Is there a gender confidence gap?

 “Stop waiting to feel confident before finding the courage to begin.”

WHAT’S ON DECK

• Tell Me More: “What’s wrong with being confident?” Nothing. But there is a catch…

• Troublemaker Spotlight: Kleona Mack, CMO of Glossier

• Dear FQ: Help! Great Interviews but No Job Offer

• Poll the Pack: Should You Bring Your Personal Life to Work?

TELL ME MORE

A long-standing gender stereotype in the modern working world is that women are less confident than men. New research suggests that the opposite is true.

HP’s recent Work Relationship Index surveyed more than 15,600 workers across 12 countries and found that 52% of women business leaders feel confident with skills like empathy, communication, and self-awareness. Their male counterparts? 39% feel confident. And the trend corresponds to hard skills, too. The same study found that 48% of women leaders are confident in their technical skills, like computing, presenting, and marketing, whereas 38% of male leaders feel similarly.

This contradicts countless narratives of the “Confidence Gap” between men and women. But there’s a catch. While the news is promising, the fatal flaw in these numbers remains the percentage of women who get leadership positions.

At a glance:

• Only 10% of Fortune 500 companies have a woman CEO.

• Despite women representing 61% of accountants and auditors in financial services, only 12.5% of Chief Financial Officers at Fortune 500s are women.

• In even better terms? Women CEOs finally outnumber CEOs named John. (This is not a joke.)

In short, women have to have confidence as leaders to get a seat at the table. So how can you build lasting confidence and work your way to a leadership role at your company? We called in Lan Phan, acclaimed author of Do This Daily, CEO of community of SEVEN, and sought-after consultant to Fortune 500 companies, to break it down.

In Lan’s world, there is no perfect moment to practice confidence. “Stop waiting to feel confident before finding the courage to begin. You have to start before you're ready. You have to allow yourself to stumble and fall. Confidence grows through action, and mastery is built by what we do daily.”

If you’re not yet leading a team, don’t let that discourage you from acting like a leader. Lan says the best leadership she ever received came from her mother, a hairdresser with no direct reports.

“Though she never officially managed a team, she was the first and most impactful leader I’ve ever known. She taught me that true leadership isn’t about wielding authority—it’s about inspiring others through your actions, values, and presence.”

So how can we all gain more confidence? Lean into your strengths, create meaningful connections across your organization, and practice being an effective communicator.

TROUBLEMAKER SPOTLIGHT

Kleona Mack, CMO of Glossier

How do you revolutionize an industry plagued by stereotypes and sexism? Ask Glossier. And more specifically, ask Kleona Mack. Glossier’s Chief Marketing Officer got her feet wet in the beauty industry at Victoria’s Secret Beauty, then moved on to both L'Oréal and Tarte, all before landing her role at Glossier almost 4 years ago. With countless awards for innovative campaigns under her belt (including “The Comments Section”), Kleona’s team has garnered a staggering 14.1 million likes on TikTok, rolled out a new retail partnership with Sephora, and embraced countless Black beauty brands with Glossier’s Grant Program for Black-owned businesses.   

In a world where 2 out of 3 beauty execs are men, we’re here for the Kleonas. 

FQ: What’s the worst career advice you’ve gotten?

KM: ‘Pick your lane and stick to it’—I’m glad I didn’t follow this path and instead have a dynamic, well-rounded set of experiences across my career.

What’s the best piece of non-obvious career advice you’ve gotten?

‘Good ideas have no hierarchy.’ It emboldened me to be an active participant when I was just getting started in my career, and now it compels me to ask for ideas and insight across the team, at all levels. 

What was a “heartbeat moment” for you in your career?

I joined Glossier when I was pregnant with my first child. I was nervous about stepping into a big role, professionally, with an even bigger role on the horizon in my personal life. There have been many heartbeat moments along the way, especially now that I’m a mom of two, but a major one was when the team cast my daughter Rowe in a campaign for our Milky Jelly Cleansing Bar—a product so gentle, parents can use it on their little ones. That moment cemented that I could bring my whole self to work at Glossier.  

Where have you caused trouble?

Good trouble might be my MO, the question for me is more, ‘when haven’t you caused some good trouble’? Most recently, it might be the voter registration campaign we led at Glossier, along with some eye-catching ads in key swing states and in the New York Times.  

DEAR FQ

Your burning career questions answered

Jason Schulweis of The Female Quotient weighs in:

In a perfect world, companies can hire for passion and train for skill (like our fearless leader, Shelley Zalis, preaches). But that's not always the case. This can be due to timing requirements, role nuances, client needs, etc.

To more directly answer your question, I'd recommend a few things, all in the name of showing your skills, and not just waiting to talk about them in the interviews:

• Create content (think: thought leadership) on LinkedIn. Post about relevant category news, and share how you think! I look at a candidate's LinkedIn profile before I look at their resume to get a more complete picture of who they are and how they think and communicate.

• Take on small consulting opportunities at companies that do similar things, in the same category, or that require similar skillsets to the role you're applying to. Make sure this experience is on your resume and LinkedIn (even if the jobs are small or low paying, you want to accumulate the most relevant experience quickly).

• Ask for a project. Many companies ask finalists to complete a project, and it's a great opportunity to demonstrate your expertise and stand out as a top candidate. While it can sometimes feel like unnecessary spec work, when executed well, it can significantly influence decision-making in your favor. Even if a company doesn't explicitly request a project, consider submitting a tailored project to highlight your skills, creativity, and passion—it's a bold move that can set you apart.

• Network, find referrals, and find “back ways” into the companies or roles you crave. This can be through your “2nd connections” on LinkedIn or through others at the company—the more people who have your back during the process, and reinforce how great you'd be, the better.

And lastly, make sure you include personal and professional anecdotes in your thank you emails following up after your interviews. Those are great pieces of collateral and can get passed around—it's all part of the interview process!

P.S. Got a burning career question? Serve it up here to Dear FQ to score advice from a powerhouse leader in our network.

POLL THE PACK

Most employees have some level of comfort discussing personal challenges at work

Do you feel comfortable sharing challenges in your personal life with your colleagues? If you haven’t in the past, consider 2025 your year to start opening up. Why? Because most high-performing teams share one common thread: trust.

Not sure where to start when it comes to opening up at work? Try sharing small things like personal goals, so sharing challenges won’t feel as foreign when the time comes. Training for a marathon? Someone else in your office might be, too. The more you can connect with your colleagues on a human level, the easier it will be to share the challenges that make you, well, human.

But if you’re in a leadership position and worried about losing credibility by oversharing, Susan Cain, a researcher and author, puts it best: “You don’t need to speak to your employees the same way you’d talk to a therapist. It’s enough to move in the direction of open-heartedness.”

Let’s end our first edition of 2025 inspired by Lan Phan: “Stop waiting to feel confident before finding the courage to begin.”

Xo,

The FQ