Corporate America has daddy issues
I have what I consider a healthy skepticism toward authority. I’ve always considered leaders—despite what titles they hold—as fallible people who don’t necessarily deserve blind adulation or deference. That skepticism has made it hard for me to adopt the “company man persona,” which might explain how little of the proverbial corporate ladder I’ve climbed.
And rather than take responsibility for that, I’m going to “blame” my dad: The instinct to question rather than comply, to think critically instead of playing yes-man, came from him. We never had a formal conversation about it. I just watched how he moved through the world—confident, grounded, with little to prove—and absorbed it. Even though I now interrogate masculinity professionally as a writer, the version of “being a man” I internalized first came from my father.
The idea of masculinity is broad, contested, and constantly evolving. And in corporate America, it still matters.
Research shows that sons often emulate their fathers’ version of masculinity, and because men continue to dominate leadership positions in the U.S., those inherited models don’t stop at the home. They show up in how work gets done, who gets promoted, and what kinds of behaviors are rewarded.
In practice, that inheritance can look like an executive who demands deference but bristles at accountability. Or a leader who establishes a culture where men bond through exclusion or bigotry. Or an environment that rewards bravado over substance, and conflates emotional intelligence with weak, “beta” behavior.
It can show up when men label assertive women “aggressive,” when they police what version of masculinity makes a leader, or when they constantly need to prove their worth. Think of Succession’s Kendall Roy, or your own pick of privileged white men whose familial connections thrust them into headlines more than their merit.
In short: Corporate America has what’s colloquially known as “daddy issues.”
Corporate culture reflects the versions of manhood its leaders were taught to perform. In speaking with several psychologists and professors who specialize in families and masculinity, I’ve come to understand that changing this culture won’t come from diagnosing men.
It will come from redesigning work so that care and empathy aren’t something they have to unlearn to succeed.
Rethinking the dad dynamic
Research shows that fathers influence how sons build social networks, how they communicate, and even whether they feel comfortable promoting women. All that even further complexifies when the father-son relationship is fraught.
Masculinity researchers use the term father hunger to describe the effects of an absent or emotionally distant father, which can result in insecurity, difficulty forming healthy relationships, a constant search for validation, or adopting a hardened persona to mask fear.
But as far as the label “daddy issues,” it’s typically reserved for women, and psychologists have long pointed out that this framing is both inaccurate and sexist: “All human beings have ‘mommy issues’ and ‘daddy issues,’” Michael Thompson, a psychologist specializing in children and families, told me, “because our parents shape us so powerfully.”
When I first started researching this piece, I assumed it would focus primarily on how toxic masculinity is passed from fathers to sons and then reproduced in the workplace. That assumption was informed by my own experiences with male coworkers, and trying to make sense of the world we’re currently living through: one where that toxic form of masculinity and its negative by-products—cruelty, aggression, bigotry—seem to be celebrated and exacerbated.
But the more I spoke with experts who study the intersection of masculinity, fatherhood, and work, the more that framing felt incomplete. What emerged instead was a picture of modern fatherhood that’s more intentional, and more emotionally engaged than the stereotypes suggest. Many of today’s fathers—and those who hope to become fathers—care deeply about being present for their children and involved in their daily lives.
Contemporary “daddy issues” in the workplace aren’t about litigating past fatherhood. They’re about whether institutions make room for a healthier version going forward.
Changes underway
Language plays a role in that shift to encourage men to more closely examine their masculinity, and the versions of it they’ve inherited from fathers and older men in their lives.
Developmental psychologist Gary Barker, founder and CEO of the Equimundo Center for Masculinities and Justice, an international organization that works globally to engage men and boys in healthy masculinities, told me he prefers the term caring masculinity over phrases like toxic masculinity or even healthy masculinity. The former, he explains, often makes men defensive; the latter can sound clinical. Caring masculinity, by contrast, frames masculinity around care for children, family members, communities, and friends.
“It means recognizing that you’re at your best when you’re connecting with others in caring relationships,” Barker said.
Barker and I spoke about the influence of our own fathers. Neither explicitly told us that a softer, kinder, less bombastic version of masculinity was the way to go, but care, not a rigid toxicity, was modeled. My father regularly asked me about my feelings and talked with me about my interests, even if they weren’t interests he shared. I always felt seen and accepted.
“Maybe they didn’t have the language around it,” Barker said, “but they did feel an ethic of, ‘I’ve got a duty to those around me.”
That perspective aligns with how some psychologists understand the current cultural moment. Michael Reichert, a clinical psychologist and founding director of the Center for the Study of Boys’ and Girls’ Lives at the University of Pennsylvania, a research consortium, sees today’s conversations not as a rejection of the past, but as an evolution.
“I don’t think we’re at this place because we’ve had everything wrong all along,” he said. “I think we’re evolving toward a new understanding of what it means to be a man.” That evolution shows up in data. Reichert said this generation of young men prioritizes emotional competence: the ability to identify and regulate their own emotions, express vulnerability, and maintain close relationships without defaulting to dominance or withdrawal.
In an interview with The Atlantic, Reichert spoke about an emotional literacy course he taught at a boys’ high school for 25 years, and how he’s seen firsthand the way resistance has morphed into acceptance on this front.
National surveys also suggest sustained interest in fatherhood: Pew Research Center data shows that 57% of Gen Z men without children hope to become fathers, while a majority of millennial dads report being highly engaged parents. In other words, many young men aren’t aspiring to emotional distance—they’re aspiring to connection.
The question is whether the workplaces they enter will reward that shift.
Where we go from here
Jamie Ladge, a professor of management at Boston College who studies fatherhood and organizations, told me that both workplace research and workplace culture still rely on overly narrow definitions of what fathers look like, often centering cisgender, heterosexual men with one partner. That hypothetical father maps neatly onto traditional ideas of masculinity: stoic provider, unencumbered worker, secondary caregiver.
But “there’s a lot more nuance and complexity in the fatherhood identity that needs to be considered,” she said.
Fathers may see themselves as caregivers, role models, breadwinners, or stay-at-home parents—often moving between those identities over time. Many fathers aren’t married, don’t work traditional jobs, don’t live in nuclear families, or aren’t in heterosexual relationships.
When organizations cling to a single archetype, they don’t just miss entire groups of men, they reinforce a narrow model of masculinity that constrains everyone.
Ladge’s research suggests that when workplaces support fathers in these varied roles—and thus support more diverse views of masculinity—the benefits are tangible. Involved fathers are more likely to experience work-family enrichment, feel more satisfied at work, and think less about quitting.
“There’s a real benefit to being an involved father,” Ladge said. “That satisfaction carries over into positive outcomes for organizations.”
Supportive management is key. Policies that normalize paid parental leave, flexible schedules, and caregiving responsibilities don’t just benefit families, they influence how employees relate to their work.
Barker echoed this point, noting that organizations that encourage caregiving often see greater engagement in return. As fathers, “if we feel supported in taking that time, we come back with more energy, more productivity, and more connection to the workplace that made it possible,” he said.
And yet, despite evidence that caring workplaces are more sustainable and productive, many organizations still cling to outdated ideals.
“There’s a strong bias, especially in the U.S., that the ideal worker is someone who works the longest hours and has no life outside of work,” Ladge said.
That expectation undermines the very conditions that allow parents—including fathers—to be present at home and engaged at work.
The result is a self-reinforcing loop: Research shows that parents with greater autonomy and supportive supervisors are more involved with their children, while involved parents are more satisfied and productive employees.
I didn’t learn skepticism of authority from a leadership seminar. I learned it by watching a man who knew who he was—and didn’t need a job to prove it.
Workplaces that make room for that kind of fatherhood might finally get the leaders they keep claiming to want.