Why Women's Ideas Are Being Ignored by Science - And What It Costs Us All

Why Women's Ideas Are Being Ignored by Science - And What It Costs Us All

What if the greatest ideas shaping our future are being overlooked, simply because of who proposed them? Dr. Michaël Bikard, Associate Professor of Strategy at INSEAD, has spent years researching exactly this question. In a landmark study conducted with his colleague Isabel Fernandez-Mateo of London Business School, Prof. Bikard examined how gender shapes which scientific ideas gain technological traction. Using a powerful "idea twins" design, cases where men and women independently published the same discovery at nearly the same time, the research found that identical ideas received significantly greater impact when attributed to men, measured through patent-to-paper citations. Scaling the analysis to over 60 million publications, the gender gap proved universal across every scientific field and showed no sign of shrinking over time. An online experiment with 400+ PhD and MD holders further confirmed that this bias is not deliberate, it operates unconsciously, affecting both male and female respondents alike. The implications are profound: this is not just a fairness issue, but an innovation efficiency problem, strong ideas from women are being left on the table, slowing technological progress for everyone. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy.

Age, Gender & AI: The Research That's Changing How We Think About Bias | Prof. Solène Delecourt

Prof. Solène Delecourt, a faculty member in the Management of Organizations and Entrepreneurship & Innovation groups at the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, shared key insights from her research on "Age and Gender Distortion in Online Media and Large Language Models." In this episode of Business Talk, host Deepak Bhatt sits down with Prof. Solène Delecourt, a faculty member in the Management of Organizations and Entrepreneurship & Innovation groups at the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley, and a recipient of the Best 40 Under 40 MBA Professor award by Poets & Quants (2024). Drawing from her landmark research published in Nature, Prof. Delecourt shares insights from an analysis of over 1.3 million online images across Google, Wikipedia, IMDb, and YouTube, revealing how digital media does not merely reflect gender bias, it actively amplifies it. Her research further exposes a troubling age distortion effect, where the mere presence of a woman in an image led participants to estimate an occupation's average age as nearly 5.5 years younger. Extending her inquiry into artificial intelligence, Prof. Delecourt also presents findings from an audit of nearly 40,000 synthetic resumes processed through ChatGPT, which consistently assigned women lower experience, younger ages, and lower scores than male counterparts, challenging the widespread assumption that AI-driven hiring is neutral or objective. The conversation explores the societal and business implications of these findings, offering actionable recommendations for leaders to audit hiring pipelines, standardize screening processes, and maintain critical human oversight when deploying AI tools. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy. Disclaimer: 1. The background music incorporated in this video is the intellectual property of its respective developer and is protected under applicable copyright laws. Notwithstanding that it is a free-to-use version, Business Talk, Global Management Consultancy, and Deepak Bhatt do not own, and expressly do not claim, any rights, title, or interest in or to this music. 2. Dr. Solène Delecourt shared key insights from her fascinating research, “Age and Gender Distortion in Online Media and Large Language Models”, in an engaging episode of the Business Talk podcast. The uploaded video contains copyrighted content, so changing any graphics, music, or on-screen appearance of the author or host is not allowed.

What Really Drives Gender Bias in Leadership Evaluations | Dr. Aparna Joshi

In this episode of Business Talk, host Deepak Bhatt sits down with Dr. Aparna Joshi, Professor of Management and Organizations at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, Fellow of the Academy of Management, and recipient of the 2025 Academy of Management General Impact Award, to explore her landmark paper, "An Integrative Conceptual Review of Gender Bias in Leader Evaluations: An Observer-Focused, Motive-Driven Process Model." For decades, gender bias research has implicitly placed the burden of change on women, from unconscious bias training to the Lean In movement, asking them to navigate, adjust, and get it just right. Dr. Joshi makes a decisive pivot: rather than asking what women leaders should do differently, her research asks why different observers evaluate the very same woman leader so differently. At the heart of her model are three core observer motives, identity (rooted in either threat or affinity), value alignment (shaped by ideology and beliefs about merit), and resource dependence (which can lead to bias-by-proxy in multilateral settings), each revealing that bias is not simply a product of the leader's behaviour, but of the goals and motives the evaluator brings to the room. This conversation challenges organisations, managers, and scholars to stop targeting women and start targeting the systems and evaluators that shape these unequal outcomes. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy. Disclaimer: 1. The background music incorporated in this video is the intellectual property of its respective developer and is protected under applicable copyright laws. Notwithstanding that it is a free-to-use version, Business Talk, Global Management Consultancy, and Deepak Bhatt do not own, and expressly do not claim, any rights, title, or interest in or to this music. 2. Dr. Aparna Joshi shared key insights from her fascinating research, “An Integrative Conceptual Review of Gender Bias in Leader Evaluations: An Observer-Focused Motive-Driven Process Model”, in an engaging episode of the Business Talk podcast. The uploaded video contains copyrighted content, so changing any graphics, music, or on-screen appearance of the author or host is not allowed.

The Science of Political Misinformation: Why Corrections Alone Won't Work

In this episode of Business Talk, we sit down with Dr. Adam J. Berinsky, Mitsui Professor of Political Science at MIT and one of the foremost scholars on public opinion and political behavior, to explore the unsettling world of political misinformation. Drawing from his book Political Rumors: Why We Accept Misinformation and How to Fight It (Princeton University Press), Dr. Berinsky unpacks why false political narratives continue to circulate long after being debunked, not because people are irrational, but because of rational inattention, the power of social transmission, and the outsized influence of political elites. His research reveals a striking finding: while only a small percentage of people believe many conspiracy theories, a staggering 85% of people will endorse at least one political rumor when presented with a range of claims. From the "Whack-A-Mole" challenge of repeated corrections to the critical role of trusted messengers who speak against their own apparent interest, Dr. Berinsky offers evidence-based strategies for communicators, fact-checkers, and everyday citizens navigating an age of widespread misinformation. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy. Disclaimer: 1. The background music incorporated in this video is the intellectual property of its respective developer and is protected under applicable copyright laws. Notwithstanding that it is a free-to-use version, Business Talk, Global Management Consultancy, and Deepak Bhatt do not own, and expressly do not claim, any rights, title, or interest in or to this music. 2. Dr. Adam J. Berinsky shared key insights from his book, “Political Rumors: Why We Accept Misinformation and How to Fight It”, in an engaging episode of the Business Talk podcast. The uploaded video contains copyrighted content, so changing any graphics, music, or on-screen appearance of the author or host is not allowed.

Existential Politics: The Real Reason Global Climate Institutions Are Failing | Dr. Jessica Green

Dr. Jessica Green, Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto, with cross-appointments at the School of Environment and the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, shares insights from her book Existential Politics: Why Global Climate Institutions Are Failing and How to Fix Them, a courageous and incisive examination of the critical gaps in global climate governance and the urgent reforms needed to bridge them. In this compelling episode of Business Talk, Dr. Jessica F. Green challenges one of the most deeply held assumptions in climate policy, that climate change is fundamentally a collective action problem requiring global cooperation on emissions. Instead, she reframes it as an existential political conflict between fossil asset owners, whose trillion-dollar investments would be rendered worthless by decarbonization, and green asset owners, who stand to gain from the transition. Drawing from her book Existential Politics, Dr. Green argues that decades of climate governance have been built on the wrong diagnosis, producing technocratic tools like carbon pricing, carbon offsets, and net-zero targets that are not only ineffective but actively harmful, obscuring real power dynamics and generating public backlash. Her proposed remedy, which she calls "radical pragmatism," shifts the focus from managing tons of emissions to managing assets and capital flows, using existing levers such as green industrial policy, global corporate minimum tax, and withdrawal from fossil-fuel-friendly investment treaties to constrain fossil fuel power and accelerate the rise of renewable energy. Ultimately, Dr. Green argues that the most politically viable path forward lies not in asking citizens to sacrifice for distant climate goals, but in reframing climate action as an investment in economic security, energy independence, and everyday public goods. This podcast is brought to you by Global Management Consultancy. Disclaimer: 1. The background music incorporated in this video is the intellectual property of its respective developer and is protected under applicable copyright laws. Notwithstanding that it is a free-to-use version, Business Talk, Global Management Consultancy, and Deepak Bhatt do not own, and expressly do not claim, any rights, title, or interest in or to this music. 2. Dr. Jessica Green shared key insights from her fascinating book, “Existential Politics: Why Global Climate Institutions Are Failing and How to Fix Them”, in an engaging episode of the Business Talk podcast. The uploaded video contains copyrighted content, so changing any graphics, music, or on-screen appearance of the author or host is not allowed.