My wife is a scientist and has complained about exactly this same phenomenon – literally, exactly this – in a science context. She says it’s a regular occurrence.
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I’m glad the thread reopened.
Here is one of the situations that have caused me to raise the question.
I work in engineering. I am an instructional designer of technical and sales courses. If I walk into a room for a sales course meeting, there will be a smattering of women, mostly from the sales and marketing teams. If I walked into a room for a technical course meeting, there will be one or two other women in the room; usually working on things like accessories - which are often an important part of the whole product - or the Beta test, but only rarely do women work on the main product.
Recently I WAS, remarkably, in a two day meeting where there were roughly half women and half men. Yeah, it was a marketing meeting, and many of the women were not from our company but from a vendor, but it was so unusual that I got excited about the possibilities.
The head of this particular team is a real pompous doodoo head who I have had the joy of working with many times this past year.
I spent two days watching this guy manage to dominate every single discussion in a variety of soul sucking ways. He started this session with an exercise where we were supposed to rate the various marketing materials we’d used in the last product launch - was the launch video a 5 or a 15? The USB tchotckes a 3 or a 6? It turns out only he knew the right answer, and people who tried to explain how dumb the whole exercise was (how are we measuring the impact?) were told just to “roll with it.” Two hours later every one in the room was completely deflated and defeated, and whatever hope I had of women having a voice was drained away.
When a woman starting presenting her draft key marketing messages presentation, he interrupted her 1 minute into her presentation to play super boring video that he “forgot” to play before, taking all the wind out of her sails.
It went on and on. Most of the men kept trying, but the women stopped talking pretty quickly.
Granted everyone was dealing with this guy being the kind of guy he is, but I have NEVER seen a woman walk into a room and act like this.
This is exactly what I have found in engineering. There will be 19 out of 20 of the guys who are really nice people that I enjoy working with. Then there will be some domineering SOB who will cut every person off at their knees, and most especially the women. There will be a few men around him who have his ear, but women only in supporting roles.
In my last job the guy was the owner of the company. He was a fun, creative guy, but a complete nerd. He wasn’t douchey the way this guy was, but he didn’t relate to women because N E R D. I was several times given a chance to present with just him and one or two people in the meeting who were championing me, but he was so uncomfortable with me and so dismissive of me that I never had an chance to move ahead. The only woman in managing worked in the relatively secretarial role of Quality Management, and she worked insane hours to hang with the men for her crappy job.
I am so sick of having people like this. I do have to work with this guy and I want to know how to break the cycle. How do the women get in with some douchey dickbag like this? Or a nerd who gets antsy around attractive women?
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That sounds so, so frustrating. I don’t know the answer. These were ideas I posted in the other thread. It may be that these have been tried and don’t work for the situation you’re describing.
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I’ve seen this happen more than a fair number of times. Heck not only has happened to me, but I’ve called out for doing it a few times with my partner.
I have a theory that it happens when someone is half tuned out and not fully processing what someone is saying and then their brains slowly process it in the background and it comes to them later as their own idea.
Maybe that is the overly optimistic way of viewing it, but I hate to believe that people are consciously doing it.
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I’m not reading this whole thread. I am just going to respond to you. My opinion is that the most powerful form of speech is total self-ownership with total self-respect. If you feel something, express that you feel it and what you feel. YOU. As in saying “I” when you’re talking, and do not refer outside yourself for validation of your statements. Do not say you. Say I, or we, if there are more than one of the same mind and you are representing the group.
Total ownership of the concepts you are putting forth. This is what Cecile Richards did in her hearing. I saw her scroll by just now. If you feel someone is trying to malign you, you can say, I am talking about me, my feelings on this matter, backed up by my experience and what I know to be true. You do not need their validation; you already have it from yourself. The moment we veer into “you” statements, that is the gateway to accusation and then ad hominem and at that point non-listening and non-communication are all but guaranteed.
People are mortified by skilled self-respecters. They will try to malign, detract, deflect, dodge, ignore, etc. But your sticking always to your total self respecting speech, total ownership of your ideas will eventually rub off.
There are people who appear to take this to an extreme, such as trying to impose their will on others, how it sounds like your co-worker is doing. Those are not who I am talking about. You can spot them by their egocentricity and their unwillingness to entertain any other ideas besides their own. Narcissism has a certain smell: fear. And you can also detect hints of weakness because they do not fully own their feelings on the matter and will refer outside themselves constantly to make their point. That is ego standing in for the missing self respect.
Own your shit. Completely. When some jerk tries to pull you off your ground, stand it. And if you have heard enough out of them, then you have heard enough. Excuse yourself as soon as you can.
I did this when I was being laid off from a job I’d held for 10 years. They brought me into a room, had a bunch of papers and my boss and his boss launched into this legalistic thing then asked me what I had to say. I said one sentence about how I know my skills are valuable and it was astounding to me that I was being axed after such a long tenure of service. They started to dig in and defend their positions, budget, yadda. Knowing that I would get all the paperwork in the mail and didn’t have to sign anything at that table, I stood up and said goodbye. They tried to retrieve me to continue the “conversation” but I continued walking despite their protests that they weren’t finished, and left the door to the conference room hanging open behind myself. When there is nothing left to say, or hear, it is time to walk away.
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I know you mean well… and a lot of what you say is good advice for some situatuons. But you should really read the whole thread. Including the first one.
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My daughter and I just watched The Intern with Anne Hathaway and Robert DeNiro. My daughter was the one who thought the combo of the two of them would be fun to watch, and when it came on Amazon and had a Saturday night girls night alone, we decided it’d be a good pick for the evening.
I was so surprised by this movie. It was great. It avoided all the obvious age jokes and woman in charge tropes and had a beautiful theme of men looking back to the chivalry of olden days as a model for how to support women.
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Well, see that’s kind of what I mean- Assumptions and stereotypes, being paid less for the same work, for men to be respectful and listen- Those are all matters of equality. That’s just common sense, and it’s positively embarrassing that we didn’t settle those issues decades ago.
But what constitutes a sensible work-life balance, especially when it comes to family care, that’s way more subjective. I don’t know that three people could every really agree on exactly what that entails, even with everyone genuinely concerned about everyone else getting a fair shake.
Maybe I’m arguing semantics, but I think there’s a big issue with what happens when you confront privilege- If it’s done in a way that emphasizes equality, it’s hard to argue against. When it appeals to fairness, there’s a strong chance that it will actually be perceived as unfair, and trigger a reactionary response. When you start mixing the two, it makes it very easy for that reactionary mindset to write off even the most demonstrably justified cases as simply looking for special treatment.
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The article does go into a number of contexts where women tend to speak more than men, especially in informal contexts where there’s no status involved. I agree though, it’s often different labels for something that’s functionally very similar. Discussing the game or coworkers’ performance is strategic, while discussing celebrities or relationships is social, but they’re often both just different ways to bond over conversation. The same goes for doing something together vs. going somewhere to talk together in your free time.
In my own experience, I find there are a number of contexts where there are big differences, although I don’t think I could say who speaks more on the whole. This week I spoke with my brother for the first time in months. We spoke for an hour and a half, almost exclusively about ideas. I don’t actually know who he lives with, whether he has a job or not, how his health is or what his marriage plans are (he is engaged - or at least I think he is. I do know that he has a girlfriend and wants to get married at some point). If there was a problem or something interesting, I’m sure he would have told me - I’m as close to him as any of my other brothers, and we’re all very close. We basically talked about what we were thinking about and what he was writing about (he has a popular blog and is writing a book).
If I’m talking with my wife about ideas, I’ll generally speak for the majority of the time. Where it comes to more informal discussions about relationships though, she will almost completely carry the conversation, and she can talk for hours with only brief affirmative comments from my end. If we’re with another couple, the women usually spend most of the time talking. Where she’s with her girlfriends, I’ll occasionally listen for a while, then go off and spend some time elsewhere or have a nap for an hour or two. They haven’t even slowed down by the time I come back. I cannot keep that much information about different people in my head, but it’s very important to her and it has a genuine social purpose that I can respect. Talk about ideas often bores her though, as it just seems like impractical ivory tower nonsense. Still, it has an important social purpose for me. I think there are extremes to both kinds of conversation, but there’s no sense in which one is for great minds and one is for small minds.
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OK, I did. @Stynx and @codinghorror have the answer: get a different job. If the boss and the culture are oppressive, you’re not going to change it single-handedly and will exhaust yourself trying.
From my perspective I have never had these issues in the workplace. I have worked consistently in environments that valued people’s contributions regardless of gender, race, orientation, etc. When it seemed like someone had a good point and the leader or other members of the group were talking over them or ignoring, as can happen in heated discussions sometimes, then one of us spoke up, “Well Becca has a good point we should listen to her.” Or “Tom has something to say, can we let him get into this discussion?”
I work with women and men. Right now, there are two women and two men in the group who know way, way, way more than I do. And I would be what kind of person if I talked over them in meetings and dismissed what they had to say? The boss would be what kind of person if he talked over them and ignored their opinions on our work?
Seriously, if you are in a toxic work environment, GET OUT! You don’t need improved conversational styles and to parse the nuance of man/woman communication. You need A NEW JOB. …With people who care about you and actually develop friendships based on kindness, trust and mutual respect.
We knew anecdotally that women were leaving these careers. We didn’t expect to see the number 52 percent," said Laura Sherbin, a director at the Center for Work-Life Policy. “We [also] found that there was a specific age range in their mid- to late-30s where the attrition seemed to spike.”
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My workplace is in the sciences… data science. Hard core programming and statistics. There is equality. So there are places to go. People do not have to jump ship of their discipline. I was not suggesting that.
What about when it happens at the new job? Or the one after that? This is not some one off thing, it happens pretty frequently to many women.
Lucky for you.
[quote=“awjt, post:79, topic:74908”]
I have worked consistently in environments that valued people’s contributions regardless of gender, race, orientation, etc.[/quote]
With all due respect, do you know if everyone there felt the same way, or that they didn’t experience problems because of their gender/race/etc?
That’s great. At what point do we get respect without having a dude speak up for us?
But again, this isn’t about you, it’s about a pervasive culture that continues to throw up serious roadblocks for women’s (and POC) advancement. It would be nice if you wouldn’t dismiss it just because you haven’t seen it yourself.
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And since women are accustomed to dealing with this behavior from men since childhood, they know to pull back and save their energy for a workable situation instead. How many times do you bang your head against a brick wall before you accept the fact that it’s stupid to keep trying?
But oh no, women just don’t know how to stand up for themselves in professional settings. Yup, that’s gotta be it.
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Keep in mind that just because you and your wife fulfill the stereotypes well doesn’t mean:
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Every other male/female partnership is the same (n=1 and all that); and
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You haven’t come to this point in your lives without having been subtly (or not-so-subtly) raised up with stereotypical expectations so that by the time you met each other, you were already set in those grooves.
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Sure, it’s just one data point. I wasn’t arguing that everyone was the same, just that “person A talks more than person B” is hard to prove as there are different contexts in which people are more talkative or take more control of the conversation (this has nothing to do with the main point that there are specific and important contexts in which women’s voices are suppressed). It just so happens that my experience matches the general trend seen in the studies that the article reviewed. Similarly, “talking about ideas is for great minds” is rubbish. People talk about what they’re interested in, and greatness has very little to do with it. If anything, I’d say that a greater focus on relationships in conversations is more likely to do some good.
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I have no solutions to suggest. I know the problem is real, and especially real for women (I’ve not just read about it, but seen it in action many many times, and I do what I can to call it out when I see it), but the same damn thing happens to me all the time, too, and I’m stumped. I’m not particularly anyone’s image of a shrinking violet at 6’2", but I’ve always had a problem being acknowledged as a viable contributor in meetings or conversations of certain types involving more than just me and one other person. Two examples of the type:
A question will come up and I’ll think the answer may be obtained from the Line Producer (whose rank is roughly equivalent to mine, except he mostly oversees Production and I oversee Post Production… plus he’s an old friend of mine). I’ll stroll over to his office and he’ll be conversing with someone else. Might be schmoozing with the Costume Designer, might be negotiating a deal with Panavision, might be discussing the Lakers with the UPM. I’ll catch his eye, he’ll notice me, and I’ll wait for a natural break in the conversation. Which never comes. From behind me, the (female) Production Coordinator will poke her head past me, ask a quick question (interrupting if the issue warrants it), get a quick answer, then be on her way. And it’s weird. I have tried politely waiting, I’ve tried peremptorily spouting off with my question, I’ve tried interrupting, I’ve tried subtly indicating that my question is both important and brief… nothing reliably works. I just come across as easily ignored, even among people who like me.
The other example occurs in small-group conversation, like when three to seven of us are standing around, talking about whatever. Could be work, could be friends and family at a party. In an earnest conversation with a bunch of people, I rarely get heard. I try to wait for breaks in the flow so as not to actually interrupt people, but then I never get to speak. If I find a hole and start talking, within three seconds, someone’s talking over me. So then I figure “It’s cool, in this venue, interrupting must not be rude then,” and then I’ll interrupt at certain places. To no avail, people still interrupt and talk over me. I am pretty consistently viewed as, I suppose, some kind of passive participant at best, even among my friends, even in conversations with family. My wife does it to me too. I am not sure what causes this. I don’t think I give off any kind of doormat demeanor, nor am I all that soft-spoken. People will even glance at me while they do it, and honestly I’ve never been given any occasion to think that they’re doing it on purpose (like, to shut me up or anything), but somehow I think I don’t register as a conversational contributor.
This has happened all my professional life, and I have yet to discover a strategy to overcome it, short of wailing “why won’t anyone listen to me?!”
Since I’m a white, cisgendered male, I am generally accorded every other advantage that has traditionally been accorded us white dudes, but I’ll be damned if I know how to dominate (or sometimes even enter) a conversation. So I read this thread with interest.
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I wonder if there are marked differences between particular regions and types of businesses.
I’ve been in the New England hospitality industry for years, and it’s been pretty egalitarian. My retail experience was as well.
Yet I hear TONS of stories about sexism coming from office and manufacturing environments, and it seems like a lot is centered on technology.
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Is it safe/possible to point out he’s mansplaining to other people? Then it’s not just you vs. him, but you intervening when he’s disrespecting a peer.
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