Abstract: Women’s leadership development is dominated by neoliberal ideology. Individualized, non-critical, and binary interventions (e.g., women leaders do X, men leaders do Y) prevail in leadership development since leadership development has been regarded as an instrumental way to advance in an organization. In women’s leadership development, in particular, the postfeminist discourse— “fixing the oppressed women individuals,” not “fixing the oppressive system”— has encroached on the dominant discourse on women’s leadership development (Greer et al., 2022). Developed under neoliberal capitalism, postfeminism—a movement believing that feminist values to confront oppressive systems are outdated—encourages women leaders to be neoliberal perfectionists who are confident, care for themselves, and control their emotions, bodies, and behaviors without critical consciousness (Admanson & Kelan, 2019; Gill, 2017; Mavin & Grandy, 2016; 2019; McRobbie, 2015; Orgad & Gill, 2022; Rottenberg, 2014). Further, neoliberal, postfeminist women’s leadership development has disregarded the intersectional identities of women leaders by limiting the scope of women leaders to the elite white women (Liu, 2020). Thus, postfeminist women’s leadership development unconsciously has erased the existence of historically excluded women leaders (e.g., women of color). For instance, Sandberg’s (2013) Lean In, one of the best-selling leadership books, showed how she, as an elite white woman, could be successful without critical awareness. The postfeminist perspective cannot help women and historically excluded leaders because it does not consider systemic barriers that women are likely to face in organizations. Although it often claims to celebrate diversity, leadership development has reproduced interlocking systems of domination in the workplace due to the lack of critical, systemic, and institutional interventions (Liu, 2020; Perriton, 2009). We argue that a critical feminist perspective is required to confront oppressive leadership development. Critical feminism is “an amalgamation of principles from critical perspectives and post-structural feminism” (Bierema & Cseh, 2014, p. 131). “Critical feminism offers an unvarnished look at the realities of sexist, patriarchal organizations and analyzes how they perpetuate implicit bias that blocks women from full access to development experiences and advancement opportunities” (Bierema, 2017, p. 146). Although a few studies proposed aspects of critical leadership development (CLD) and organizational change strategies from a critical feminist perspective (e.g., Bierema, 2017), they did not address emerging problems in leadership development stemming from postfeminist discourse or include recent feminist discourses, such as intersectionality and gender diversity. Thus, existing CLD models have limitations in interrogating oppressive characteristics in current leadership development. This paper aims to suggest an updated CLD model in order to challenge postfeminism in leadership development and develop gender conscious leaders. To achieve this goal, we will answer the following research questions by conducting a conceptual study that involves a literature review: (a) What is the gap in women’s leadership? (b) How has gender discourse in women’s leadership development been changed? (c) How has postfeminist discourse in women’s leadership development oppressed women? (d) How can critical feminist leadership development improve gender consciousness that privileges intersectional inclusivity over postfeminist exclusivity? Specifically, we will review CLD studies to understand past discourse on leadership development from a critical feminist perspective (e.g., Bierema, 2017). We will briefly summarize how CLD has been understood and suggested so far and describe the gap in women’s leadership, women’s leadership theory, and women’s leadership development. Next, we will explore the change in understanding gender and its implications for CLD. Specifically, we will introduce the shift in the feminist discourse on gender from “binary” to “diverse,” “fixed” to “fluid,” and “singular” to “intersectional” (Bierema & Grace, 2020; Dray et al., 2020; Greer et al., 2022). In addition, we will examine the discourse in postfeminist leadership development from a critical feminist approach (e.g., Liu, 2020; Perriton, 2009). We will show how postfeminist leadership development can oppress women. Lastly, we will propose a critical and gender conscious leadership development model integrating the recent understanding of gender and critical feminism challenging postfeminism. This paper will contribute to human resource development (HRD) practice and scholarship by suggesting a critical, feminist model that can be practically used to develop women leaders in organizations. This work provides new language for discussing women’s leadership development and issues a challenge to those working in leadership development to take a more critical perspective of the values, interventions, and scope (fix the individual woman versus fix the organization) of leadership development as well as eschew neoliberal, postfeminist values. More mindful, critical approaches to leadership development will result in leaders and organizations that are more sensitized to issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and realize more success in attracting and retaining diverse talent.
