The Mindful Manager

There is so much in the media today about sexual harassment in the workplace. It got me thinking, compared to 50-60 years ago, have things gotten any better? Have women made any progress?

Judge Ruth Bader Ginsberg, in an interview*, noted that when she started her career, women worked for “pin money.” Women weren’t supposed to have careers; they were to focus on marriage and raising a family. In her first job as a professor at Rutgers School of Law – Newark, Ginsburg was informed she would be paid less than her male colleagues because she had a husband with a well-paid job.[15]

Interestingly, Ginsburg fought not only for equality for women in the workplace, but also for men; for her it’s about people’s rights. Here is what she said about that:

“… when I was a teacher at Rutgers and deciding where I should affiliate, with what group should I affiliate, I picked the ACLU, because it’s not women’s rights, it’s people’s rights. It’s men’s rights as well as women. I called it the struggle for equal citizenship stature for men and women. And a number of the cases we brought were on behalf of men who were disadvantaged simply because they were men. The laws reflected this pattern. They were men, they were the bread winners, they represented the family outside the home, and then there were women who took care of the home and the children. The common law rule and the civil law rule were identical in this respect. The man was head of the household, he could choose any mode of living and she was obliged to conform. In the civil law, the states in the United States that have their inheritance from Spanish and French law, it was called the head and master rule. The man was head and master of the family.”

I think progress has been made in regard to some of the antiquated legal views on women, but women still are not paid equal pay for equal jobs and there is still sexual harassment and discrimination in the workplace.

Almost all of the women I interviewed said that when they started their careers, they experienced sexual discrimination and harassment. How they handled the situations varied. Here are some comments on how they avoided or handled harassment:

“ I made jokes of what they said” turning the inappropriate comments back on the men.

“I called them out on it every time. Yes, they didn’t like it but they didn’t continue with the inappropriate behavior.”

“I [Quit] companies that tolerated the bad behavior.” She noted that in tech, it is ok to leave companies after one or two years. She also noted that the bad behavior was often exhibited by management creating a culture of tolerance of such behavior.

When asked if they think things have changed since they started in tech compared to now, the responses were overwhelming, “no.”

“Things just went underground. The discrimination is more subtle now,” said one woman.

One woman observed that as working in tech become more lucrative and mainstream, the geek culture started to get replaced with the bro culture.

Many of the women also said they never felt supported by the HR department. HR is there to protect the company.

So who should protect the women?

Why don’t we band together to protect women? Unions were created because the companies weren’t there to advocate for better work conditions and pay.

Maybe that’s what women need – a group outside of corporate America that advocates and supports women at work.

If one compares working conditions today to working conditions in the 1950’s, women have made progress. Laws prohibiting or limiting women in the workplace are no longer in place. Women are often the main breadwinners in their families. But equal pay is still elusive and the tacit tolerance of harassment of women is still prevalent. The current outing of harassment in entertainment and other industries is a step in the right direction. But maybe it’s a good idea to have an organization independent of corporate America that works at eliminating sexual harassment in the workplace.

 

*Source: Ginsburg interview: https://charlierose.com/videos/29284

“[We were] changing the world one Mac at a time. Always a thread of pushing the envelope.” This is how Marie* described how it was to work at Apple in the early days. She loved the excitement of knowing she was making a difference and being part of something that was changing the world.

Marie did have challenges working with men. “There were managers that made serious attempts when hiring to not look at gender. I saw this happening more as time when on.” However, she noted, “there were more subtle versions of discrimination.” For example, “we noticed [in meetings], one man in particular would cut the women in the room out of the conversation.”

But this didn’t happen with all men and Marie knew she was well respected for her work. She won awards and was a sought after speaker at conferences. And she has over 21 patents to her name.

Marie worked in the tech industry, at several companies, for over 25 years. “Playing with new technology was always fun.” But she did decide to leave to pursue a career in art. “There came a point where I felt like my creativity was dying. That I had hit my limit in that place and time. That’s when I begin dreaming of leaving tech to follow a life-long desire to work as an artist.” When she told her manager she was leaving, he was upset. “He said I was one of the key employees in the company. [But] I needed to do what I needed to do. I felt appreciated. I felt I was part of something.”

When asked if she would recommend a career in tech to young women Marie said, “I would. I’d also likely give them advice about how to be both powerful and to do it as a woman – something I had to learn. Women in tech who are truly successful are those who stay true to who they are as women.”

* Note: The names of the women are changed  to protect their privacy.