Why Everything You've Heard About Women And Negotiation Might Be Wrong

Samantha Miller didn't believe the conventional wisdom that women are bad at negotiating. So Miller, a student at the University of Florida, asked professor Yellowlees Douglas to help her take another look. Their study blew previous findings out of the water. Here are 5 things they learned.

1. Women can and do negotiate for what they want.

Women who had experience with successful negotiation were better at it than the men in the study, even when they rated themselves as only average negotiators.

2. It’s not a lady thing.

Women who avoided negotiation or negotiated poorly were probably influenced by a lack of experience – not by anything inherent in their gender.

3. Women asked for more than men.

In the study, 25 MBA students completed a survey and were asked to name the amount they would get on a Starbucks card for participating. Women asked for twice as much as men on average, and every woman who participated asked for a reward. Of the three highest amounts requested, two came from women.

4. So why have past studies shown otherwise?

Men are more likely than women to have held high-paying jobs, so they are more likely to have successful negotiations to draw on. Miller thinks the change could also be generational. "I think it's very telling of a new generation of empowered women," she said.

5. What's next?

Landing a high-paying job isn't the only way to practice negotiation: College career-services offices could add negotiations to mock interviews to give new grads experience to draw on, and job applicants – male or female – can take time to reflect on their previous successes before heading into a negotiation, Douglas said. "I hope people shut up about gender and talk about the framework that informs gender bias – the forces that work on us subconsciously and affect men and women alike."