Research has shown that women managers in the United States were considered more effective when they were rated higher than men in factors related to transformational leadership. Given that culture and a woman's position within a culture are different in the Middle East, this study was designed to examine the impact of gender on the effectiveness of leadership in higher education in three universities in Lebanon and Egypt. Theories of transformational leadership and Hofstede's theory were used as a basis for understanding gender and leadership effectiveness in higher education in the Middle East. The researcher used a quantitative approach and she collected data by randomly selecting 12 leaders (deans) and 72 followers (professors and employees) from the three universities. Participants were asked to complete the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ) to measure the effectiveness of leadership of the deans. The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) was used for data analysis. Data was analyzed by using ANOVA for exploring the relationship between gender and leadership effectiveness and Pearson correlation to explore the relationship between the three leadership styles and leadership effectiveness. The results showed that gender does not impact leadership effectiveness. There was no significant effect of gender on leadership effectiveness. Thus, women leaders were as effective as men leaders in those universities. The results also indicated that women at the three universities used the transformational leadership style and that men at the three universities used the transactional leadership style. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://www.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]