There’s a quiet, insidious filter through which society judges women in power—a filter we rarely acknowledge but almost always apply. It’s not competence. It’s not clarity of vision. It’s not even moral integrity. It’s likeability.

We say we want strong women leaders. We teach our daughters to speak up, lead teams, break ceilings. But when a woman finally steps onto the stage—be it in politics, business, or the media—our first instinct is to weigh her smile, her tone, her warmth. Not her policies, her decisions, or the results she drives. We want her strong, but not forceful. Smart, but not intimidating. Ambitious, but not self-effacing. We demand a constant emotional calibration that has nothing to do with leadership and everything to do with comfort.

This isn’t theoretical. We’ve seen it unfold in real time.

When Leni Robredo ran for president, she was organized, composed, and deliberate. She took the high road in an undeniably hostile political climate, one that increased in such, stuck to facts, and focused on concrete solutions. And yet, she was derided as “too soft”, “too slow”, or ironically, “too full of herself.” The message was clear as day: it doesn’t matter how clean your record or sharp your vision, if you’re a woman, you’d better package it in a way that feels pleasing to everyone. This is not unique to Robredo, many women in positions of power or are aspirants of such across the world—are lauded for their empathy, only to burn out under the relentless demand to perform emotional leadership at all times. It’s a pattern as old as patriarchy itself—women must earn the right to lead not with mere results, but with charm.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth: likeability is a moving target. For women, it shifts with the room, with the mood, with the audience. It punishes outspokenness and independence while rewarding deference and affability. And crucially, it’s rarely a metric men are held to in the same way. When a man leads with conviction, he’s respected. When a woman does, she’s “difficult.”

Why does this matter? Because it doesn’t just harm individual women—it corrodes the entire leadership pipeline. It teaches the next generation that to lead as a woman, you must also perform, constantly shape-shift, and mask your authenticity. It creates a chilling effect where the cost of ambition isn’t just failure—it’s public dissection.

And so, we must ask ourselves: Do we actually want women leaders, or do we just want women who lead likeable lives? Because if we’re only comfortable with women in power when they make us feel good, we haven’t truly dismantled bias—we’ve simply made it prettier.

It’s time to retire likeability as a leadership requirement. Leadership should not be a personality contest, especially when the criteria being used are built on double standards, and by men who are too threatened to have women lead—they have to find some superficial way of incapacitating them. We should be led by those with vision, integrity, and competence—not just by those who smile the right way while doing it.

Because if we only elevate women who make us feel comfortable, we’re not breaking barriers—we’re just decorating them.

H/T: https://fearlessbr.com/, https://www.politico.com/, https://blogs.illinois.edu/