Despite all they have to overcome, women still make better bosses than men

A study has revealed that women make better bosses to employees than men do.

Yup, you better believe it. Not only are women taking leadership positions in their stride, they’re absolutely smashing it. That’s despite everything you’ve heard about maternity leave and yes, that nasty pay gap.

Gallup has been tracking this for decades, and the pattern holds into 2026: women managers are more engaged at work than men (41% vs 35%) and are consistently better at engaging their own teams. (Source: Gallup, State of the Global Workplace 2026)

But 2025-2026 also brought a twist: female manager engagement fell by seven points — one of the steepest declines of any group tracked — as part of a broader global engagement crisis that’s pushed worker engagement down to just 20%, the lowest since 2020. Women aren’t just better at the job; right now, they’re also absorbing more of the pressure that comes with it.

More than 27 million workers were interviewed over the course of time it took to gather this research. Of those workers who were polled, the survey found they were more likely agree with the following statements if their managers were women:

• “There is someone at work who encourages my development”
• “In the last six months, someone has talked to me about my progress”
• “In the last seven days, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work”

Additionally, female managers eclipsed their male counterparts in numerous other areas. These included setting basic expectations for their employees, building relationships with their subordinates, encouraging a positive team environment and providing employees with opportunities to develop within their careers.

So, no more excuses for poor representation

I know all about the benefits of being managed by women, working under two of the best any company has to offer here at Debut. But despite this well-documented evidence proving it, the vast majority of people will not get the experience due women being badly represented in management positions.

Back in 2015, there were genuinely more men called John running FTSE 100 companies than women of any name — a stat that made headlines for a reason. It’s better now: as of early 2026, FTSE 350 companies report women hold 43% of board seats and 35.3% of leadership roles (up from 34.5% in 2023), and there were 21 female CEOs across the FTSE 100 and 250 combined in 2025 — the joint-highest number on record. (Source: FTSE Women Leaders Review, 2026)

Yet, there is more call for engagement in the workplace than ever before. According to Gallup, roughly 80% of employees worldwide report feeling disengaged at work. And let’s not forgot, it’s young people and millennials that suffer the most from disengagement from their jobs.

It’s time to stop thinking of this as a coincidence any more. It’s been said time and again, that diversity and gender parity has clear economic benefits. Companies with highly engaged workers outperform their competitors by 147 per cent in earnings per share. If pay and recognition are part of what’s driving this, our piece on [why money and job satisfaction go hand in hand] digs into that link further. So the message to CEOs from this report is clear. If you want your company to do well, promote more women.