Uploaded February 2015 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Why are there so few women at the top? Part of the answer is prejudice, stereotypes, the fact that they still do most of the childrearing, etc. etc. – and all these might help explain why a woman’s male colleagues are often preferred. But there is another factor at play: once someone is actually promoted, a certain mechanism kicks in which helps magnify any initial difference – or create a very real one where none existed originally! Here is Malcolm Gladwell explaining the same process at work in the field of sports.
I believe the same mechanism can help explain a number of things – not least the huge discrepancy between NESTs and NNESTs at the top levels of ELT.
[NB: I do not own the copyright to this video clip. I have uploaded it here for educational purposes].
Why are there so few women at the top? Part of the answer is prejudice, stereotypes, the fact that they still do most of the childrearing, etc. etc. – and all these might help explain why a woman’s male colleagues are often preferred. But there is another factor at play: once someone is actually promoted, a certain mechanism kicks in which helps magnify any initial difference – or create a very real one where none existed originally! Here is Malcolm Gladwell explaining the same process at work in the field of sports.
I believe the same mechanism can help explain a number of things – not least the huge discrepancy between NESTs and NNESTs at the top levels of ELT.
[NB: I do not own the copyright to this video clip. I have uploaded it here for educational purposes].
