With all the creative -- and in some cases draconian -- solutions proposed for this global financial mess, Iceland of all places has come up with a novel solution. That country, in serious financial doo-doo because of the meltdown, has appointed women to run the country's two largest and newly nationalized banks.

The guys make a mess, and the women come in and clean it up. That hardly ever happens, right? The top three banks were run by men, reportedly in reckless, over-leveraged and speculative ways, and the institutions were holding $61 billion in debt in a $20 billion national economy. One commentator called it "testosterone fueled follies."

Hmm. With all the hyper-greed and the ethical and legal corner-cutting we've seen by business executives in the last 25 years, how many women have you seen in handcuffs doing the perp walk or in public disgrace because of their transgressions? Think Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, the Keating Five and the S&L crisis.

And who was running the show at Lehman Bros, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, WaMu, Bear-Sterns and AIG, all of which have gone down in flames because of all the over-leveraging, the speculating, the pseudo-hedging? Not many ladies have been inducted into the Hall of Shame these last few months.

That's not to say that gender is a good predictor of business executive success. High profile CEOs got shown the door at HP and Lucent because they couldn't get it done, and there has been an occasional executive suite scandal involving women.

But it seems to be the reckless and overly aggressive behavior on the part of many members of my gender that has largely gotten us into this financial mess. Where was the good judgment? Where was the prudence?

Several studies involving tens of thousands of traders -- professional and amateurs -- during a 15-year period found that women made better investment decisions and outperformed their male counterparts. Why? Misplaced overconfidence among the men. The researchers found that women will stick to the rules, while men will second-guess the rules more often and do dumb things. It's an arrogance of sorts, akin to not wanting to stop and ask for directions.

But biology is not destiny. There are reckless women, and there are prudent and careful men. Think about the thousands of local and regional male bankers who have exercised good judgment and whose banks don't need a bailout.

Let's also remember that many great things have happened in history because of ego-driven, ambitious, testosterone-fueled behavior. Caution and prudence would not have allowed us to put a man on the moon when we did.

These extraordinary economic times call for business leadership that is neither reckless nor overly cautious. In these times, we need Venus AND Mars. We need more bosses on Wall Street who don't have a Y chromosome, and perhaps part of the U.S. recovery plan should be a variation of the Iceland solution.

Opinions expressed solely are those of the writer. Mike Hoban, of Crown Point, is a senior consultant for an international leadership development and training firm. Send mail to him c/o The Times, or e-mail him at business-at-large@sbcglobal.net.