Women In Business
I attended a session titled Women In Technology at XChange on Tuesday. Now, this was a roundtable of female executives from BMC Software, IBM, Intel & Ricoh, moderated by the always awesome Toni Clayton Hine from IPED. We’re talking serious Wheel factor here. Several of the panelists were onstage later that evening, accepting major awards for their respective companies.
However, there were no more than 10 men in the entire audience. Maybe less. Let’s say 7, tops.
I had no sooner sat down than several ladies sitting near me, some of whom I had already met at the conference, and some of whom I had not, started tapping me on the shoulder and whispering “Ummm, are you sure you’re in the right session?” All of it good-natured and we laughed about it. I’d bet the other men in the room were hearing similar reactions.
This was, without any doubt, the session that will have the most impact on my business, both in the short-term and the long-term.
Here’s why…
During the session, the issues and challenges being raised by the panelists, and the types of advice they were giving started ringing some bells in the back of my head. These are all things Running Antelope has been writing about…for YEARS. Heck, dealing with for years in one form or another.
When she was a teacher, she would notice these types of things among her students. As an advice columnist for a teen girl magazine. And as a freelancer, she saw these same types of issues writing her articles about teen pregnancy, suicide, etc. And for her articles in publications for women…working mothers, etc.
So I spoke up, and said that the issues being mentioned sounded a lot like an article Running Antelope had written several years ago that ran in For Me magazine’s Working Girl section called Fake, Fraud, Imposter! (August 2005, page 66). The article discussed a phenomenon known as “Imposter Syndrome.” Almost exclusively appearing in women, Imposter Syndrome is the unique reaction women have when something doesn’t go right at work, or in some other situation. Even more so among highly-capable, skilled women. In a nutshell, the premise is that women, by and large, tend to feel that their accomplishments are the result of luck, or connections, or anything other than their own abilities and strengths. Which means they feel like they will be found out as a, well…fake/fraud/imposter, at any time.
Here’s how it works…
Let’s say, you’re a woman who has just been given a new assignment at work. Perhaps a new position even. Let’s say you get caught unawares by something, and your boss…or even your boss’s boss, wants you to explain what happened. Big time issue, heads ready to roll, etc.
Even tho you maintain a cool head on the outside, and get the situation handled, maybe to the point of finding a better solution in the process, most women don’t count that kind of thing as a win. That incident might continually plague them, with nagging feelings of “I’m so not qualified. I’m out of my league. People are going to find out that I don’t know what I’m doing” and on and on. Approaching infinity. Like those infinity mirrors from Spencers.
A guy? Even if he’d been on his knees, begging not to be fired, after work he’d be at a bar, smoking cigars and high-fiving his pals for getting away with it. Heck, he’d prolly put down “Stays cool under pressure” and “Perseveres in the face of impossible odds” on his “Show Me The Money” list for his next salary review.
When Running Antelope and I were talking about that article 2 years ago, I told her that didn’t surprise me in the least. I’ve always thought that women are WAAAAAY too tough on themselves. The example I gave her at the time, and the audience this week, was the difference in our respective “getting dressed to go out” rituals…
She:
- Curl/flat iron hair
- Apply makeup
- Pick clothes
- Freak out about lack of clothes
- Change clothes again
- Find jewelry to match
- Change outfit to match jewelry
- Take off jewelry, go back to original outfit
- Freak out about lack of shoes
- Change back to second outfit to match shoes
- Apply perfume
- Redo hair after all the outfit changes
- And on and on, approaching infinity
Me:
- Socks = Match. Check.
- Fly = Zipped. Check.
I told the audience that I often hear a lament about the dearth of women in the industry. But, looking around the room, what I saw was…
- 70–80 intelligent, capable women in the IT field
- A discussion about career advancement that was applicable to both men and women
- A conference session that had lots of empty seats
- Seats which should have been filled with men
I also had been bummed that the “Women of the Channel” reception the previous evening had been closed to men. Siloing in our industry is the kiss of death. How many times have you complained to a vendor about that very same thing? That their different divisions need to communicate more, not less. So how is segregating men from women, and vice-versa, any way to make progress in this industry?
My reason for attending that session, as I told them, was for the simple fact that 90% of my business interactions are with females. Vendors, customers, local business community, etc. So it is in my absolute best interest as a business person to understand, or at least try to understand, what makes women tick. Altho I rarely have anything even approaching a clue about the workings of the female mind (a fact which Running Antelope reminds me constantly) and will obviously never fully understand how women think, if I can get even a sliver of insight, it will make me a better solution provider to my customers, a better business person, a better community leader…and quite frankly, a better husband and father. And I need that insight right.hell.now. For sure before my daughters become teenagers.
But the other thing I said was that my business could not, and would not, exist without Running Antelope. I’ve already talked about that in a lot of ways here at the Funcave. To make a long story short…she’s basically a BWT version of a super-cool secret agent ninja small business assassin with a kickass mind and bod to match. Wrapped in velvet. But the main strength we have is the fact that she and I are so different, with very different skills and talents. Together we have 2x as many strengths as each of us could muster on our own. Prolly more like 3x, if you want to get specific.
So here’s what I don’t get about the way women, as a group, operate. It seems as tho there are only 2 settings…ON and OFF.
Women can be some of the most supportive, connected, lift-you-up-girl, amazingly powerful people in the world with each other. As in…take over the world. As in, surrender now guys…we have no hope of competing with them when they are in ON mode. Because women offer to each other WAAAAAY more support than men would ever dream of doing within their own ranks.
But the flipside to that is…when they aren’t being supportive, women are absolutely bloodthirsty toward one another.
FAR beyond anything guys would ever think of doing to each other. This was backed up by some of the panelists, who talked about ways that other women, during the course of their careers, had been some of the worst stumbling blocks they had ever encountered.
In my younger days, one of my cousins, who used to be a bar bouncer, said there was only one type of fight he would never dare try to break up.
Two women? Oh hell no. Once a woman sets her mind to take out another woman, she will kill anything and anybody who gets in her way.
Obviously, in polite society, including the business world, that viciousness doesn’t reach the physical level. But the fact that it’s not a physical asskicking doesn’t change the fact that it can be an asskicking nonetheless.
In fact, that very harshness, to the point of brutality, was more than amply demonstrated within the very last hour of the conference. And I ended up having a front row seat to it. Or at least its after-effects. And maybe got a chance to counteract some of it personally. Maybe. I hope.
All this helped me complete part 1 of the 2 part decision-making process I completed in the last four days regarding the single most important issue in Black Warrior Technology’s young life as a company.
Part 2 of this decision…coming soon.
|| posted by chris under business, epiphany, it pro, more cowbell, opinion, thumbs down, thumbs up, travel || || ||
