“You need to communicate as vividly and clearly as possible that you’re on some different trajectory. And the stronger the break from the past, the clearer the signaling,” Haslam says. “For that reason women or members of other minority groups are often preferentially appointed under these circumstances.”

Yaccarino’s background in advertising, Twitter’s primary source of revenue, certainly makes her a logical choice to try to salvage the company’s crumbling business. But experts who spoke to WIRED say that one reason women step…