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Celebrating Diversity
Cracking the gender code
Women have made progress in the workplace; the next step is changing the conversation
TOP BARRIERS WOMEN FACE AT WORK
Women hold more than 50 percent of professional and management positions today. Yet most of these jobs are at the middle-management level and lower. What keeps women from cracking the glass ceiling and finding seats in the boardroom? Author Connie Glaser offers several reasons:
- Women frequently do not seek or are not promoted to positions that have profit-and-loss responsibilities. "Women are promoted into training, human resources and other positions that are essential but are not on the side of operations or sales - positions where there's monetary authority and responsibility."
- Women often are excluded from informal networking. "It's not deliberate. It's unusual to invite the women to go to the cigar bar, the golf game, the sports event. It's part of the male culture, but a lot of women are excluded, either because it's not of interest to them or it's assumed it isn't."
- Gender-based stereotypes continue to play a part in decision-making. "A woman with a family may not be considered for an overseas position on the assumption that her husband won't leave his job. A woman who has just had a child may not be considered for a promotion because there's an assumption that her priority is her child. That may be the case, but maybe not."
- Companies lose a tremendous amount of female talent by not acknowledging that there may be a period when a woman wants to plateau or step off the work cycle for a while. "To keep them, it's important to keep the re-entry on-ramps available to women."
- Men seem more comfortable promoting themselves because it's part of the culture in which they grew up. "That leaves women to figure out strategies to support and promote one another. Women are more prone to do a good job and wait to be recognized for it than to promote themselves."
In the last 15 years, women have made record advances in the business world - as entrepreneurs and as corporate leaders. But when it comes to communicating with the opposite sex, not much has changed.
It's hard to believe that veterans and daughters of the women's movement of the '60s and '70s can still be caught off guard by the stereotypes of male and female roles. But it's still an issue many women - and men - deal with at work every day.
"Women comprise more than 50 percent of the workplace, in management and professional positions, yet we're still dealing with a culture that goes by the old rules," author Connie Glaser said.
The Sandy Springs resident has written extensively on gender differences, including her newest book, "GenderTalk Works: Seven Steps for Cracking the Gender Code at Work" (Windsor Hall Press, $19.95), which comes out this month.
"It's time to have a new conversation on gender talk," Glaser said. "Given the accessibility and profusion of information these days - through blogs, Web sites and even around the water cooler - the issues are being discussed anyway. But organizations can step up and address them head-on to find some constructive solutions."
Fighting stereotypes
Glaser frequently conducts workshops and seminars for companies to help employees break down gender stereotypes. Those sessions also have provided plenty of material for her writing.
"For instance, I went to ESPN headquarters in Connecticut to make presentations on gender issues," Glaser recalled. "During a tour of the campus, I noticed a couple of high-level women standing in the hall as a man approached. The women wanted to engage him - ask him questions, invite him to join - because they like inclusiveness.
"Translate this into a meeting: A woman is waiting to be invited in, to be asked her opinion. That's the appropriate thing to do in the female culture. But the male culture is more like a pickup basketball game: You want in, you jump in."
Glaser saw similar differences during a visit to a large Massachusetts hospital, where a newly promoted female physician was treated to a celebration at a cigar bar by her male colleagues.
"They thought they were including her, but she saw the cigar bar as an alien environment," Glaser said.
One of the most frequently asked questions Glaser hears is, "Do women have to emulate men to be successful?"
"Definitely not," she said. "Women bring to the table a different set of strengths. The focus of my book 'Swim With the Dolphins' was about succeeding in corporate America, not by being sharks, but by building your own strengths."
Company programs
Many companies have started workplace programs to help women define and focus on their strengths. Glaser cites Deloitte & Touche's Personal Pursuits program, which allows women to take leave from the company for up to five years but still stay involved by attending workshops, keeping skills current and updating professional credentials.
Turner Broadcasting's Turner Women Today offers networking and training opportunities.
Atlanta also is home to Pathbuilders Inc., which pairs executives from established companies with up-and-coming women from other companies.
"So someone from Delta may be paired with someone from Turner for a year," Glaser explained. "That provides a role model and often opens doors."
The Board of Directors Network is another local organization that helps women build the credentials needed to serve on corporate boards.
"In the past, a lot of organizations have formed women's initiatives to give them the tools, network and mentors to help them succeed," Glaser said. "What I see right now is a lot of emphasis on diversity but with tremendous gender differences.
"There is a certain level of enlightenment on how men and women are hard-wired differently, how they communicate and solve problems differently. It's not a right-or-wrong situation. The key now is to leverage those differences so men and women work together in a more collaborative way, before there are hurt feelings, conflicts and even major lawsuits."
