progress, are still woefully underrepresented at the highest levels. All of that is the bad news. The good news is that with work, confidence can be acquired. Which means that the confidence gap, in turn, can be closed."

Read the whole piece here -

The Atlantic article illustration by Edmon de Haro