Gender variation in perception of professional characteristics of educators

Changing work environment unfolds a variety of challenges for successful management of human resources. Participation of women in professions is not very similar to the impact of male professionals. This poses a striking demand of understanding the male and female characteristics and needs so as to manage them to yield their best performance at work. This paper attempts to study whether there are gender differences in the perception of professional characteristics of educators. A comprehensive set of professional characteristics derived from literature review was chosen for the study. A validated instrument was used to analyze the professional characteristics of a sample of 175 engineering educators. Was also intended to identify the specific perceptional dispositions that distinguish male educators and female educators. Men and women educators significantly differ in perceiving some of their professional characteristics, especially in their ‘concern for self’ circle.