Women in Leadership training in NeuchâtelWomen’s leadership in the canton of Neuchâtel: how can technical experts lead teams without controlling everything?
In the canton of Neuchâtel, microtechnology, watchmaking and microelectronics combine demanding industrial cycles with scarce expertise and continuing talent-retention challenges. How can a technical expert who becomes a manager develop her team’s autonomy without making her personal oversight the permanent guarantee of quality?
What the literature establishes: legitimacy is not just about competence
Alice H. Eagly and Steven J. Karau (2002, Psychological Review) propose a theory of prejudice towards women leaders, supported by the literature available at the time. When expectations associated with women appear incompatible with those associated with leaders, women may be evaluated less favourably both as leadership candidates and when exercising leadership. This analysis cautions against interpreting every difficulty in taking on a management role as an individual competence deficit.
A mechanism: developing leadership capability through experience
Albert Bandura (1977, Psychological Review) describes mastery experiences as a source of self-efficacy, alongside sources including observing others and verbal persuasion. Applied cautiously to management, this mechanism suggests that a manager benefits from trying out bounded delegation rather than simply being told to “trust the team”. The relevant experience then becomes successfully framing and monitoring a delegated decision, rather than solving every technical problem herself.
The hasty conclusion: simply let go
These papers establish neither that women exercise more control nor that a lack of confidence alone explains their managerial difficulties. Asking a manager to delegate while requiring her continually to demonstrate superior technical expertise creates an organisational contradiction. The transition therefore also requires her own management to recognise the development of collective autonomy as leadership work. (our executive and employee training programmes)
The limits: delegation does not mean removing controls
Neither article evaluates leadership training in Neuchâtel’s industrial sector. Applying the self-efficacy mechanism to delegation remains a working hypothesis, not evidence of an effect on quality or retention. In precision manufacturing, prescribed approvals, traceability and safety requirements remain essential: these necessary controls must be distinguished from a manager systematically taking work back.
A practical check in Neuchâtel
In a hypothetical microtechnology team in Neuchâtel, a manager could delegate the preparation of a deviation analysis, specifying permitted decisions, escalation thresholds and mandatory quality approval. A relevant exercise for SHR’s “Leadership au féminin” programme would be to record every managerial intervention for one month: prescribed check, requested support or unplanned takeover. The review would examine the proportion of unplanned takeovers among interventions, alongside quality deviations and compliance with approval requirements. This check would support discussion of a changing managerial role without confusing autonomy with an absence of oversight. To go further: explore the Women in Leadership training in Neuchâtel in the canton of Neuchâtel, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
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