Are you a Female Project Manager? How do you succeed in a male dominated industry?

It's already a four years old but this abstract on an article that highlights female advantages in leadership in certain specific contexts may help...
http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.109...199658213-e-005

I want to add something I've seen over the last couple of years. It's that I'm seeing more female PM's and Scrum Master than ever before. In the last 3 companies, the # of female PM's was equal to the male counterparts as PM's and/or as Director of the PMO. I can not speak to the environment or effort required.

I'm not a female PM, but one thing women need to do to succeed in a male-dominated industry is cast off the archaic thought patterns men have imposed on women for millennia. Women are taught to care what others think of them above all else, and to place great emphasis on being liked even if it means ignoring their own interests and desires. These traits are the very opposite of those a person needs to advance in the workplace.
This isn't a coincidence. More than a few men use these traits to manipulate women and remove them as competition. I can scarcely count the number of brilliant women I've worked with who were afraid to assert themselves to get the positions they deserved because they believed doing so would make them seem pushy or disagreeable. They told themselves if they worked hard enough their efforts would eventually be rewarded - they never were. Instead, in many cases incompetent men who had no issues about reaching for what they wanted stepped into those positions unopposed.

I'm not a female PM, but one thing women need to do to succeed in a male-dominated industry is cast off the archaic thought patterns men have imposed on women for millennia. Women are taught to care what others think of them above all else, and to place great emphasis on being liked even if it means ignoring their own interests and desires. These traits are the very opposite of those a person needs to advance in the workplace.
This isn't a coincidence. More than a few men use these traits to manipulate women and remove them as competition. I can scarcely count the number of brilliant women I've worked with who were afraid to assert themselves to get the positions they deserved because they believed doing so would make them seem pushy or disagreeable. They told themselves if they worked hard enough their efforts would eventually be rewarded - they never were. Instead, in many cases incompetent men who had no issues about reaching for what they wanted stepped into those positions unopposed.