What do hyenas, killer whales and elephants have in common? They’re members of an exclusive club where female bosses are the norm.

New research has found that of the more than 5,000 known species of mammals, just a handful are led by females.

As humans puzzle over the glass ceiling and how to get more women into leadership, could it be possible to learn something from the outliers of the animal kingdom? It’s a controversial idea, but according to the scientists who made this discovery, the answer is yes.

Wild styles

In a paper published this week, Mills College animal behaviour professor Jennifer Smith and three colleagues identified eight species that exemplify female leadership: hyenas, killer whales, lions, spotted hyenas, bonobos, lemurs, and elephants.

To find this group, the team first had to pinpoint the social species that show any leadership traits at all – by looking at things like movement, foraging, or conflict resolution, they identified 76 such mammals. Then within that group, the team searched for evidence of female leadership, and for the characteristics which define these female leaders.

“I think there’s a lot to learn from these non-human societies,” Smith says.