These are photographs of real women who do work typically done by men....and love it. Read their complete stories in this book, Men's Work?
The advice to come, from the author and from these inspiring women, could change your life!
Friday, February 8, 2008
I. MENS WORK?
Non-traditional Occupations for women, as defined by the U.S. Department of Labor, are jobs that few women do. That is, they are jobs that are generally considered men's work.
People grow and change over the course of their career lives. Some change careers a few times as a part of their personal evolution. It is difficult to predict how much success and satisfaction we will find in even the most carefully chosen occupation. The least we can do is to be sure that we have looked at every single possibility, and that we have not allowed ourselves to be unduly influenced away from the best of those possibilities.
This book exists because evidence shows that women are ignoring many career fields and are flooding other, often less promising ones. It exists to encourage all women, especially girls in their formative years, to look at all the jobs that most women never consider when they plan their futures. It is said that the happiest people know what they want, and then go out and get it. First, though, they must know and understand what there is.If the differentiating terms ‘Men’s Work’ and ‘Women’s Work’ are controversial--good. Indeed, no work should be the domain of one gender or the other. But the fact is: as it stands right now, there is huge difference between the kind of work done by men and that which women do. This book will draw attention to a body of occupations for which these terms are, at this time, disturbingly appropriate.
People grow and change over the course of their career lives. Some change careers a few times as a part of their personal evolution. It is difficult to predict how much success and satisfaction we will find in even the most carefully chosen occupation. The least we can do is to be sure that we have looked at every single possibility, and that we have not allowed ourselves to be unduly influenced away from the best of those possibilities.
This book exists because evidence shows that women are ignoring many career fields and are flooding other, often less promising ones. It exists to encourage all women, especially girls in their formative years, to look at all the jobs that most women never consider when they plan their futures. It is said that the happiest people know what they want, and then go out and get it. First, though, they must know and understand what there is.If the differentiating terms ‘Men’s Work’ and ‘Women’s Work’ are controversial--good. Indeed, no work should be the domain of one gender or the other. But the fact is: as it stands right now, there is huge difference between the kind of work done by men and that which women do. This book will draw attention to a body of occupations for which these terms are, at this time, disturbingly appropriate.
II. WHAT ARE WOMEN DOING?
Do you know which of the following is true?
· A large percentage of physicians and attorneys are female.
· Women do all kinds of jobs
Only the first statement is true. The second is far from true.
The most startling feature of the world of working women in the new millenium is expressed in this shocking statistic: 42% of all women choose from only 6% of the jobs listed by the Department of Labor. Put another way, almost half of all women are contained in just twenty of the more than 359 different jobs listed. Imagine, of the 44 million women in today’s workforce, almost 20 million have flocked to just a few of all available jobs!
Women have made enormous progress preparing for and participating in the workforce in the last few decades. Women are in the majority on countless university campuses. They have entered the professions in greater numbers than ever. But, on the whole, they are still not engaged in the full spectrum of careers, blue or white-collar, available, and this fact is putting the brakes on their progress. It is time for more women to explore the remaining career territory, non-traditional occupations: currently Men’s Work.
What kinds of jobs are those twenty that attract so many women? Are they such wonderful, irresistible callings that nearly half of all women want them? Are they jobs that everyone, men and women, want if they can get them? Are they especially lucrative? Gratifying? Full of opportunity for advancement?
Here is the list of the twenty leading occupations of full-time, hourly-paid and salaried women in the United States, and the percentage of female workers in each field.
CAREER ___________PERCENTAGE WOMEN________
Preschool and kindergarten teachers 98.3
Secretaries and administrative assistants 96.3
Receptionists/information clerks 93.2
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks 91.4 Teacher assistants 90.0
Registered nurses 90.2
Nursing, psychiatric, home care aides 89.0
Maids and housekeeping cleaners 84.6
Office clerks, general 83.8
Elementary and middle school teachers 80.6
Cashiers 75.5
Customer services representatives 69.1
Waiters/waitresses 68.1
First line supervisors/managers, office and
administrative support 67.9
Accountants and auditors 58.3
Secondary school teachers 53.5
Financial managers 51.6
Retail salespersons 41.6
First line supervisors/managers of retail
sales workers 41.5
Cooks 39.3
Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Annual Averages 2003.
These jobs have features in common. Most are considered nurturing, or support careers. Most of these jobs-- teachers, nurses, secretaries and maids, for example, are held almost exclusively by women. Men hardly ever do them. Most of these jobs do not lead to executive positions.
These are certainly some of the most important and necessary jobs in society. This work is valuable, and can be tremendously gratifying for its participants, if they have made the correct personal career choices. But the sheer numbers of women flooding the marketplace to do these jobs is cause for concern and examination.
Were all of these women aware of all of their career choices? Have they made the most careful, best possible choice for their particular needs and desires? Have they considered non-traditional job options that might pay more and provide more opportunity for advancement? Do they know enough about Men’s Work to disqualify non-traditional careers? Do they know that the women who do non-traditional work often find themselves surprisingly satisfied relative to many in traditional women’s careers?
Studies show that women tend to assist, support, facilitate and care for others in their work, rather than decide, delegate, invent or direct, which men are more inclined to do in their work. That’s all well and good, provided it is the result of a conscious choice of each woman, with priorities set and all things considered. Many women love a supportive, nurturing role. Many women care more about the psychological benefits than the financial gains to be had by working. But if good earnings, promotions, challenge and demand-based opportunity are high on a woman’s list of priorities, she needs to take a hard look at non-traditional occupations when choosing a career.
Without a doubt, women have made inroads over the years, into fields once dominated by male workers. A number of professions that once had few women now have many, and are no longer mostly men’s work in our society. Veterinarians, attorneys, doctors, are now just about as likely to be women as men. Still, there are dozens and dozens of jobs that women hardly ever take. Much of this Men’s Work requires no more skill, strength or risk, and pays significantly more than the many of the jobs women are now choosing. Only 15% of women are participating in dozens of jobs traditionally done by men.
If the block that is keeping women from these jobs can be eliminated, women will receive greater career rewards. If women begin making some different choices in work type and work style, there will be a new surge away from the gender gap in the workplace.
· A large percentage of physicians and attorneys are female.
· Women do all kinds of jobs
Only the first statement is true. The second is far from true.
The most startling feature of the world of working women in the new millenium is expressed in this shocking statistic: 42% of all women choose from only 6% of the jobs listed by the Department of Labor. Put another way, almost half of all women are contained in just twenty of the more than 359 different jobs listed. Imagine, of the 44 million women in today’s workforce, almost 20 million have flocked to just a few of all available jobs!
Women have made enormous progress preparing for and participating in the workforce in the last few decades. Women are in the majority on countless university campuses. They have entered the professions in greater numbers than ever. But, on the whole, they are still not engaged in the full spectrum of careers, blue or white-collar, available, and this fact is putting the brakes on their progress. It is time for more women to explore the remaining career territory, non-traditional occupations: currently Men’s Work.
What kinds of jobs are those twenty that attract so many women? Are they such wonderful, irresistible callings that nearly half of all women want them? Are they jobs that everyone, men and women, want if they can get them? Are they especially lucrative? Gratifying? Full of opportunity for advancement?
Here is the list of the twenty leading occupations of full-time, hourly-paid and salaried women in the United States, and the percentage of female workers in each field.
CAREER ___________PERCENTAGE WOMEN________
Preschool and kindergarten teachers 98.3
Secretaries and administrative assistants 96.3
Receptionists/information clerks 93.2
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks 91.4 Teacher assistants 90.0
Registered nurses 90.2
Nursing, psychiatric, home care aides 89.0
Maids and housekeeping cleaners 84.6
Office clerks, general 83.8
Elementary and middle school teachers 80.6
Cashiers 75.5
Customer services representatives 69.1
Waiters/waitresses 68.1
First line supervisors/managers, office and
administrative support 67.9
Accountants and auditors 58.3
Secondary school teachers 53.5
Financial managers 51.6
Retail salespersons 41.6
First line supervisors/managers of retail
sales workers 41.5
Cooks 39.3
Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Annual Averages 2003.
These jobs have features in common. Most are considered nurturing, or support careers. Most of these jobs-- teachers, nurses, secretaries and maids, for example, are held almost exclusively by women. Men hardly ever do them. Most of these jobs do not lead to executive positions.
These are certainly some of the most important and necessary jobs in society. This work is valuable, and can be tremendously gratifying for its participants, if they have made the correct personal career choices. But the sheer numbers of women flooding the marketplace to do these jobs is cause for concern and examination.
Were all of these women aware of all of their career choices? Have they made the most careful, best possible choice for their particular needs and desires? Have they considered non-traditional job options that might pay more and provide more opportunity for advancement? Do they know enough about Men’s Work to disqualify non-traditional careers? Do they know that the women who do non-traditional work often find themselves surprisingly satisfied relative to many in traditional women’s careers?
Studies show that women tend to assist, support, facilitate and care for others in their work, rather than decide, delegate, invent or direct, which men are more inclined to do in their work. That’s all well and good, provided it is the result of a conscious choice of each woman, with priorities set and all things considered. Many women love a supportive, nurturing role. Many women care more about the psychological benefits than the financial gains to be had by working. But if good earnings, promotions, challenge and demand-based opportunity are high on a woman’s list of priorities, she needs to take a hard look at non-traditional occupations when choosing a career.
Without a doubt, women have made inroads over the years, into fields once dominated by male workers. A number of professions that once had few women now have many, and are no longer mostly men’s work in our society. Veterinarians, attorneys, doctors, are now just about as likely to be women as men. Still, there are dozens and dozens of jobs that women hardly ever take. Much of this Men’s Work requires no more skill, strength or risk, and pays significantly more than the many of the jobs women are now choosing. Only 15% of women are participating in dozens of jobs traditionally done by men.
If the block that is keeping women from these jobs can be eliminated, women will receive greater career rewards. If women begin making some different choices in work type and work style, there will be a new surge away from the gender gap in the workplace.
III. WHAT ARE WOMEN NOT DOING?
Are you surprised to hear that there are hardly any women helping to figure out ways to run pipelines of safe drinking water to people in developing countries? (Did you know that water engineers save more lives than doctors?)
There are hardly any women planning the next big ‘step for mankind’ in space exploration, or even cyberspace exploration!
The secrets of the universe lie in the puzzles of physics and math. The way things are going, odds are it won’t be a woman who unlocks them.
When a stylish new home is completed, a woman might have selected drapes and room colors, but chances are that a woman did not have the fun of designing the dramatic new building, nor did a woman likely do the beautiful marquetry woodwork, or install the tile.
The pest-control technician who comes by to spray once a month will probably not be a woman. Whoever it is will earn a lot more than the housekeeper, probably with less effort.
Non-traditional occupations (NTOs), jobs usually done by men, include those in the building trades, technical and transportation fields, computer sciences, math and science teaching, computer science and the many different fields of engineering. Additionally, and importantly, most high-level business executives are men. Women might be alarmed to learn that, at the start of 2006, only seven of the nation’s Fortune 500 companies had a female CEO. That’s down from nine the previous year. That’s less than 2%! Women who run whole countries are probably less rare!
Here is the U.S. Department of Labor’s long list of most of the jobs that very few women do: those in which women comprise 25% or less of the workforce. Some of these jobs include a scant few or, in terms of statistical significance, no women.
JOBS WITH FEW WOMEN
AEROSPACE ENGINEER
AIRCRAFT PILOT
AIRCRAFT MECHANIC
ARCHITECT
AUTOMOBILE SERVICE TECHNICIAN AND MECHANIC
BAGGAGE PORTER/BELLHOP
BARBER
BROADCAST AND SOUND ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN
BRICKMASON/BLOCKMASON/STONEMASON
BUS/TRUCK MECHANIC
COIN-OPERATED/VENDING/AMUSEMENT MACHINE SERVICER/REPAIRER
CHEF/HEAD COOK
CHEMICAL ENGINEER
CIVIL ENGINEER
COIN-OPERATED/VENDING/AMUSEMENT MACHINE SERVICER/REPAIRER
COMPUTER HARDWARE ENGINEER
COURIER
COST ESTIMATOR
CLEANER/DETAILER OF VEHICLES AND EQUIP.
CLERGY
COMPUTER/AUTOMATED TELLER/OFFICE MACHINE REPAIR
CHEMICAL PROCESSING MACHINE OPERATOR
CRUSHING/GRINDING/POLISHING/MIXING/BLENDING WORKER
CONSTRUCTION AND BUILDING INSPECTOR
CONSTRUCTION MANAGER
CUTTING WORKER
CABINET MAKER/BENCH CARPENTER
CRANE AND TOWER OPERATOR
CONSTRUCTION LABORER
CARPET/FLOOR/TILE INSTALLER
CEMENT MASON
CARPENTER
DISHWASHER
DETECTIVE, CRIMINAL INVESTIGATOR
DRAFTER
DRILLING/BORING MACHINE OPERATOR
DRIVER/SALES WORKERS, TRUCK DRIVER
DRYWALL INSTALLER/CEILING TILE INSTALLER/TAPER
DREDGE/EXCAVATING/LOADING MACHINE OPERATOR
ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN
ELECTRICIAN
ELECTRICAL POWER LINE INSTALLERS/REPAIRER
ENGINEER, ALL OTHER
ENGINEERING MANAGERS
FARMER, RANCHER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF POLICE AND DETECTIVES
FARM, RANCH, AGRICULTURAL MANAGER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF MECHANICS/INSTALLERS/REPAIRERS
TRANSPORTATION/MATERIAL MOVING
REFUSE COLLECTOR
FIREFIGHTER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF FARMING/FISHING/FORESTRY WORKERS
CONSTRUCTION TRADES/EXTRACTION WORKERS
GRINDING/LAPPING/BUFFING MACHINE OPERATOR
GROUNDS MAINTENANCE WORKER
GLAZIER
HEAVY VEHICLE AND MOBILE EQUIP SERVICE
HEATING/AIR CONDITIONING/REFRIGERATION MECHANIC, INSTALLER
HIGHWAY MAINTENANCE WORKER
INDUSTRIAL ENGINEER
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION MANAGER
INDUSTRIAL TRUCK AND TRACTOR OPERATOR
INDUSTRIAL REFACTORY MACHINERY MECHANIC
JOB PRINTER
LOGGING WORKER
MECHANICAL ENGINEER
METAL WORKER/PLASTIC WORKER
MISC CONSTRUCTION
MILLWRIGHT
METER READER
MOTOR VEHICLE/ ALL OTHER
MATERIAL MOVING WORKER
MAINTENANCE AND REPAIR WORKER, GENERAL
OPERATING ENGINEERS AND OTHER
PAINTER
PARTS SALESPERSON
PRECISION INSTRUMENT AND EQUIPMENT REPAIR
POLICE AND SHERIFF’S PATROL OFFICER
PARKING LOT ATTENDANT
PLASTERER/STUCCO MASON
PLUMBER, PIPELAYER, PIPEFITTER, STEAMFITTER
REFUSE/RECYCLABLE COLLECTOR
RAILROAD CONDUCTOR/YARDMASTER
SUPERVISOR OF PROTECTIVE SERVICE WORKERS
SECURITY GUARD/GAMING SURVEILLANCE OFFICER
SURVEYING AND MAPPING TECHNICIAN
SYSTEM OPERATOR
SHEET METAL WORKER
SECURITY AND FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS INSTALLER
SERVICE STATION ATTENDANT
SAWING MACHINE SETTER/OPERATOR
SALES ENGINEER
STRUCTURAL IRON/STEELWORKER
SMALL ENGINE MECHANIC
TELECOMMUNICATIONS LINE INSTALLER/REPAIRER
TOOL AND DIE MAKER
TAXI DRIVER/CHAUFFEUR
UPHOLSTERER
WELDER/SOLDERER
WATER/WASTE TREATMENT PLANT SYSTEM OPERATOR
As anyone can see, the list of fields women now don’t enter is very long. Furthermore, this list does not account for the fact that, even in those businesses that do interest and include women, females are not well-represented in the highest-level jobs. This significant fact will be discussed later.
When we consider both the huge numbers of women going into just a few different careers, and the very few women in dozens of male-dominated jobs, we can see that women really have tunnel vision when it comes to choosing jobs. We will later explore the possible reasons for this narrow perspective.
The exact profile of women’s participation in jobs varies from region to region. Recently Washington State, for example, looked at the census statistics for their state. Their statistics differed somewhat from the national percentages. For example, 6.9 percent of firefighters in that state were women, almost twice the national number. They had more than the average number of female clergy, with 17.1%, and way fewer female dentists with 16.5%. Among job categories with many workers, there were only 425 women among 20,300 automotive mechanics in the state. That’s just 2.1 percent. There were 37,144 carpenters in Washington, but only 954 women, for 2.6 percent.
Regional differences might demonstrate that the surrounding culture can influence a woman’s job choices. Each woman’s choice to be a firefighter can inspire another woman, and it could take just a few such inspiring women in a community to change a statistic significantly.
Women might be more motivated to start the trend toward “men’s jobs” themselves if they consider the following: women doing non-traditional jobs are making 20-30% more than women in equivalent traditional jobs.
Are college-educated women a lot more interested in non-traditional jobs than other women? It doesn’t look like it.
As of 1999, even at the most progressive universities in the U.S., there was only, on the average, one female for every five male engineering students. It was worse in the Computer Science field, with a whopping 83% of the bachelor degrees in computer science and computer engineering going to men.
Cisco Systems paid IDC, an analyst firm, to look at the shortage of skilled networking engineers, who install, maintain, and operate computer systems. According to Marianne Kolding, “While the whole information technology industry suffers from low female participation rates, it was surprising to see just how few women see networking as a suitable profession.” It seems women see this field as too ‘nerdy’. Only about 7% of the workforce in this field is female. Mike Couzens of Cisco reports that females surveyed still perceive networking as “too technical for women”.
Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business contains almost a third of all its undergraduate students. The gender gap in this major is second only to that in the engineering school, with 64% of its 1,010 upperclassmen being men. Of the 108 Management majors, 78% were men in 2004. Of the Finance majors, 76% were male---this at Notre Dame, a school with approximately equal numbers of men and women, the best and the brightest. Some will probably wind up CEOs of those Fortune 500 companies.
There are many jobs that can currently be accurately described as Men’s Work, because men, by and large, do them. On average, the jobs pay 33% more, to start. This work is blue-collar, white collar, indoor and outdoor. These jobs are sometimes physically challenging and often mentally demanding.Men’s Work? Why?
There are hardly any women planning the next big ‘step for mankind’ in space exploration, or even cyberspace exploration!
The secrets of the universe lie in the puzzles of physics and math. The way things are going, odds are it won’t be a woman who unlocks them.
When a stylish new home is completed, a woman might have selected drapes and room colors, but chances are that a woman did not have the fun of designing the dramatic new building, nor did a woman likely do the beautiful marquetry woodwork, or install the tile.
The pest-control technician who comes by to spray once a month will probably not be a woman. Whoever it is will earn a lot more than the housekeeper, probably with less effort.
Non-traditional occupations (NTOs), jobs usually done by men, include those in the building trades, technical and transportation fields, computer sciences, math and science teaching, computer science and the many different fields of engineering. Additionally, and importantly, most high-level business executives are men. Women might be alarmed to learn that, at the start of 2006, only seven of the nation’s Fortune 500 companies had a female CEO. That’s down from nine the previous year. That’s less than 2%! Women who run whole countries are probably less rare!
Here is the U.S. Department of Labor’s long list of most of the jobs that very few women do: those in which women comprise 25% or less of the workforce. Some of these jobs include a scant few or, in terms of statistical significance, no women.
JOBS WITH FEW WOMEN
AEROSPACE ENGINEER
AIRCRAFT PILOT
AIRCRAFT MECHANIC
ARCHITECT
AUTOMOBILE SERVICE TECHNICIAN AND MECHANIC
BAGGAGE PORTER/BELLHOP
BARBER
BROADCAST AND SOUND ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN
BRICKMASON/BLOCKMASON/STONEMASON
BUS/TRUCK MECHANIC
COIN-OPERATED/VENDING/AMUSEMENT MACHINE SERVICER/REPAIRER
CHEF/HEAD COOK
CHEMICAL ENGINEER
CIVIL ENGINEER
COIN-OPERATED/VENDING/AMUSEMENT MACHINE SERVICER/REPAIRER
COMPUTER HARDWARE ENGINEER
COURIER
COST ESTIMATOR
CLEANER/DETAILER OF VEHICLES AND EQUIP.
CLERGY
COMPUTER/AUTOMATED TELLER/OFFICE MACHINE REPAIR
CHEMICAL PROCESSING MACHINE OPERATOR
CRUSHING/GRINDING/POLISHING/MIXING/BLENDING WORKER
CONSTRUCTION AND BUILDING INSPECTOR
CONSTRUCTION MANAGER
CUTTING WORKER
CABINET MAKER/BENCH CARPENTER
CRANE AND TOWER OPERATOR
CONSTRUCTION LABORER
CARPET/FLOOR/TILE INSTALLER
CEMENT MASON
CARPENTER
DISHWASHER
DETECTIVE, CRIMINAL INVESTIGATOR
DRAFTER
DRILLING/BORING MACHINE OPERATOR
DRIVER/SALES WORKERS, TRUCK DRIVER
DRYWALL INSTALLER/CEILING TILE INSTALLER/TAPER
DREDGE/EXCAVATING/LOADING MACHINE OPERATOR
ENGINEERING TECHNICIAN
ELECTRICIAN
ELECTRICAL POWER LINE INSTALLERS/REPAIRER
ENGINEER, ALL OTHER
ENGINEERING MANAGERS
FARMER, RANCHER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF POLICE AND DETECTIVES
FARM, RANCH, AGRICULTURAL MANAGER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF MECHANICS/INSTALLERS/REPAIRERS
TRANSPORTATION/MATERIAL MOVING
REFUSE COLLECTOR
FIREFIGHTER
FIRST LINE SUPERVISOR OF FARMING/FISHING/FORESTRY WORKERS
CONSTRUCTION TRADES/EXTRACTION WORKERS
GRINDING/LAPPING/BUFFING MACHINE OPERATOR
GROUNDS MAINTENANCE WORKER
GLAZIER
HEAVY VEHICLE AND MOBILE EQUIP SERVICE
HEATING/AIR CONDITIONING/REFRIGERATION MECHANIC, INSTALLER
HIGHWAY MAINTENANCE WORKER
INDUSTRIAL ENGINEER
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION MANAGER
INDUSTRIAL TRUCK AND TRACTOR OPERATOR
INDUSTRIAL REFACTORY MACHINERY MECHANIC
JOB PRINTER
LOGGING WORKER
MECHANICAL ENGINEER
METAL WORKER/PLASTIC WORKER
MISC CONSTRUCTION
MILLWRIGHT
METER READER
MOTOR VEHICLE/ ALL OTHER
MATERIAL MOVING WORKER
MAINTENANCE AND REPAIR WORKER, GENERAL
OPERATING ENGINEERS AND OTHER
PAINTER
PARTS SALESPERSON
PRECISION INSTRUMENT AND EQUIPMENT REPAIR
POLICE AND SHERIFF’S PATROL OFFICER
PARKING LOT ATTENDANT
PLASTERER/STUCCO MASON
PLUMBER, PIPELAYER, PIPEFITTER, STEAMFITTER
REFUSE/RECYCLABLE COLLECTOR
RAILROAD CONDUCTOR/YARDMASTER
SUPERVISOR OF PROTECTIVE SERVICE WORKERS
SECURITY GUARD/GAMING SURVEILLANCE OFFICER
SURVEYING AND MAPPING TECHNICIAN
SYSTEM OPERATOR
SHEET METAL WORKER
SECURITY AND FIRE ALARM SYSTEMS INSTALLER
SERVICE STATION ATTENDANT
SAWING MACHINE SETTER/OPERATOR
SALES ENGINEER
STRUCTURAL IRON/STEELWORKER
SMALL ENGINE MECHANIC
TELECOMMUNICATIONS LINE INSTALLER/REPAIRER
TOOL AND DIE MAKER
TAXI DRIVER/CHAUFFEUR
UPHOLSTERER
WELDER/SOLDERER
WATER/WASTE TREATMENT PLANT SYSTEM OPERATOR
As anyone can see, the list of fields women now don’t enter is very long. Furthermore, this list does not account for the fact that, even in those businesses that do interest and include women, females are not well-represented in the highest-level jobs. This significant fact will be discussed later.
When we consider both the huge numbers of women going into just a few different careers, and the very few women in dozens of male-dominated jobs, we can see that women really have tunnel vision when it comes to choosing jobs. We will later explore the possible reasons for this narrow perspective.
The exact profile of women’s participation in jobs varies from region to region. Recently Washington State, for example, looked at the census statistics for their state. Their statistics differed somewhat from the national percentages. For example, 6.9 percent of firefighters in that state were women, almost twice the national number. They had more than the average number of female clergy, with 17.1%, and way fewer female dentists with 16.5%. Among job categories with many workers, there were only 425 women among 20,300 automotive mechanics in the state. That’s just 2.1 percent. There were 37,144 carpenters in Washington, but only 954 women, for 2.6 percent.
Regional differences might demonstrate that the surrounding culture can influence a woman’s job choices. Each woman’s choice to be a firefighter can inspire another woman, and it could take just a few such inspiring women in a community to change a statistic significantly.
Women might be more motivated to start the trend toward “men’s jobs” themselves if they consider the following: women doing non-traditional jobs are making 20-30% more than women in equivalent traditional jobs.
Are college-educated women a lot more interested in non-traditional jobs than other women? It doesn’t look like it.
As of 1999, even at the most progressive universities in the U.S., there was only, on the average, one female for every five male engineering students. It was worse in the Computer Science field, with a whopping 83% of the bachelor degrees in computer science and computer engineering going to men.
Cisco Systems paid IDC, an analyst firm, to look at the shortage of skilled networking engineers, who install, maintain, and operate computer systems. According to Marianne Kolding, “While the whole information technology industry suffers from low female participation rates, it was surprising to see just how few women see networking as a suitable profession.” It seems women see this field as too ‘nerdy’. Only about 7% of the workforce in this field is female. Mike Couzens of Cisco reports that females surveyed still perceive networking as “too technical for women”.
Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business contains almost a third of all its undergraduate students. The gender gap in this major is second only to that in the engineering school, with 64% of its 1,010 upperclassmen being men. Of the 108 Management majors, 78% were men in 2004. Of the Finance majors, 76% were male---this at Notre Dame, a school with approximately equal numbers of men and women, the best and the brightest. Some will probably wind up CEOs of those Fortune 500 companies.
There are many jobs that can currently be accurately described as Men’s Work, because men, by and large, do them. On average, the jobs pay 33% more, to start. This work is blue-collar, white collar, indoor and outdoor. These jobs are sometimes physically challenging and often mentally demanding.Men’s Work? Why?
IV. WHY DO MEN MAKE MORE MONEY?
WHY DO MEN MAKE MORE MONEY?
Before we look closer at women in the workplace, lets investigate the claim by some that women are simply not financially rewarded in a fair manner for the work they do.
The difference in the status of women and men in the workplace is most often reported as a wage gap. No wonder, as the numbers make good inflammatory headlines. Since women hit a peak, earning 77% of men’s earnings in 1992, they have slipped back to 75.5%, according to the 2004 U.S. Census. That’s comparing full-time year-round workers. Women earn much less (44% of men’s wages) if you include those who work part-time or dip in and out of the job market to tend to family. ****
On the face of it, this seems just plain unfair, but the numbers are misleading. It is not always appropriate to use terms like ‘equality’ or ‘parity’ in discussing the male/female wage gap. Care must be taken, with all the variables involved, to avoid the classic apples-to-oranges comparison.
The difference between the status of men and that of women at work is better described as a gender gap than a wage gap. There is more of a difference in how men and women work (the jobs they choose, the effort they put in) than there is a difference in pay for the same work.
Instances in which a woman earns less pay for doing exactly the same work as a man for exactly the same number of hours probably account for a small part of the disparity. This type of obvious gap is being continually narrowed by lawsuits and company salary reviews.
It is important that women look at everything else that has kept the gender gap alive in the workplace. Once they have a real understanding of the complexities of the issue, they will see that the situation is far from out of their control. There is much that any woman can do right now to position herself to reach any career goal. At the same time, she will be changing the state of the female workforce.
The facts are; women work differently than men, and make different choices than men.
The main reason women make less money than men is that they choose different jobs than men.
As we’ve shown, huge numbers of women flock to occupations in health care, teaching, office support, food service, retail, cosmetology and child-care.
With nearly half of women going into just 5% of the available job choices, salaries stay low relative to level of effort. This is consistent with the laws of supply and demand that characterize the capitalistic economy and is considered by many to be one of the strengths of our democracy. Its effect is not a good one for hard workers who are easy to come by. Its effect is a very good one for rarities in the job market or for entrepeneurs with a specialty niche.
Further inhibiting their lucrativeness, these twenty occupations have evolved in the female job culture. Historically, these jobs have often provided secondary or supplementary income for families. Such jobs have not traditionally paid as much as those which have always been held by the main breadwinner for a family.
Another reason women make less money than men is that women do not rise to top executive levels proportionate to their numbers in the workplace.
There is much talk of the “glass ceiling”, that is, a barrier that’s hard to see or define, but that is nevertheless there, and keeps women from rising to the highest levels of business.
There is no doubt women start falling off the corporate ladder as they approach the highest rungs. While it is true that the CEO club is traditionally a boys club, (in varying degrees depending upon the business), its members comfortable in their exclusive world of men’s talk, fine cigars, business golf, and Laker’s tickets, it is not really a closed club. It simply has not contained many women in the past, and so has developed a leathery male ambience. Studies show that only a small number of women embrace and demonstrate the degree of ambition necessary to advance to the very highest levels of responsibility in top tier companies. There is, therefore, a catch-22. The existence of fewer female than male candidates creates a more universally male atmosphere for conducting business and making decisions. This atmosphere is less welcoming and comfortable for a woman than a man, and it is therefore difficult for both men and women to visualize females in the topmost roles. The context is similar to that in politics. Nevertheless, women can and do rise to the top, when they decide to pursue their careers as dogmatically as their male counterparts. Often they simply do not decide to do so.
Not only are there only seven female CEOs of Fortune 500 Companies, but of the twenty-four top executives working for those women, only three are women! Twenty-one are men who put in the time and quality effort it took to be selected for their positions by their woman CEO.
The Department of Labor list illustrates the numbers of women in non-traditional wage-paying and-salaried employment, but doesn’t really address women-owned businesses or commission-based jobs.
What about female business owners, compared to male entrepeneurs?
The good news is that privately held, majority-owned (not just a partner to the hubby) women-owned businesses account for about 28% of businesses in the country. Even better news is that the fastest growth rates for women-owned businesses are in non-traditional industries, like construction, and agricultural services.
The not-so-good news is that more than half of women-owned firms are still in the service sector (home cleaning, day care, home health care, etc), and many are in retail. Only 9% of women-owned businesses are in finance, insurance, or real estate. Also, as of 1998, while 58% of men business owners had $50,000 or more in credit available to them, a measure of success, only 34% of women did. In 2000, $89.8 billion in venture capital investments went to firms generally. How much of that went to firms with women CEOs? Only five percent! Generally, women-owned businesses are smaller and less sophisticated than businesses in general.
In a hard look at the state of women’s work, women must face the fact that women have, for many reasons, declined jobs in many lucrative fields. They have chosen to do work that doesn’t pay as well. They have also chosen not to compete as aggressively as men for a place on the executive (leadership) track.
Before we look closer at women in the workplace, lets investigate the claim by some that women are simply not financially rewarded in a fair manner for the work they do.
The difference in the status of women and men in the workplace is most often reported as a wage gap. No wonder, as the numbers make good inflammatory headlines. Since women hit a peak, earning 77% of men’s earnings in 1992, they have slipped back to 75.5%, according to the 2004 U.S. Census. That’s comparing full-time year-round workers. Women earn much less (44% of men’s wages) if you include those who work part-time or dip in and out of the job market to tend to family. ****
On the face of it, this seems just plain unfair, but the numbers are misleading. It is not always appropriate to use terms like ‘equality’ or ‘parity’ in discussing the male/female wage gap. Care must be taken, with all the variables involved, to avoid the classic apples-to-oranges comparison.
The difference between the status of men and that of women at work is better described as a gender gap than a wage gap. There is more of a difference in how men and women work (the jobs they choose, the effort they put in) than there is a difference in pay for the same work.
Instances in which a woman earns less pay for doing exactly the same work as a man for exactly the same number of hours probably account for a small part of the disparity. This type of obvious gap is being continually narrowed by lawsuits and company salary reviews.
It is important that women look at everything else that has kept the gender gap alive in the workplace. Once they have a real understanding of the complexities of the issue, they will see that the situation is far from out of their control. There is much that any woman can do right now to position herself to reach any career goal. At the same time, she will be changing the state of the female workforce.
The facts are; women work differently than men, and make different choices than men.
The main reason women make less money than men is that they choose different jobs than men.
As we’ve shown, huge numbers of women flock to occupations in health care, teaching, office support, food service, retail, cosmetology and child-care.
With nearly half of women going into just 5% of the available job choices, salaries stay low relative to level of effort. This is consistent with the laws of supply and demand that characterize the capitalistic economy and is considered by many to be one of the strengths of our democracy. Its effect is not a good one for hard workers who are easy to come by. Its effect is a very good one for rarities in the job market or for entrepeneurs with a specialty niche.
Further inhibiting their lucrativeness, these twenty occupations have evolved in the female job culture. Historically, these jobs have often provided secondary or supplementary income for families. Such jobs have not traditionally paid as much as those which have always been held by the main breadwinner for a family.
Another reason women make less money than men is that women do not rise to top executive levels proportionate to their numbers in the workplace.
There is much talk of the “glass ceiling”, that is, a barrier that’s hard to see or define, but that is nevertheless there, and keeps women from rising to the highest levels of business.
There is no doubt women start falling off the corporate ladder as they approach the highest rungs. While it is true that the CEO club is traditionally a boys club, (in varying degrees depending upon the business), its members comfortable in their exclusive world of men’s talk, fine cigars, business golf, and Laker’s tickets, it is not really a closed club. It simply has not contained many women in the past, and so has developed a leathery male ambience. Studies show that only a small number of women embrace and demonstrate the degree of ambition necessary to advance to the very highest levels of responsibility in top tier companies. There is, therefore, a catch-22. The existence of fewer female than male candidates creates a more universally male atmosphere for conducting business and making decisions. This atmosphere is less welcoming and comfortable for a woman than a man, and it is therefore difficult for both men and women to visualize females in the topmost roles. The context is similar to that in politics. Nevertheless, women can and do rise to the top, when they decide to pursue their careers as dogmatically as their male counterparts. Often they simply do not decide to do so.
Not only are there only seven female CEOs of Fortune 500 Companies, but of the twenty-four top executives working for those women, only three are women! Twenty-one are men who put in the time and quality effort it took to be selected for their positions by their woman CEO.
The Department of Labor list illustrates the numbers of women in non-traditional wage-paying and-salaried employment, but doesn’t really address women-owned businesses or commission-based jobs.
What about female business owners, compared to male entrepeneurs?
The good news is that privately held, majority-owned (not just a partner to the hubby) women-owned businesses account for about 28% of businesses in the country. Even better news is that the fastest growth rates for women-owned businesses are in non-traditional industries, like construction, and agricultural services.
The not-so-good news is that more than half of women-owned firms are still in the service sector (home cleaning, day care, home health care, etc), and many are in retail. Only 9% of women-owned businesses are in finance, insurance, or real estate. Also, as of 1998, while 58% of men business owners had $50,000 or more in credit available to them, a measure of success, only 34% of women did. In 2000, $89.8 billion in venture capital investments went to firms generally. How much of that went to firms with women CEOs? Only five percent! Generally, women-owned businesses are smaller and less sophisticated than businesses in general.
In a hard look at the state of women’s work, women must face the fact that women have, for many reasons, declined jobs in many lucrative fields. They have chosen to do work that doesn’t pay as well. They have also chosen not to compete as aggressively as men for a place on the executive (leadership) track.
V. WHAT KEEPS WOMEN FROM MEN'S WORK?
Here are the some of the questions often posed about women relative to Men’s Work, and some of the answers that research has made available. Each woman can better understand herself if she first recognizes traits she shares with womankind in general. Then she can move on to identifying the characteristics that distinguish her as an individual.
IS MEN’S WORK TOO PHYSICALLY DEMANDING?
Women are concerned about the physical demands of men’s work. The truth is, relatively few non-traditional jobs necessitate exceptional strength. While a few jobs require considerable upper body strength, keep in mind that many women are much stronger than many men. Also, a lot of jobs thought to be brawn-intensive have been shown to take no more strength than housework requires. The coordination and nimbleness a woman might contribute to a job trimming trees or plumbing would often offset a strength disparity.
HOW DIFFERENT ARE MEN AND WOMEN?
Evidence indicates that women, generally speaking, come to the job market with traits, desires and tastes different than men’s.
When, as sophomores, the high school class of 2005 took the PSAT (practice SAT college entrance exam), they were asked what their college majors of interest were. The most frequently indicated interest for males was engineering (16.1%). For females it was health sciences and services (22.6%). (*)
There is reason to believe that the nurturing tendencies of women, whether innate, or caused by upbringing, influence their career choices, and therefore, their earning potential. In 2004, at Notre Dame University, 57% of Arts and Letters students were female. According to Christina Wolbrecht, a political science professor, “Major choice influences future employment, future earnings, and is where the wage discrepancy starts.” (*)
A very significant 64% of anthropology majors are women at that university. Anthropology Department Chair Jim McKenna believes that anthropology is a very nurturing field, and he said “We do identify, in a stereotypical role, this persona of nurturing, caring, listening, observing and protecting with female qualities.” (*)
Do many women prefer a facilitating or helping role at work? Do many feel less comfortable in a leadership role? It seems so.
Girls care. They like to help. Females are more interested than males in community service beginning in elementary school.
Boys want to lead the charge. One study of undergraduate students at the University of Maryland revealed that men were more likely to consider themselves as leaders than were females, and they also viewed themselves as acting more strongly on things they believed in than did the women (especially if they get to delegate!).
We do not know exactly why women are making the choices they are making, why men more aggressively seek leadership roles, etc. I will leave it to Sociologists, Biologists and Psychologists can sort through the facts and figure out why women’s and men’s traits and aptitudes are as they are, collectively and individually. While we might speculate, it’s too soon to even appear to be drawing conclusions, as Harvard President Lawrence Summers learned the hard way when he suggested that biological differences account for women’s relative lack of career success in the sciences. We cannot distinguish with certainty the influence of our hard-wiring from the influence of our social programming. Without generalizing about the relative power of these influences on each person, it is well worth our while to look at the facts, look at our collective tendencies and consider how they’ve affected our individual decisions. It is also worth studying those women who have chosen to move beyond traditional roles.
This book was written to let girls know that, for one reason or another, they have been shying away from a lot of great jobs and flocking to a relative few. Each woman can ponder her own influences, and address the wonderful possibility that a wealth of opportunities exist that she has not yet considered. This book urges women to, no matter what, take a look at all that’s out there. This book exists to help remedy one reason why women don’t consider a huge number of jobs--that they simply don’t know enough about them to have thought about them before.
DO WOMEN NOT CARE AS MUCH ABOUT THE MONEY?
Women care about other aspects of jobs besides money and promotion. In a 2002 study by Teresa Heckert, in which 102 college seniors and 504 alumni from a mid-western university were interviewed, women rated the pay and promotion facets of a job significantly lower in importance than did the men. They rated the remaining facets listed (travel, interpersonal relations, non-tangible benefits, family considerations, benefits, and societal contribution) significantly higher than did the men. (*)
What do women want at work? Here are some of the considerations that distract women from the jobs where they might make as much money as possible.
It seems women care quite a bit about pleasant working conditions.
Physical features of certain jobs come into play. A simple example: generally, women don’t want to get dirty. They also don’t like danger. Some jobs, especially those requiring much upper body strength, do not appeal to many women. These aspects, however, aren’t what keep women from doing most of the non-traditional jobs.
Women care about having more time off, whereas men are more willing to work extra hours for extra pay. Women judge satisfying relationships at work to be more important than men do. They like supervision and friendly coworkers. Men like autonomy. They are more willing to be relatively isolated on the job. Women care more than men do about flexibility of the work schedule to allow accomodations for family life. Women also care more about travel opportunities and benefits. Men care significantly more than women about salary and advancement opportunities. (Heckert, 2002) Men are also more likely than women to take commission-based jobs, which can be stressful and difficult, but lucrative.
These facts are affecting women’s willingness to get into, or stay in, careers whose best qualities are pay and promotion possibilities.
A woman’s chance for a raise or promotion is also affected, if, relative to her male colleague, she wants less overtime, frequently asks for schedule adjustments, or, as is statistically borne out, goes part-time, or takes leaves-of-absence.
There are, of course, reasons, besides fastidiousness and a wanting to enjoy going to work, that make women feel as though they must emphasize qualities besides high pay when choosing their careers. These circumstances will be discussed later.
Many women are, understandably, defensive of their priorities. After all, shouldn’t the other facets of a career, besides just money and the chance of climbing the ladder, be important to everyone? Of course they should. It’s fine to make a conscious choice, if you can afford it, of maximum flexibility, a job with the kind of gratification money can’t buy, or a just-plain-fun job! Just be aware that, as it stands now, men are generally more willing than women to prioritize money and advancement over all other conditions, so they are getting and hanging on to the jobs with more money and advancement. Just make sure your job is giving you what you need, after looking at every component.
Over time, two occurrences will help reduce the gap between men and women in the workplace, in both compensation and conditions.
First, as our society evolves, the workplace will continue to sensitize to the rest of life’s considerations, like family and health. They will incorporate a broader range of qualities (non-tangible benefits), which both men and women alike will appreciate and increasingly demand.
Second, women will more and more often choose jobs traditionally done by men, risking less flexibility or more adjustment, in order to maximize their earning and advancement potential.
These two movements will support each other. As women decide they are willing to sacrifice some other job qualities, to do men’s work to get men’s pay, companies doing business in those arenas will be positively influenced by women’s more nurturing style. The resulting environment will be better for everyone, increasing job satisfaction and business success.
As traditionally male-operated companies’ policies and style evolve, women will be more drawn to these fields. These women will then serve as role models for girls who will then consider more options when contemplating their own futures. It’s already happening, as some occupations (lawyer, veterinarian, physician) have already left the list of NTOs for women in the past few years. In short, over time, we’ll all come together.
WHAT ABOUT THE LACK OF EXPOSURE TO JOB POSSIBLITIES? SOCIAL PRESSURE?
Outside influences surreptitiously, sometimes unintentionally, narrow a girl’s perspective during critical years.
One educational authority on gender equity believes that a young woman who might have been interested in a non-traditional job, but is steered by a counselor to a traditional role, loses the potential to earn up to 150% more in her lifetime.
The media is an overwhelming influence. I just watched an inspiring TV commercial for NASDAQ, a stocks-selection service. It featured dramatic music and four ‘visionary’ CEOs meant to inspire investors. None of them were female.
Career colleges, trade schools like those advertising heavily on daytime television, customarily show computer technologists as male, massage therapists and medical and dental assistants as female. This is the perfect example of the vicious cycle. Women are shown images of other women in certain fields, and are more likely to think about entering them. Consequently, trade schools (technical institutes, career colleges) continue, like any business, to solicit to their proven target audience. I was flabbergasted by one recent cosmetology school television spot which declared, “Create your own future! Create your own look!” This insulting campaign trivializes the importance of women’s career goals. Another very often-aired commercial has a happy young woman declaring “Making people feel good...you can’t get a better job that! That’s why I trained to be a massage therapist!” If this were true, we’d all be able to do volunteer work for a living.
Family influence contributes greatly to a girl’s basic outlook, achievement orientation and self-confidence. Parents of daughters need to be careful that they don’t take it lightly when their daughters don’t grasp math and science concepts. There should be a presumption that these skills will be equally important in the career goals of boys and girls. Parental encouragement is a major predictor of a woman’s persistence in science.(Scientific American, 1998.
I must also address the sometimes-judgmental context of female society. If you’ve read “I Don’t Know How She Does It”, by Allison Pearson, which depicts the dilemmas of working moms, then you probably either laughed or cried at the chapter where she roughs up a store-bought cake to make it look homemade in order save face with the critical super-moms. Most women, certainly the single moms I know, wrestle mightily with their own internal demands--to be a good parent, a homemaker, a contributor to society, and, often, a breadwinner. They do not need additional scrutiny and subtle condemnation of their choices by other women. Each woman deserves to find her own delicate balance, for the benefit of herself and her family, and we cannot know her needs and personal challenges.
How pervasive is the ‘job ushering’ in our society? It is very influential---and occurs right from the beginning of life. Most of us with career-aged daughters were raised on the Dick and Jane readers. These books, a marker of our times, depict a total of 24 careers for females (e.g. dressmaker, governess, housekeeper, teacher, ice-skater, school nurse, etc.) and more that 146 careers for male characters. (from airplane builder to zookeeper!) There’s a bit of Disney fantasy in most of us, and we still collectively see our daughters, to some extent, as precious princesses to be cared for. Fathers and mothers alike enjoy this pretty picture for their girls, even though so many women wind up needing to earn a living for themselves and their children, and so many men resent or shirk support payments.
We honor our daughters as the strong women they will someday be, when we let them know, every chance we get, as teachers, counselors and parents, that the world is full of possibilities. We must teach them that no avenue is closed. There are no arbitrary limits.
I believe that it not enough to say to girls, as many of us do, “you can have any job you want”. We need to show them their choices.
DO WOMEN LACK CONFIDENCE?
“Pretend to what is not, and that the passion’s over, so you’ll become, in truth, what you are studying to be”---Ovid the Roman
To put it another way, as Amway founder Phil Kerns did--
“Fake it ‘til you make it.”
Women do not always muster the bluster. Men are masters of this skill. Women are often not confident enough to front the bravado required to take on a challenging job or tout their talents. Men are more likely to forge ahead, convinced that they will ‘catch up’ on needed skills in the nick of time, and still get the job done right. Women are more likely to feel not quite qualified.
This statement is bound to rankle some, and you individually may unstoppable, but its not a surprising finding, considered women’s more self-effacing nature, need for emotional support, and lack of societal support.
Studies show that young women entering college generally have less confidence in their ability to complete the coursework successfully, even though they actually prove to be just as successful in school. As we’ve discussed, they also consider themselves to be ‘leader-types’ less often than men do. Even graduate students studied at Stanford, where everyone’s pretty smart, have been shown to be less confident, both in and outside the classroom. (SIGSE Bulletin)
Both sexes must face the occasional failure, but women handle it differently than men. Female students who fail a technical course often conclude that they are not smart enough to understand the material, whereas men are inclined to attribute such failure to factors outside themselves, like poor teaching. (Ware et al)
Women’s insecurities can also make them less able than men to take criticism. Confident people do not allow criticism to affect their sense of general well-being. (SIGSE Bulletin)
Studies of Stanford graduate students also show that self-doubt makes women less likely than men to speak up in class. At a job, where the squeaky wheel might get the grease, confident self-promotion and obvious displays of initiative can increase success. Sometimes, speaking up matters.
ARE WOMEN CONTROLLED BY THEIR CIRCUMSTANCES?
A woman’s circumstances outside the workplace are more likely to affect her attitude and performance on the job.
When a woman, married or otherwise partnered, decides to embark on a career, not as the primary breadwinner, but to supplement the family income, she may be less inclined than a man to go the extra mile, work the extra hours, on the job. Without the ‘hunger’ experienced by a man who is his family’s main support, she has the luxury of working as much as she likes, at a job that she enjoys, and which suits the rest of her life.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are women who are the sole or primary support of their children and themselves. Women are far more likely than men to be single parents with majority or sole custody of children. The ability of these women to take jobs where lot of extra hours, frequent travel and unexpected dinner meetings are required to climb the corporate ladder, is limited. It really is true that, by and large, behind the successful man is a good woman, or at least SOME woman, keeping the home fires burning and tucking the kids in. Most fathers have that. What’s behind the successful mother? Sometimes only a halfway decent day care center that closes at 6 PM sharp. Sometimes not even that.
IS IT STILL A MAN’S WORLD?
Should we lay any of the blame for the wage chasm on pure chauvinism? Is a sexist society keeping women ‘in their place’? Is any of the disparity just plain unfair?
In short, it’s still not fair, but its much more fair than it used to be. These days, out-and-out discrimination probably only accounts for about 10 percentage points of the pay gap. (Businessweek Online, 2004) There are still instances of women earning less money for doing the very same job, doing it just as well as a man, and for the same number of hours. These infractions are being addressed more and more consistently, with lawsuits aimed at various entities, from Wal-Mart to the court system itself. Furthermore, instances of this type of gap are less and less common as we look at fields requiring higher education. In fact, in professional fields where women are rarities and companies want more female representation, they are often offered higher salaries than men.
THE UNFAIRNESS WOMEN HELP CREATE
Of course, unfair circumstances in the rest of a woman’s life can also affect the energy she puts into her career. Women in two-parent working households are still doing the lion’s share of domestic duties, still often expected to take the overriding responsibility for everything from meals to science projects.
The way men and woman function together is like a complicated dance which we have all performed together for centuries.
The domestic steps of the dance have traditionally been choreographed by women. Women complain about the unfair distribution of labor in the home, but often, it’s their own high standard, not held by others in the home, that creates the work load. A woman’s self-image may hinge on the appearance of the domestic show presented to the world, and, after so long, women have this routine down.
In the work world, however, men have been the dance leaders and they aren’t easily going to surrender that position without learning some fancy new footwork.
The dance is changing, though, and the new routine will be a better one for men and women. We must realize meanwhile, that women will grapple with practical issues and their self-esteem as mothers, partners, and workers. Men traditionally have a lot of their ego-eggs in the one breadwinner basket, and are also experiencing some confusion as to what is expected of them as society “de-machofies”.
In their careers, women and men work differently in some ways. Confident women executives, who do become leaders, have been shown to have different management styles than men, and they are very effective.
Female leaders tend to be good at team-building. They are facilitators. They are better than men both at getting people to coordinate their efforts, and in empowering and motivating individuals. Men are more inclined to lead by reward and punishment. Because women have a tendency to focus on relationships, they communicate more frequently on the job, sharing more information, proven to affect business positively.
Over time, as corporations recognize fully the contribution women are capable of making at every level, the style of business will change. The corporate setting will adjust, be more hospitable to its female participants, and a happier place for everyone.
The wonderful news is that there are so many determinants of career success over which a woman has plenty of control. Right now--- today---with patience, awareness of options, careful choices and planning, each woman can do more than ever to have a satisfying work life that truly works with the all rest of her life.
IS MEN’S WORK TOO PHYSICALLY DEMANDING?
Women are concerned about the physical demands of men’s work. The truth is, relatively few non-traditional jobs necessitate exceptional strength. While a few jobs require considerable upper body strength, keep in mind that many women are much stronger than many men. Also, a lot of jobs thought to be brawn-intensive have been shown to take no more strength than housework requires. The coordination and nimbleness a woman might contribute to a job trimming trees or plumbing would often offset a strength disparity.
HOW DIFFERENT ARE MEN AND WOMEN?
Evidence indicates that women, generally speaking, come to the job market with traits, desires and tastes different than men’s.
When, as sophomores, the high school class of 2005 took the PSAT (practice SAT college entrance exam), they were asked what their college majors of interest were. The most frequently indicated interest for males was engineering (16.1%). For females it was health sciences and services (22.6%). (*)
There is reason to believe that the nurturing tendencies of women, whether innate, or caused by upbringing, influence their career choices, and therefore, their earning potential. In 2004, at Notre Dame University, 57% of Arts and Letters students were female. According to Christina Wolbrecht, a political science professor, “Major choice influences future employment, future earnings, and is where the wage discrepancy starts.” (*)
A very significant 64% of anthropology majors are women at that university. Anthropology Department Chair Jim McKenna believes that anthropology is a very nurturing field, and he said “We do identify, in a stereotypical role, this persona of nurturing, caring, listening, observing and protecting with female qualities.” (*)
Do many women prefer a facilitating or helping role at work? Do many feel less comfortable in a leadership role? It seems so.
Girls care. They like to help. Females are more interested than males in community service beginning in elementary school.
Boys want to lead the charge. One study of undergraduate students at the University of Maryland revealed that men were more likely to consider themselves as leaders than were females, and they also viewed themselves as acting more strongly on things they believed in than did the women (especially if they get to delegate!).
We do not know exactly why women are making the choices they are making, why men more aggressively seek leadership roles, etc. I will leave it to Sociologists, Biologists and Psychologists can sort through the facts and figure out why women’s and men’s traits and aptitudes are as they are, collectively and individually. While we might speculate, it’s too soon to even appear to be drawing conclusions, as Harvard President Lawrence Summers learned the hard way when he suggested that biological differences account for women’s relative lack of career success in the sciences. We cannot distinguish with certainty the influence of our hard-wiring from the influence of our social programming. Without generalizing about the relative power of these influences on each person, it is well worth our while to look at the facts, look at our collective tendencies and consider how they’ve affected our individual decisions. It is also worth studying those women who have chosen to move beyond traditional roles.
This book was written to let girls know that, for one reason or another, they have been shying away from a lot of great jobs and flocking to a relative few. Each woman can ponder her own influences, and address the wonderful possibility that a wealth of opportunities exist that she has not yet considered. This book urges women to, no matter what, take a look at all that’s out there. This book exists to help remedy one reason why women don’t consider a huge number of jobs--that they simply don’t know enough about them to have thought about them before.
DO WOMEN NOT CARE AS MUCH ABOUT THE MONEY?
Women care about other aspects of jobs besides money and promotion. In a 2002 study by Teresa Heckert, in which 102 college seniors and 504 alumni from a mid-western university were interviewed, women rated the pay and promotion facets of a job significantly lower in importance than did the men. They rated the remaining facets listed (travel, interpersonal relations, non-tangible benefits, family considerations, benefits, and societal contribution) significantly higher than did the men. (*)
What do women want at work? Here are some of the considerations that distract women from the jobs where they might make as much money as possible.
It seems women care quite a bit about pleasant working conditions.
Physical features of certain jobs come into play. A simple example: generally, women don’t want to get dirty. They also don’t like danger. Some jobs, especially those requiring much upper body strength, do not appeal to many women. These aspects, however, aren’t what keep women from doing most of the non-traditional jobs.
Women care about having more time off, whereas men are more willing to work extra hours for extra pay. Women judge satisfying relationships at work to be more important than men do. They like supervision and friendly coworkers. Men like autonomy. They are more willing to be relatively isolated on the job. Women care more than men do about flexibility of the work schedule to allow accomodations for family life. Women also care more about travel opportunities and benefits. Men care significantly more than women about salary and advancement opportunities. (Heckert, 2002) Men are also more likely than women to take commission-based jobs, which can be stressful and difficult, but lucrative.
These facts are affecting women’s willingness to get into, or stay in, careers whose best qualities are pay and promotion possibilities.
A woman’s chance for a raise or promotion is also affected, if, relative to her male colleague, she wants less overtime, frequently asks for schedule adjustments, or, as is statistically borne out, goes part-time, or takes leaves-of-absence.
There are, of course, reasons, besides fastidiousness and a wanting to enjoy going to work, that make women feel as though they must emphasize qualities besides high pay when choosing their careers. These circumstances will be discussed later.
Many women are, understandably, defensive of their priorities. After all, shouldn’t the other facets of a career, besides just money and the chance of climbing the ladder, be important to everyone? Of course they should. It’s fine to make a conscious choice, if you can afford it, of maximum flexibility, a job with the kind of gratification money can’t buy, or a just-plain-fun job! Just be aware that, as it stands now, men are generally more willing than women to prioritize money and advancement over all other conditions, so they are getting and hanging on to the jobs with more money and advancement. Just make sure your job is giving you what you need, after looking at every component.
Over time, two occurrences will help reduce the gap between men and women in the workplace, in both compensation and conditions.
First, as our society evolves, the workplace will continue to sensitize to the rest of life’s considerations, like family and health. They will incorporate a broader range of qualities (non-tangible benefits), which both men and women alike will appreciate and increasingly demand.
Second, women will more and more often choose jobs traditionally done by men, risking less flexibility or more adjustment, in order to maximize their earning and advancement potential.
These two movements will support each other. As women decide they are willing to sacrifice some other job qualities, to do men’s work to get men’s pay, companies doing business in those arenas will be positively influenced by women’s more nurturing style. The resulting environment will be better for everyone, increasing job satisfaction and business success.
As traditionally male-operated companies’ policies and style evolve, women will be more drawn to these fields. These women will then serve as role models for girls who will then consider more options when contemplating their own futures. It’s already happening, as some occupations (lawyer, veterinarian, physician) have already left the list of NTOs for women in the past few years. In short, over time, we’ll all come together.
WHAT ABOUT THE LACK OF EXPOSURE TO JOB POSSIBLITIES? SOCIAL PRESSURE?
Outside influences surreptitiously, sometimes unintentionally, narrow a girl’s perspective during critical years.
One educational authority on gender equity believes that a young woman who might have been interested in a non-traditional job, but is steered by a counselor to a traditional role, loses the potential to earn up to 150% more in her lifetime.
The media is an overwhelming influence. I just watched an inspiring TV commercial for NASDAQ, a stocks-selection service. It featured dramatic music and four ‘visionary’ CEOs meant to inspire investors. None of them were female.
Career colleges, trade schools like those advertising heavily on daytime television, customarily show computer technologists as male, massage therapists and medical and dental assistants as female. This is the perfect example of the vicious cycle. Women are shown images of other women in certain fields, and are more likely to think about entering them. Consequently, trade schools (technical institutes, career colleges) continue, like any business, to solicit to their proven target audience. I was flabbergasted by one recent cosmetology school television spot which declared, “Create your own future! Create your own look!” This insulting campaign trivializes the importance of women’s career goals. Another very often-aired commercial has a happy young woman declaring “Making people feel good...you can’t get a better job that! That’s why I trained to be a massage therapist!” If this were true, we’d all be able to do volunteer work for a living.
Family influence contributes greatly to a girl’s basic outlook, achievement orientation and self-confidence. Parents of daughters need to be careful that they don’t take it lightly when their daughters don’t grasp math and science concepts. There should be a presumption that these skills will be equally important in the career goals of boys and girls. Parental encouragement is a major predictor of a woman’s persistence in science.(Scientific American, 1998.
I must also address the sometimes-judgmental context of female society. If you’ve read “I Don’t Know How She Does It”, by Allison Pearson, which depicts the dilemmas of working moms, then you probably either laughed or cried at the chapter where she roughs up a store-bought cake to make it look homemade in order save face with the critical super-moms. Most women, certainly the single moms I know, wrestle mightily with their own internal demands--to be a good parent, a homemaker, a contributor to society, and, often, a breadwinner. They do not need additional scrutiny and subtle condemnation of their choices by other women. Each woman deserves to find her own delicate balance, for the benefit of herself and her family, and we cannot know her needs and personal challenges.
How pervasive is the ‘job ushering’ in our society? It is very influential---and occurs right from the beginning of life. Most of us with career-aged daughters were raised on the Dick and Jane readers. These books, a marker of our times, depict a total of 24 careers for females (e.g. dressmaker, governess, housekeeper, teacher, ice-skater, school nurse, etc.) and more that 146 careers for male characters. (from airplane builder to zookeeper!) There’s a bit of Disney fantasy in most of us, and we still collectively see our daughters, to some extent, as precious princesses to be cared for. Fathers and mothers alike enjoy this pretty picture for their girls, even though so many women wind up needing to earn a living for themselves and their children, and so many men resent or shirk support payments.
We honor our daughters as the strong women they will someday be, when we let them know, every chance we get, as teachers, counselors and parents, that the world is full of possibilities. We must teach them that no avenue is closed. There are no arbitrary limits.
I believe that it not enough to say to girls, as many of us do, “you can have any job you want”. We need to show them their choices.
DO WOMEN LACK CONFIDENCE?
“Pretend to what is not, and that the passion’s over, so you’ll become, in truth, what you are studying to be”---Ovid the Roman
To put it another way, as Amway founder Phil Kerns did--
“Fake it ‘til you make it.”
Women do not always muster the bluster. Men are masters of this skill. Women are often not confident enough to front the bravado required to take on a challenging job or tout their talents. Men are more likely to forge ahead, convinced that they will ‘catch up’ on needed skills in the nick of time, and still get the job done right. Women are more likely to feel not quite qualified.
This statement is bound to rankle some, and you individually may unstoppable, but its not a surprising finding, considered women’s more self-effacing nature, need for emotional support, and lack of societal support.
Studies show that young women entering college generally have less confidence in their ability to complete the coursework successfully, even though they actually prove to be just as successful in school. As we’ve discussed, they also consider themselves to be ‘leader-types’ less often than men do. Even graduate students studied at Stanford, where everyone’s pretty smart, have been shown to be less confident, both in and outside the classroom. (SIGSE Bulletin)
Both sexes must face the occasional failure, but women handle it differently than men. Female students who fail a technical course often conclude that they are not smart enough to understand the material, whereas men are inclined to attribute such failure to factors outside themselves, like poor teaching. (Ware et al)
Women’s insecurities can also make them less able than men to take criticism. Confident people do not allow criticism to affect their sense of general well-being. (SIGSE Bulletin)
Studies of Stanford graduate students also show that self-doubt makes women less likely than men to speak up in class. At a job, where the squeaky wheel might get the grease, confident self-promotion and obvious displays of initiative can increase success. Sometimes, speaking up matters.
ARE WOMEN CONTROLLED BY THEIR CIRCUMSTANCES?
A woman’s circumstances outside the workplace are more likely to affect her attitude and performance on the job.
When a woman, married or otherwise partnered, decides to embark on a career, not as the primary breadwinner, but to supplement the family income, she may be less inclined than a man to go the extra mile, work the extra hours, on the job. Without the ‘hunger’ experienced by a man who is his family’s main support, she has the luxury of working as much as she likes, at a job that she enjoys, and which suits the rest of her life.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are women who are the sole or primary support of their children and themselves. Women are far more likely than men to be single parents with majority or sole custody of children. The ability of these women to take jobs where lot of extra hours, frequent travel and unexpected dinner meetings are required to climb the corporate ladder, is limited. It really is true that, by and large, behind the successful man is a good woman, or at least SOME woman, keeping the home fires burning and tucking the kids in. Most fathers have that. What’s behind the successful mother? Sometimes only a halfway decent day care center that closes at 6 PM sharp. Sometimes not even that.
IS IT STILL A MAN’S WORLD?
Should we lay any of the blame for the wage chasm on pure chauvinism? Is a sexist society keeping women ‘in their place’? Is any of the disparity just plain unfair?
In short, it’s still not fair, but its much more fair than it used to be. These days, out-and-out discrimination probably only accounts for about 10 percentage points of the pay gap. (Businessweek Online, 2004) There are still instances of women earning less money for doing the very same job, doing it just as well as a man, and for the same number of hours. These infractions are being addressed more and more consistently, with lawsuits aimed at various entities, from Wal-Mart to the court system itself. Furthermore, instances of this type of gap are less and less common as we look at fields requiring higher education. In fact, in professional fields where women are rarities and companies want more female representation, they are often offered higher salaries than men.
THE UNFAIRNESS WOMEN HELP CREATE
Of course, unfair circumstances in the rest of a woman’s life can also affect the energy she puts into her career. Women in two-parent working households are still doing the lion’s share of domestic duties, still often expected to take the overriding responsibility for everything from meals to science projects.
The way men and woman function together is like a complicated dance which we have all performed together for centuries.
The domestic steps of the dance have traditionally been choreographed by women. Women complain about the unfair distribution of labor in the home, but often, it’s their own high standard, not held by others in the home, that creates the work load. A woman’s self-image may hinge on the appearance of the domestic show presented to the world, and, after so long, women have this routine down.
In the work world, however, men have been the dance leaders and they aren’t easily going to surrender that position without learning some fancy new footwork.
The dance is changing, though, and the new routine will be a better one for men and women. We must realize meanwhile, that women will grapple with practical issues and their self-esteem as mothers, partners, and workers. Men traditionally have a lot of their ego-eggs in the one breadwinner basket, and are also experiencing some confusion as to what is expected of them as society “de-machofies”.
In their careers, women and men work differently in some ways. Confident women executives, who do become leaders, have been shown to have different management styles than men, and they are very effective.
Female leaders tend to be good at team-building. They are facilitators. They are better than men both at getting people to coordinate their efforts, and in empowering and motivating individuals. Men are more inclined to lead by reward and punishment. Because women have a tendency to focus on relationships, they communicate more frequently on the job, sharing more information, proven to affect business positively.
Over time, as corporations recognize fully the contribution women are capable of making at every level, the style of business will change. The corporate setting will adjust, be more hospitable to its female participants, and a happier place for everyone.
The wonderful news is that there are so many determinants of career success over which a woman has plenty of control. Right now--- today---with patience, awareness of options, careful choices and planning, each woman can do more than ever to have a satisfying work life that truly works with the all rest of her life.
VI. WHY CONSIDER MEN'S WORK?
Because it is there!
A better question is: Why would woman not want to think about all her options, taking every factor into account?
IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT THE MONEY
Consider the variety. The fun of having a lot of choices is in being able to custom-make your life, and suit yourself. If the ice-cream shop has only chocolate, strawberry and vanilla, you’ll make do and probably still enjoy the treat, but, once you know about jamocha almond fudge, it might be even more worth the cost and calories!
If we are not aware of all our options, ideally from a young age, we cannot begin to observe, visualize, and then prepare ourselves to take advantage of the whole range of choices. If, for the whole of our lives, we see only a narrow range of possibilities, we will adjust to them psychologically, and our lives will be narrower, smaller for it.
Women, with their particular instincts, are prone to thinking things like “I’m a mom (or hope to be), and I’m really interested in kids, so I’ll look at being a teacher” (child psychologist, day care worker), or, “I like helping people so I’ll be a nurse”.
Woman often gravitate to where they are most comfortable, to what they already do. Consider that every woman who is married with children spends her time nurturing, maintaining, facilitating, assisting and coordinating. If she selects employment that includes these same features, hers is not a life filled with as much contrast and scope as it might be if she were helping with homework and stir-frying dinner in the evening, engineering a dam or rebuilding an engine during the day. Why not consider something different? What if variety really is the spice of life?
There is another, more subtle benefit for us all in women taking non-traditional jobs. Women and men working together professionally is a positive thing. If men and women are dichotomized by their careers, our interactions with the opposite sex might be primarily romantic or domestic in nature. Working together gives women the opportunity to enjoy men as people and colleagues. So, in effect, we provide ourselves with a more interesting variety of co-workers. Further, as more women aspire to executive positions and other jobs traditionally filled by men within corporations, there will be less stereotyping of women in corporate roles of a support or assistance nature. While some might concern themselves that an increase in the numbers of men and women working together in more similar jobs would create more titillating and distracting work environments, I believe the opposite is true. As we grow more accustomed to viewing the opposite sex as capable, respectable coworkers, and as the support role of women diminishes, there will be less intrigue in the boardroom and the service bay. Besides, a gratifying and stimulating job might be as much activity and ego boost a girl needs before going home!
Consider the challenge. As soon as a woman decides to double, triple or quadruple the number of different jobs she’s willing to consider, she has the opportunity to be challenged in new ways. Once on the job, she may well approach a challenge in a new way, in a place where her perspective is a fresh one. Women who haven’t fully explored technical, mechanical or other aptitudes may find gratification in non-traditional jobs. Likewise, fascinating new territory awaits those inventive women who are problem solvers and natural leaders. For girls who prefer to work outdoors, or who like physical challenges, considering non-traditional occupations is a must.
Consider the benefits. Because Men’s Work has evolved in a context of the needs and expectations of breadwinners, there are often better health and retirement plans offered as part of the compensation package for these occupations. Financially-based benefits are more likely to be family-inclusive.
Consider the job security. Traditionally male-dominated occupations, with the support of labor unions and advanced human resources departments, often have a lot of employment protection and termination protocol built into their policies.
Consider the opportunities for advancement. Men’s Work is more likely to include the promotion feature. Many of the support roles women choose have less chance of putting them on the executive track. A woman should beware of the dead-end component, regardless of entry-level pay, if they want to end up in decision-making, leadership roles.
Consider the societal support. Governmental endorsement of diverse hiring has generally created an improved environment for women considering non-traditional jobs. A few women who have entered male-dominated professions have gone on to head companies that have benefited from public and private sector policies favoring the granting of jobs to a variety of contractors. Many large projects are municipal ones, with policies in place to support diversity in the hiring of private firms to do the work. As there are so few women-run engineering and computer science firms, for example, those that do exist are in great demand as sub-contractors by large male-run contracting firms seeking to meet a government agency’s guidelines. I know a woman who heads up her own engineering company, in great demand for complicated projects. She is not only a woman but also a minority woman. What she is not is an engineer! She’s just a very, very smart businesswoman.
Consider the alternative. The future does not look bright for “Woman’s Work”---that is, for the traditional occupations of women, if women continue to crowd these fields. Supply and demand will create a relative downward spiral in the value of these jobs, and the brunt of the consequence will be borne by the minority and poverty level women most inclined to view their choices as limited to service industries. Women as a population, especially in the blue-collar sector, need to branch into other fields so that they do not create an overabundance of workers in fields in which limited compensation is available.
NOW LETS TALK ABOUT THE MONEY
As I have discussed, Men’s Work pays better overall, for a number of reasons, most justifiable, some not. That’s way it is. This alone should be reason enough for many women, who really need or want to make as much money as possible in the time they have, to look hard at non-traditional employment.
WHY CAN’T WE WORK IT OUT SO WOMEN ARE PAID AS WELL AS MEN FOR THE KIND OF WORK THEY ALREADY DO?
If a woman works just as hard as a man, for just as many hours, in a job that requires just as much skill or risk, why shouldn’t the law require that she make just as much money?
In the 1990s the concept of ‘comparable worth’ was explored and began to become a focus, as affirmative action had been in the ‘80s, busing in the ‘70s. Some universities, hospitals and governmental agencies developed elaborate ratings systems that attempted to measure and assign value to features of each employed person, like years of schooling, skill, and responsibility. Proponents of the idea claimed that it was unfair that women should be victimized by low pay just because they’d been herded by our society into non-lucrative careers. They claimed that figuring out the comparable worth of each worker is necessary for society to meet its moral obligation to treat all people equally.
Determining the value of a person’s job, based on its features, would be a difficult and expensive prospect, fraught with much subjectivity and opportunity for ongoing controversy. The best and easiest way to determine the value of a job in a capitalistic system, is by the natural process of supply and demand. Even if some arbitrary ranking method could be developed, and wages for Women’s Work were thereby increased, the result could be detrimental for women. Companies would be forced to lay off workers and require more of existing workers in order to stay in business. Once again, the neediest segment of our society, uneducated female minority mothers, would risk the greatest loss.
Comparable worth laws have been voted on in Congress, but have never passed.
In Federal Court, comparable worth cases have generally been unsuccessful for the Plaintiffs. In one case in Colorado, nurses complained that they were paid less than tree trimmers and sign painters being paid by a hospital. The hospital prevailed. One Iowa university that actually did have a comparable worth grading system in force, was sued when they paid workers at their plant more than clerical workers of the same grade. They claimed they needed to because there were fewer plant workers than clerical workers available. The university won.
Accepting the efficiency of the marketplace and the principals of supply and demand, the best way for the value of Women’s Work to go up is to create its scarcity. This can only happen if women go into other careers, or quit working all together. The first solution is the most practical.
A better question is: Why would woman not want to think about all her options, taking every factor into account?
IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT THE MONEY
Consider the variety. The fun of having a lot of choices is in being able to custom-make your life, and suit yourself. If the ice-cream shop has only chocolate, strawberry and vanilla, you’ll make do and probably still enjoy the treat, but, once you know about jamocha almond fudge, it might be even more worth the cost and calories!
If we are not aware of all our options, ideally from a young age, we cannot begin to observe, visualize, and then prepare ourselves to take advantage of the whole range of choices. If, for the whole of our lives, we see only a narrow range of possibilities, we will adjust to them psychologically, and our lives will be narrower, smaller for it.
Women, with their particular instincts, are prone to thinking things like “I’m a mom (or hope to be), and I’m really interested in kids, so I’ll look at being a teacher” (child psychologist, day care worker), or, “I like helping people so I’ll be a nurse”.
Woman often gravitate to where they are most comfortable, to what they already do. Consider that every woman who is married with children spends her time nurturing, maintaining, facilitating, assisting and coordinating. If she selects employment that includes these same features, hers is not a life filled with as much contrast and scope as it might be if she were helping with homework and stir-frying dinner in the evening, engineering a dam or rebuilding an engine during the day. Why not consider something different? What if variety really is the spice of life?
There is another, more subtle benefit for us all in women taking non-traditional jobs. Women and men working together professionally is a positive thing. If men and women are dichotomized by their careers, our interactions with the opposite sex might be primarily romantic or domestic in nature. Working together gives women the opportunity to enjoy men as people and colleagues. So, in effect, we provide ourselves with a more interesting variety of co-workers. Further, as more women aspire to executive positions and other jobs traditionally filled by men within corporations, there will be less stereotyping of women in corporate roles of a support or assistance nature. While some might concern themselves that an increase in the numbers of men and women working together in more similar jobs would create more titillating and distracting work environments, I believe the opposite is true. As we grow more accustomed to viewing the opposite sex as capable, respectable coworkers, and as the support role of women diminishes, there will be less intrigue in the boardroom and the service bay. Besides, a gratifying and stimulating job might be as much activity and ego boost a girl needs before going home!
Consider the challenge. As soon as a woman decides to double, triple or quadruple the number of different jobs she’s willing to consider, she has the opportunity to be challenged in new ways. Once on the job, she may well approach a challenge in a new way, in a place where her perspective is a fresh one. Women who haven’t fully explored technical, mechanical or other aptitudes may find gratification in non-traditional jobs. Likewise, fascinating new territory awaits those inventive women who are problem solvers and natural leaders. For girls who prefer to work outdoors, or who like physical challenges, considering non-traditional occupations is a must.
Consider the benefits. Because Men’s Work has evolved in a context of the needs and expectations of breadwinners, there are often better health and retirement plans offered as part of the compensation package for these occupations. Financially-based benefits are more likely to be family-inclusive.
Consider the job security. Traditionally male-dominated occupations, with the support of labor unions and advanced human resources departments, often have a lot of employment protection and termination protocol built into their policies.
Consider the opportunities for advancement. Men’s Work is more likely to include the promotion feature. Many of the support roles women choose have less chance of putting them on the executive track. A woman should beware of the dead-end component, regardless of entry-level pay, if they want to end up in decision-making, leadership roles.
Consider the societal support. Governmental endorsement of diverse hiring has generally created an improved environment for women considering non-traditional jobs. A few women who have entered male-dominated professions have gone on to head companies that have benefited from public and private sector policies favoring the granting of jobs to a variety of contractors. Many large projects are municipal ones, with policies in place to support diversity in the hiring of private firms to do the work. As there are so few women-run engineering and computer science firms, for example, those that do exist are in great demand as sub-contractors by large male-run contracting firms seeking to meet a government agency’s guidelines. I know a woman who heads up her own engineering company, in great demand for complicated projects. She is not only a woman but also a minority woman. What she is not is an engineer! She’s just a very, very smart businesswoman.
Consider the alternative. The future does not look bright for “Woman’s Work”---that is, for the traditional occupations of women, if women continue to crowd these fields. Supply and demand will create a relative downward spiral in the value of these jobs, and the brunt of the consequence will be borne by the minority and poverty level women most inclined to view their choices as limited to service industries. Women as a population, especially in the blue-collar sector, need to branch into other fields so that they do not create an overabundance of workers in fields in which limited compensation is available.
NOW LETS TALK ABOUT THE MONEY
As I have discussed, Men’s Work pays better overall, for a number of reasons, most justifiable, some not. That’s way it is. This alone should be reason enough for many women, who really need or want to make as much money as possible in the time they have, to look hard at non-traditional employment.
WHY CAN’T WE WORK IT OUT SO WOMEN ARE PAID AS WELL AS MEN FOR THE KIND OF WORK THEY ALREADY DO?
If a woman works just as hard as a man, for just as many hours, in a job that requires just as much skill or risk, why shouldn’t the law require that she make just as much money?
In the 1990s the concept of ‘comparable worth’ was explored and began to become a focus, as affirmative action had been in the ‘80s, busing in the ‘70s. Some universities, hospitals and governmental agencies developed elaborate ratings systems that attempted to measure and assign value to features of each employed person, like years of schooling, skill, and responsibility. Proponents of the idea claimed that it was unfair that women should be victimized by low pay just because they’d been herded by our society into non-lucrative careers. They claimed that figuring out the comparable worth of each worker is necessary for society to meet its moral obligation to treat all people equally.
Determining the value of a person’s job, based on its features, would be a difficult and expensive prospect, fraught with much subjectivity and opportunity for ongoing controversy. The best and easiest way to determine the value of a job in a capitalistic system, is by the natural process of supply and demand. Even if some arbitrary ranking method could be developed, and wages for Women’s Work were thereby increased, the result could be detrimental for women. Companies would be forced to lay off workers and require more of existing workers in order to stay in business. Once again, the neediest segment of our society, uneducated female minority mothers, would risk the greatest loss.
Comparable worth laws have been voted on in Congress, but have never passed.
In Federal Court, comparable worth cases have generally been unsuccessful for the Plaintiffs. In one case in Colorado, nurses complained that they were paid less than tree trimmers and sign painters being paid by a hospital. The hospital prevailed. One Iowa university that actually did have a comparable worth grading system in force, was sued when they paid workers at their plant more than clerical workers of the same grade. They claimed they needed to because there were fewer plant workers than clerical workers available. The university won.
Accepting the efficiency of the marketplace and the principals of supply and demand, the best way for the value of Women’s Work to go up is to create its scarcity. This can only happen if women go into other careers, or quit working all together. The first solution is the most practical.
REAL WOMEN IN MEN'S WORK...APRILLE
Dr. Aprille Ericsson
Aeronautical/Astronautical Engineer
NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center
‘Moving Among the Stars’
No writer attempting to focus on Aprille Ericsson’s terrific job could possibly resist first discussing the fascinating woman herself. Aprille is the first African-American woman to receive a Ph.D in engineering at NASA, the Goddard Space Flight Center, where she works. She uses her brilliance to help move satellite projects, and people’s lives.
“Shoot for the moon. If you miss you’ll still be among the stars”. This is Aprille’s motto, and she has always lived it.
From an early age, Aprille knew she had far to go. If ever anyone asked “What makes you think you can do that?” her two grandfathers and her mother made it perfectly clear that she, and her three younger sisters, could do anything. She says now, “I think it especially makes a difference when men encourage girls in their life to achieve.” As a child, she was bussed from the Roosevelt Projects in New York’s Bedford Stuyvesant, to P.S. 199 in Brooklyn. She deserved to dream big. She was the only black student in her school’s Special Progress program, and she was very good at a lot of things. She graduated from middle school with high honors, and was a member of the basketball team, school band, and science and honors clubs.
Aprille moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts to live with her grandparents and attend a private high school. Her interests were varied; debate, math, science, and athletics, and she considered many paths open to her, including architecture and law. She used her summers to try different things and narrow her choices. It was after her junior year of high school that she attended a program at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and experienced a flight simulator. She suddenly realized how much she liked things that move, and set her course for a degree in Aeronautical/Astronautical Engineering.
By the time she received her undergraduate degree at M.I.T, Aprille had worked on several projects geared to manned space flight, and she applied to NASA’s astronaut program. However, the Shuttle Disaster, which took place during the Reagan administration, diverted government energies to defense. It is important to Aprille that she not be involved in any ‘destructive projects’, so she went to Howard University’s Large Space Structures Institute, earning a Master’s in Engineering and her Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering. There, she specialized in developing design procedures to be used to help control large, orbiting space structures of the future, like the Space Station. Her award-winning papers took her all over the world for presentations.
Dr. Ericsson has worked on a myriad of fascinating projects, most of them at NASA, in the Guidance, Navigation and Control Center. Many of us would have a hard time understanding these marvelous scientific adventures (I did), but Aprille’s passion for her work comes through in her voice. Here’s how she described some of what she was doing at the time of our interview. “I help to build satellites. I’m in charge of overseeing many facets of the job, including building, integration, and testing. My job means staying connected. I communicate and coordinate. As a project manager, I’m responsible for budgets. I determine how much money, how much manpower, what skills and resources are necessary to create a satellite. I keep all kinds of people, including lawyers, scientists, and contractors, focused on the goal.” April creates instruments and telescopes for scientists. When we spoke, Aprille was working on a project where the lead institution was in another country. The scientists were in Amsterdam, the contractor in Belgium. Aprille’s task was to determine and demonstrate the degree of ability to collect science, of an instrument that Aprille and colleagues would design for them at the Goddard Space Center. Imagine having the confidence to convince a bunch of researchers that the $100 million they’ll need to spend is a pretty good deal! Aprille is also involved in developing the James Webb, the telescope to replace the Hubbell Space Telescope (Hey, can my son have that old one when you’re done with it?) and the JMEX, which will look at how the sun affects Jupiter (that does seem a bargain at around $10 million). Then there’s EO-1, the first new millennium earth-observing mission, netting amazing earth images for government agencies and the public. Check out; http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/home/index.html for a great view of all the missions at Goddard Space Flight Center.
Have there been frustrations on the job? A few. Though attitudes are changing toward women and minorities in the profession, she does feel her career got a bit of a slow start due to her rarity in the field, until she proved herself. She works long hours, but that partly because Aprille feels a strong obligation to talk to young people about aiming high. She has acted as mentor, teacher, career advisor and friend to many students. She is a member of NASA’s speaker’s bureau, but tries not to have her presentations interrupt her day, and will work late to make up time she uses to give back to a society that helped her reach her goals with grants and scholarships all along the way.
Budget limitations can also frustrate Dr. Ericsson. “I want to pull off the great science. It’s expensive.”
On the plus side, the gratification is huge. Aprille has won so many awards, they’d need a chapter of their own. Many are technical (top female engineer in the federal government), and many honor her incredible outreach efforts.
Dr. Aprille Ericsson is no geek. “OK, I’m a rocket scientist, but I don’t look the part. I wear suede pants!” She’s an athlete. She still plays football, basketball, softball, tennis, and likes to ski and cycle. On weekends, she travels to play coed softball on her nationally ranked team! Recently, while speaking to a group of students in D.C., she was mistaken for singer Alicia Keyes.
Dr. Ericsson admits most people are astonished when they realize what she does for a living. “Its fun to shake them up, but I also make them comfortable.” She enjoys her life in the D.C. area, where there are plenty of well-educated African-American men and women, who think her job is “cool, no big deal”.
What kind of girl is suited to this career? Aprille emphasizes that a likely candidate is a natural in math and science, an avid reader, and interested in challenging textbooks.
She also says, “You need to be a people person. You need communication skills, good writing and verbal skills. As scientists, we’re not in black boxes anymore. You need to sell your ideas to get funded or to get partnerships. You need to know who your customer is and what you can deliver.”
She’s as brilliant as they come, and as practical as a car salesman.
Aprille Ericsson delivers.
Aeronautical/Astronautical Engineer
NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center
‘Moving Among the Stars’
No writer attempting to focus on Aprille Ericsson’s terrific job could possibly resist first discussing the fascinating woman herself. Aprille is the first African-American woman to receive a Ph.D in engineering at NASA, the Goddard Space Flight Center, where she works. She uses her brilliance to help move satellite projects, and people’s lives.
“Shoot for the moon. If you miss you’ll still be among the stars”. This is Aprille’s motto, and she has always lived it.
From an early age, Aprille knew she had far to go. If ever anyone asked “What makes you think you can do that?” her two grandfathers and her mother made it perfectly clear that she, and her three younger sisters, could do anything. She says now, “I think it especially makes a difference when men encourage girls in their life to achieve.” As a child, she was bussed from the Roosevelt Projects in New York’s Bedford Stuyvesant, to P.S. 199 in Brooklyn. She deserved to dream big. She was the only black student in her school’s Special Progress program, and she was very good at a lot of things. She graduated from middle school with high honors, and was a member of the basketball team, school band, and science and honors clubs.
Aprille moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts to live with her grandparents and attend a private high school. Her interests were varied; debate, math, science, and athletics, and she considered many paths open to her, including architecture and law. She used her summers to try different things and narrow her choices. It was after her junior year of high school that she attended a program at The Massachusetts Institute of Technology and experienced a flight simulator. She suddenly realized how much she liked things that move, and set her course for a degree in Aeronautical/Astronautical Engineering.
By the time she received her undergraduate degree at M.I.T, Aprille had worked on several projects geared to manned space flight, and she applied to NASA’s astronaut program. However, the Shuttle Disaster, which took place during the Reagan administration, diverted government energies to defense. It is important to Aprille that she not be involved in any ‘destructive projects’, so she went to Howard University’s Large Space Structures Institute, earning a Master’s in Engineering and her Ph.D in Mechanical Engineering. There, she specialized in developing design procedures to be used to help control large, orbiting space structures of the future, like the Space Station. Her award-winning papers took her all over the world for presentations.
Dr. Ericsson has worked on a myriad of fascinating projects, most of them at NASA, in the Guidance, Navigation and Control Center. Many of us would have a hard time understanding these marvelous scientific adventures (I did), but Aprille’s passion for her work comes through in her voice. Here’s how she described some of what she was doing at the time of our interview. “I help to build satellites. I’m in charge of overseeing many facets of the job, including building, integration, and testing. My job means staying connected. I communicate and coordinate. As a project manager, I’m responsible for budgets. I determine how much money, how much manpower, what skills and resources are necessary to create a satellite. I keep all kinds of people, including lawyers, scientists, and contractors, focused on the goal.” April creates instruments and telescopes for scientists. When we spoke, Aprille was working on a project where the lead institution was in another country. The scientists were in Amsterdam, the contractor in Belgium. Aprille’s task was to determine and demonstrate the degree of ability to collect science, of an instrument that Aprille and colleagues would design for them at the Goddard Space Center. Imagine having the confidence to convince a bunch of researchers that the $100 million they’ll need to spend is a pretty good deal! Aprille is also involved in developing the James Webb, the telescope to replace the Hubbell Space Telescope (Hey, can my son have that old one when you’re done with it?) and the JMEX, which will look at how the sun affects Jupiter (that does seem a bargain at around $10 million). Then there’s EO-1, the first new millennium earth-observing mission, netting amazing earth images for government agencies and the public. Check out; http://www.nasa.gov/centers/goddard/home/index.html for a great view of all the missions at Goddard Space Flight Center.
Have there been frustrations on the job? A few. Though attitudes are changing toward women and minorities in the profession, she does feel her career got a bit of a slow start due to her rarity in the field, until she proved herself. She works long hours, but that partly because Aprille feels a strong obligation to talk to young people about aiming high. She has acted as mentor, teacher, career advisor and friend to many students. She is a member of NASA’s speaker’s bureau, but tries not to have her presentations interrupt her day, and will work late to make up time she uses to give back to a society that helped her reach her goals with grants and scholarships all along the way.
Budget limitations can also frustrate Dr. Ericsson. “I want to pull off the great science. It’s expensive.”
On the plus side, the gratification is huge. Aprille has won so many awards, they’d need a chapter of their own. Many are technical (top female engineer in the federal government), and many honor her incredible outreach efforts.
Dr. Aprille Ericsson is no geek. “OK, I’m a rocket scientist, but I don’t look the part. I wear suede pants!” She’s an athlete. She still plays football, basketball, softball, tennis, and likes to ski and cycle. On weekends, she travels to play coed softball on her nationally ranked team! Recently, while speaking to a group of students in D.C., she was mistaken for singer Alicia Keyes.
Dr. Ericsson admits most people are astonished when they realize what she does for a living. “Its fun to shake them up, but I also make them comfortable.” She enjoys her life in the D.C. area, where there are plenty of well-educated African-American men and women, who think her job is “cool, no big deal”.
What kind of girl is suited to this career? Aprille emphasizes that a likely candidate is a natural in math and science, an avid reader, and interested in challenging textbooks.
She also says, “You need to be a people person. You need communication skills, good writing and verbal skills. As scientists, we’re not in black boxes anymore. You need to sell your ideas to get funded or to get partnerships. You need to know who your customer is and what you can deliver.”
She’s as brilliant as they come, and as practical as a car salesman.
Aprille Ericsson delivers.
REAL WOMEN IN MEN'S WORK...ALICE
Alice Suszynski
Cabinetmaker/Bench Carpenter
Aunt Alice’s Woodshop
‘Building beauty with her own two hands’
Diminutive Alice Suszynski has been a journeyman cabinetmaker for many years. Pixie-ish, and not much over a hundred pounds, she doesn’t look the part, but she can single-handedly build perfect cabinets, shelves and counters for offices, entertainment areas, and kitchens. She makes beautiful custom furniture, too.
Alice realized she was pioneering the field for women when, on applying to Chicago’s apprentice carpentry program she received a form letter notifying her of the aptitude test date. The very official letter began ‘Dear Sir’. How many guys do you know named Alice?
Alice became the first member of the Chicago Carpenter’s Union. This was a surprise to her. She thought becoming a carpenter was no big deal. “I like doing offbeat things.”
When Alice graduated from high school, she thought about college, but was anxious to leave home and the control of her parents. She took a bottom-rung office job, and knew very soon that it wasn’t for her. While reading Eric Fromme’s The Art of Loving, she was intrigued at the thought of a job where she could carry the process of crafting from start to finish, as he described. Which careers offered this ‘no disconnect’ feature? Shoemaker? Carpenter? Well, she’d always loved blocks as a kid. Suddenly, “I knew I wanted to build”. Carpenter it was! Her parents were stunned. Her uncle, an architect, urged to her become a cabinetmaker, not a rough or finish carpenter. Once Alice joined the union, they arranged for school one day a week and got her a job on the South side of Chicago. Talk about entry level. A whole year of floor sweeping. “It was horrible. I think they made me do it on purpose, to see if I’d be tough enough to hang in there.” But over the three-year apprenticeship, she met mentors who got her to think like a cabinetmaker, read drawings, and set up large equipment.
After her apprenticeship and her marriage, she and her husband moved to Portland, Oregon, where she went straight to the Portland Union to register. During her meeting, the interviewer inquired, “What makes you think you’re qualified for this job?” Surprised, she gamely outlined the particulars of her cabinetmaking experience in Chicago. The light finally dawning, the man asked “You’re not here for the secretarial position, are you?”
Here’s how Alice describes her job. “Measuring. Thinking. Using hand and power tools. Most of all, deciding and planning the process to accomplish a task. As a journeyman, you’re on your own. You may need to learn to direct a helper. There’s a certain amount of lifting, but not as much as you’d think. It’s manageable. Today’s cabinets are in smaller modules, and we have carts with leverage that help us lift pieces onto the saw.”
What does Alice love about her job? The creativity involved, and the opportunity to exercise her natural meticulousness and affinity for detail. Then, of course, there’s the satisfaction of seeing the completed projects (I saw a couple of her finished furniture pieces, and they were gorgeous).
Are there drawbacks to the job? “It’s pretty stressful because small mistakes have big consequences.” She was in the midst of a dilemma as we spoke. A customer was displeased with the shade she had chosen for her now-stained wall unit.
I asked Alice whether being a woman had held her back. “A long time ago, guys seem sort of appalled to have a woman in the shop, but that has really changed. I don’t get much reaction now.” As for clients, she did remember one incident where she had worked up a very thorough proposal for a couple from the Middle East. The wife was delighted with the plans, but the husband put the brakes on when he learned Alice would be doing the work herself. Such incidents are so rare as to be insignificant. “Most people just say,‘You do the work? Wow!’”
Alice had plenty of advice to give girls thinking of entering the trade. “It takes a girl who’s not afraid to use her strength. You must be able to think for yourself, be inclined to say, ‘I can do that by myself.’ Show initiative. Be ambitious. A curious, observant person will naturally want to get to the next step in the craft. It helps to be meticulous.”
According to Alice, the cabinetmakers making the most money are those with business instincts. “You kind of have three choices. You can keep working for someone else in a large shop. You can take it to the next level and go out on your own, as I did, or you can hire others and expand. I didn’t really have that kind of business acumen, so I think I hit kind of a ceiling as far as the earning potential.”
Alice had one more great tip. “I saw a few other women get into this at about the same time I did. They seemed to bitch a lot about the work, and the guys they worked with. In this job, it’s way better to be clever and classy in your response, not whiny and complaining. Instead of creating extreme hatred, it’s much better to figure out a way to inspire mild embarrassment!”
Cabinetmaker/Bench Carpenter
Aunt Alice’s Woodshop
‘Building beauty with her own two hands’
Diminutive Alice Suszynski has been a journeyman cabinetmaker for many years. Pixie-ish, and not much over a hundred pounds, she doesn’t look the part, but she can single-handedly build perfect cabinets, shelves and counters for offices, entertainment areas, and kitchens. She makes beautiful custom furniture, too.
Alice realized she was pioneering the field for women when, on applying to Chicago’s apprentice carpentry program she received a form letter notifying her of the aptitude test date. The very official letter began ‘Dear Sir’. How many guys do you know named Alice?
Alice became the first member of the Chicago Carpenter’s Union. This was a surprise to her. She thought becoming a carpenter was no big deal. “I like doing offbeat things.”
When Alice graduated from high school, she thought about college, but was anxious to leave home and the control of her parents. She took a bottom-rung office job, and knew very soon that it wasn’t for her. While reading Eric Fromme’s The Art of Loving, she was intrigued at the thought of a job where she could carry the process of crafting from start to finish, as he described. Which careers offered this ‘no disconnect’ feature? Shoemaker? Carpenter? Well, she’d always loved blocks as a kid. Suddenly, “I knew I wanted to build”. Carpenter it was! Her parents were stunned. Her uncle, an architect, urged to her become a cabinetmaker, not a rough or finish carpenter. Once Alice joined the union, they arranged for school one day a week and got her a job on the South side of Chicago. Talk about entry level. A whole year of floor sweeping. “It was horrible. I think they made me do it on purpose, to see if I’d be tough enough to hang in there.” But over the three-year apprenticeship, she met mentors who got her to think like a cabinetmaker, read drawings, and set up large equipment.
After her apprenticeship and her marriage, she and her husband moved to Portland, Oregon, where she went straight to the Portland Union to register. During her meeting, the interviewer inquired, “What makes you think you’re qualified for this job?” Surprised, she gamely outlined the particulars of her cabinetmaking experience in Chicago. The light finally dawning, the man asked “You’re not here for the secretarial position, are you?”
Here’s how Alice describes her job. “Measuring. Thinking. Using hand and power tools. Most of all, deciding and planning the process to accomplish a task. As a journeyman, you’re on your own. You may need to learn to direct a helper. There’s a certain amount of lifting, but not as much as you’d think. It’s manageable. Today’s cabinets are in smaller modules, and we have carts with leverage that help us lift pieces onto the saw.”
What does Alice love about her job? The creativity involved, and the opportunity to exercise her natural meticulousness and affinity for detail. Then, of course, there’s the satisfaction of seeing the completed projects (I saw a couple of her finished furniture pieces, and they were gorgeous).
Are there drawbacks to the job? “It’s pretty stressful because small mistakes have big consequences.” She was in the midst of a dilemma as we spoke. A customer was displeased with the shade she had chosen for her now-stained wall unit.
I asked Alice whether being a woman had held her back. “A long time ago, guys seem sort of appalled to have a woman in the shop, but that has really changed. I don’t get much reaction now.” As for clients, she did remember one incident where she had worked up a very thorough proposal for a couple from the Middle East. The wife was delighted with the plans, but the husband put the brakes on when he learned Alice would be doing the work herself. Such incidents are so rare as to be insignificant. “Most people just say,‘You do the work? Wow!’”
Alice had plenty of advice to give girls thinking of entering the trade. “It takes a girl who’s not afraid to use her strength. You must be able to think for yourself, be inclined to say, ‘I can do that by myself.’ Show initiative. Be ambitious. A curious, observant person will naturally want to get to the next step in the craft. It helps to be meticulous.”
According to Alice, the cabinetmakers making the most money are those with business instincts. “You kind of have three choices. You can keep working for someone else in a large shop. You can take it to the next level and go out on your own, as I did, or you can hire others and expand. I didn’t really have that kind of business acumen, so I think I hit kind of a ceiling as far as the earning potential.”
Alice had one more great tip. “I saw a few other women get into this at about the same time I did. They seemed to bitch a lot about the work, and the guys they worked with. In this job, it’s way better to be clever and classy in your response, not whiny and complaining. Instead of creating extreme hatred, it’s much better to figure out a way to inspire mild embarrassment!”
REAL WOMEN IN MEN'S WORK...BARBARA
Barbara Hauck
Automobile Mechanic
La Costa Limousine
‘Keeping cars on the road’
“I just love wrenching!”
When Barbara was 16, she was “dating a guy in the military who was always talking pistons.” Pretty soon she was in Auto Tech 1 in high school. She fell in love with the smell, and the more she learned, the more she liked fixing cars. Several more auto tech and auto engine performance classes followed.
She realized how much she enjoyed working with her hands. “I’ve always taken apart everything I could get my hands on...dial phones, old calculators. It used to make my Dad mad.” While still a teenager she “built a 4.3 litre V-6 Chevy engine that won second place at the Del Mar fair that year!” Beyond the classes she had taken, she learned from cars themselves. If a family member needed a brake job, there she was, to pull the car apart, and figure it out, however long it took.
After graduating high school in 1999, Barbara had been working at a grocery store, as a bakery, deli, and stock clerk. She was out driving with her sister one day and saw the job opening at the local lube center and decided to go for it. This was her break into the automotive repair business. Later, she tried to get into dealership service departments. She filled out applications for many a position for which she knew she was qualified, but thinks employers had a hard time believing she could really do the job. Week after week she would check back and the job would finally have been filled...by a man.
“It was frustrating. But my current boss knows women can do anything.” Her boss actually recruited her while she shopped at Pep Boys one day. He could tell she could talk the talk with genuine interest, and he gave her a better chance to walk the walk.
At La Costa Limousine, Barbara keeps the fleet in perfect condition for those many special occasions. She does all basic maintenance—brakes, transmission flushes, tires, oil changes, tune-ups, spark plugs. The cars vary in age and condition. Some are new, and some have 170,000 miles on them.
Barbara is so much happier fixing cars than stocking shelves. “I looove getting dirty. I have a great sense of providing real value to people. It’s good karma. And I love being able to fix my own car. I did my own 90,000-mile service. Cost me just $115 in parts!”
Have there been any serious drawbacks? Barbara had to admit, there’s a bit of danger. Scrapes, cuts and bruises are part of the job. “I’m covered in scars.”
Sexual harassment by other mechanics? “Oh, wow. It blows you away. Sometimes I just feel numb and don’t know how to respond” (which is probably the best reaction). “It’s really hard to deal with at times, but I think that some guys are just too gung ho and excited at seeing a girl on the job.” For a little while she attempted to eliminate any attraction factor, so no one would be distracted from doing the job. “I made a conscious effort to looking less feminine so I could just be one of the guys. It was a defense. That didn’t really work. My family said they’d kill me if I cut my hair. It just takes time.”
Customers can be surprised at having a female mechanic. “I remember one guy saying ‘What would you know, you’re just a little girl’.” Another time, while changing an oil filter at the lube center, “an older gent saw me under the car and asked my boss, ‘Is that a girl working on my car?’ My boss was right there with ‘Yeah, and she probably knows a lot more about cars than you.’” Women, however, are thrilled to have a female mechanic. I’ve spoken to several who feel that they would be more inclined to trust a woman not to gouge them on auto repairs. Barbara sees plenty of opportunity to make extra money in the future, repairing cars on the side.
Barbara is first to admit a woman needs a thick skin to do the job. “It’s not for the faint of heart.” Patience is important, too. Women auto technicians are a rarity, and they have to prove themselves to get ahead. “I’m pretty talkative, maybe too much, and I get along well with others. I think that’s important for a girl who wants to do this.”
The best job is not always the easiest job. For Barbara, it’s been worth the trouble. “It can be tough, but I know this is right for me. I have a passion for it. The more I get into it, the more I like it.”
Automobile Mechanic
La Costa Limousine
‘Keeping cars on the road’
“I just love wrenching!”
When Barbara was 16, she was “dating a guy in the military who was always talking pistons.” Pretty soon she was in Auto Tech 1 in high school. She fell in love with the smell, and the more she learned, the more she liked fixing cars. Several more auto tech and auto engine performance classes followed.
She realized how much she enjoyed working with her hands. “I’ve always taken apart everything I could get my hands on...dial phones, old calculators. It used to make my Dad mad.” While still a teenager she “built a 4.3 litre V-6 Chevy engine that won second place at the Del Mar fair that year!” Beyond the classes she had taken, she learned from cars themselves. If a family member needed a brake job, there she was, to pull the car apart, and figure it out, however long it took.
After graduating high school in 1999, Barbara had been working at a grocery store, as a bakery, deli, and stock clerk. She was out driving with her sister one day and saw the job opening at the local lube center and decided to go for it. This was her break into the automotive repair business. Later, she tried to get into dealership service departments. She filled out applications for many a position for which she knew she was qualified, but thinks employers had a hard time believing she could really do the job. Week after week she would check back and the job would finally have been filled...by a man.
“It was frustrating. But my current boss knows women can do anything.” Her boss actually recruited her while she shopped at Pep Boys one day. He could tell she could talk the talk with genuine interest, and he gave her a better chance to walk the walk.
At La Costa Limousine, Barbara keeps the fleet in perfect condition for those many special occasions. She does all basic maintenance—brakes, transmission flushes, tires, oil changes, tune-ups, spark plugs. The cars vary in age and condition. Some are new, and some have 170,000 miles on them.
Barbara is so much happier fixing cars than stocking shelves. “I looove getting dirty. I have a great sense of providing real value to people. It’s good karma. And I love being able to fix my own car. I did my own 90,000-mile service. Cost me just $115 in parts!”
Have there been any serious drawbacks? Barbara had to admit, there’s a bit of danger. Scrapes, cuts and bruises are part of the job. “I’m covered in scars.”
Sexual harassment by other mechanics? “Oh, wow. It blows you away. Sometimes I just feel numb and don’t know how to respond” (which is probably the best reaction). “It’s really hard to deal with at times, but I think that some guys are just too gung ho and excited at seeing a girl on the job.” For a little while she attempted to eliminate any attraction factor, so no one would be distracted from doing the job. “I made a conscious effort to looking less feminine so I could just be one of the guys. It was a defense. That didn’t really work. My family said they’d kill me if I cut my hair. It just takes time.”
Customers can be surprised at having a female mechanic. “I remember one guy saying ‘What would you know, you’re just a little girl’.” Another time, while changing an oil filter at the lube center, “an older gent saw me under the car and asked my boss, ‘Is that a girl working on my car?’ My boss was right there with ‘Yeah, and she probably knows a lot more about cars than you.’” Women, however, are thrilled to have a female mechanic. I’ve spoken to several who feel that they would be more inclined to trust a woman not to gouge them on auto repairs. Barbara sees plenty of opportunity to make extra money in the future, repairing cars on the side.
Barbara is first to admit a woman needs a thick skin to do the job. “It’s not for the faint of heart.” Patience is important, too. Women auto technicians are a rarity, and they have to prove themselves to get ahead. “I’m pretty talkative, maybe too much, and I get along well with others. I think that’s important for a girl who wants to do this.”
The best job is not always the easiest job. For Barbara, it’s been worth the trouble. “It can be tough, but I know this is right for me. I have a passion for it. The more I get into it, the more I like it.”
REAL WOMEN IN MEN'S WORK...STEPHANIE
Stephanie Bache
Civil Engineer
Parson’s Infrastructure and Technology
‘Bringing safe drinking water to millions’
Stephanie Bache is pleasantly surprised at how very much she likes her job. “I struggled with the major in school. I didn’t love it. After I graduated, I still felt uncertain. I went into the Peace Corps.”
Her mother is a computer scientist. Her father is also an engineer. Stephanie was originally a student of architecture, but her parents kept encouraging her to go into engineering. “My Dad thought that women engineers with good communication skills have it made.” She dropped out of architecture at Berkeley, and went into civil engineering. It was tough, and she didn’t feel totally committed, but she kept at it until she reached a point where “I was too lazy to switch majors, and so I just ended up in it.” OK, that’s not the most inspiring part of this story.
“I’ve always had some of the ‘save the world’ mentality.” Stephanie’s specialty is water and infrastructure engineering. She helps design and plan projects that bring safe drinking water to large populations here and abroad. She has found a place in the industry where she can exercise her considerable analytical and science talents, and “It satisfies my nurturing tendencies.”
When I interviewed Stephanie, she was working on the preliminary design for a large dam, analyzing how quickly it would fill up with sediment. The entire project will divert water from a river, store it, treat it, and then pump it into the city of Las Vegas to be used as drinking water. Ultimately, this could be a billion dollar program involving new reservoirs, pipelines and water treatment plants. Stephanie will look at environmental issues, water rights, cost and engineering feasibility. It is work that matters.
“When I was working in Africa, with the Peace Corps, I helped with a plan to get water out of a river and into a town that had never had water piped in before. Doing what I do, I feel like I help people in a very tangible way.”
Quite a bit of Stephanie’s time is spent in her office and at her computer, coordinating experts. “The female thing is good because I pull everyone together. Engineers tend not to want to talk to each other. Women do well thinking about a lot of things at once.”
A typical day for this engineer consists of “about 50% engineering in a math sort of way, calculations, and 50% meetings, phone calls, writing. So I’d say it’s about half communication and half analyzing of data.” On her present project, she gets to go to the field, the Nevada desert, every other week for a day. “I like water supply, because the sites are usually really pretty...in the middle of nowhere. I get a sense of how we are serving people’s needs in an environmentally protective way. Part of the job is to concern ourselves with the fish, birds and other life that might be affected.”
What kind of woman can do what she does? According to Stephanie, not some absolute egghead. “I think the word needs to get out that interpersonal skills are really important on this job. You do a lot better if you’re a good communicator.” Just like Dad said.
Additionally, “You need to be competent. You need above-average technical skills...math and science skills, and it helps to be naturally curious.” You need confidence, too. Stephanie seconds the research showing that, when challenged technically, women are inclined to feel “scared, shaken up, so it’s hard to think straight. Men just assume they’ll figure it out.”
Once you’ve got all that, she thinks it actually helps to be a woman. It’s easier for women to get into engineering school, and companies welcome women engineers into their mix.
Stephanie is usually the only female engineer on a project. How is it going with all those male colleagues? “In Africa, for sure there was some shock, but here in the U.S., no one’s too surprised, there’s no need to break down barriers.” The other engineers are a favorite part of her job. “I really like the ethics and quality of my co-workers. They are super-straightforward. I work with really interesting, intelligent people.”
She does, however, recommend dressing really conservatively for the job, in order to be taken seriously. At first, she wore no makeup, and stayed pretty frumpy, to assure that she would be seen primarily as another engineer, not a novelty in the business. She thinks its important to be noticed for skills, not visual style, especially at first, in order to be respected. “I didn’t call attention to myself right away, by my look. I’ve found that, over time, I can be a little more me.”
She works with women, too. “For some reason, it seems like all the big government administrators are powerful women. But as a water engineer...I’m not exactly viewed as competition. They’re fine to work with.” She does notice that “human resource women seem to resent technical women. The only work-related problems I’ve had have been with them.”
As a female civil engineer, Stephanie can count on being in demand, working wherever she wants to on this fascinating planet. Plus, she gets to use her brain, and save the world. Sounds pretty good.
Civil Engineer
Parson’s Infrastructure and Technology
‘Bringing safe drinking water to millions’
Stephanie Bache is pleasantly surprised at how very much she likes her job. “I struggled with the major in school. I didn’t love it. After I graduated, I still felt uncertain. I went into the Peace Corps.”
Her mother is a computer scientist. Her father is also an engineer. Stephanie was originally a student of architecture, but her parents kept encouraging her to go into engineering. “My Dad thought that women engineers with good communication skills have it made.” She dropped out of architecture at Berkeley, and went into civil engineering. It was tough, and she didn’t feel totally committed, but she kept at it until she reached a point where “I was too lazy to switch majors, and so I just ended up in it.” OK, that’s not the most inspiring part of this story.
“I’ve always had some of the ‘save the world’ mentality.” Stephanie’s specialty is water and infrastructure engineering. She helps design and plan projects that bring safe drinking water to large populations here and abroad. She has found a place in the industry where she can exercise her considerable analytical and science talents, and “It satisfies my nurturing tendencies.”
When I interviewed Stephanie, she was working on the preliminary design for a large dam, analyzing how quickly it would fill up with sediment. The entire project will divert water from a river, store it, treat it, and then pump it into the city of Las Vegas to be used as drinking water. Ultimately, this could be a billion dollar program involving new reservoirs, pipelines and water treatment plants. Stephanie will look at environmental issues, water rights, cost and engineering feasibility. It is work that matters.
“When I was working in Africa, with the Peace Corps, I helped with a plan to get water out of a river and into a town that had never had water piped in before. Doing what I do, I feel like I help people in a very tangible way.”
Quite a bit of Stephanie’s time is spent in her office and at her computer, coordinating experts. “The female thing is good because I pull everyone together. Engineers tend not to want to talk to each other. Women do well thinking about a lot of things at once.”
A typical day for this engineer consists of “about 50% engineering in a math sort of way, calculations, and 50% meetings, phone calls, writing. So I’d say it’s about half communication and half analyzing of data.” On her present project, she gets to go to the field, the Nevada desert, every other week for a day. “I like water supply, because the sites are usually really pretty...in the middle of nowhere. I get a sense of how we are serving people’s needs in an environmentally protective way. Part of the job is to concern ourselves with the fish, birds and other life that might be affected.”
What kind of woman can do what she does? According to Stephanie, not some absolute egghead. “I think the word needs to get out that interpersonal skills are really important on this job. You do a lot better if you’re a good communicator.” Just like Dad said.
Additionally, “You need to be competent. You need above-average technical skills...math and science skills, and it helps to be naturally curious.” You need confidence, too. Stephanie seconds the research showing that, when challenged technically, women are inclined to feel “scared, shaken up, so it’s hard to think straight. Men just assume they’ll figure it out.”
Once you’ve got all that, she thinks it actually helps to be a woman. It’s easier for women to get into engineering school, and companies welcome women engineers into their mix.
Stephanie is usually the only female engineer on a project. How is it going with all those male colleagues? “In Africa, for sure there was some shock, but here in the U.S., no one’s too surprised, there’s no need to break down barriers.” The other engineers are a favorite part of her job. “I really like the ethics and quality of my co-workers. They are super-straightforward. I work with really interesting, intelligent people.”
She does, however, recommend dressing really conservatively for the job, in order to be taken seriously. At first, she wore no makeup, and stayed pretty frumpy, to assure that she would be seen primarily as another engineer, not a novelty in the business. She thinks its important to be noticed for skills, not visual style, especially at first, in order to be respected. “I didn’t call attention to myself right away, by my look. I’ve found that, over time, I can be a little more me.”
She works with women, too. “For some reason, it seems like all the big government administrators are powerful women. But as a water engineer...I’m not exactly viewed as competition. They’re fine to work with.” She does notice that “human resource women seem to resent technical women. The only work-related problems I’ve had have been with them.”
As a female civil engineer, Stephanie can count on being in demand, working wherever she wants to on this fascinating planet. Plus, she gets to use her brain, and save the world. Sounds pretty good.
REAL WOMEN IN MEN'S WORK...JENNIFER
Jennifer Johnson
Police Officer
City of Carlsbad, California
‘Protecting and serving’
“Sometimes, when an incident’s over, I’ll think, ‘Wow, that could’ve really gone bad.’ But I don’t think about any danger when it’s happening. The training prepares you to just do what you’re supposed to do.”
It’s not just the training that makes Jennifer Johnson so capable. It was soon obvious to me that she has what anyone needs to be a police officer, including genuine confidence, a stable personality, and the ability to make good decisions independently.
I first met Jennifer at Starbuck’s before she went to work. In her beige tracksuit, with her latte, she looked like a pretty, fresh-faced college girl. At 5’6” and 125 pounds, she does not look like she’s about to take down a “perp”, except maybe on T.V. I was surprised to hear that most of the female officers she knows are similarly built. Later, when we went to the station and she suited up for work, I could see that there’s a lot of uniform involved in the Police Presence. I long to try one on!
Jennifer does patrol. She answers calls, including all kinds of disturbances, traffic collisions, domestic incidents, gang activity. She takes crime reports, and she apprehends criminals. Helping where needed is another part of the job. Police are there to help, just as our parents told us. Community service, representing the force both on and off duty, is a part of Jennifer’s life.
Jennifer’s studies in Loss Prevention at Sacramento State University led her to work apprehending shoplifters. Though this piqued her interest in law enforcement, the money was not great. She went on to earn a degree in Criminal Justice. She applied for a job at the Sacramento Police Department, and was hired as a Community Service Officer. In time, she was upgraded to Police Officer.
She later applied to the Carlsbad Police Department, north of San Diego, and near her family.
Of course, the police department had it’s own education. How hard was it to get through the Police Academy? Hard! It lasted six months. For the most part, it was a combination of daily academics, physical conditioning (especially running and weight training) and nightly firearms training. Stephanie described the atmosphere as “very military... bootcampish”. Right, so exactly how much running was there? The goal was a certain number of miles within a certain time frame. In her case, she recalls reaching a set goal of five miles in about 35 minutes. Hang in there, Ladies. It sounds worth it.
Jennifer loves her job. She’s happy not being in an office. She loves the independence, the discretion she gets to exercise. “It’s different every day. I’m dealing with all kinds of people. I see a lot. I see it all. I have many unusual experiences.”
On the other hand, Jennifer says there’s a downside to seeing a lot. “You can get very jaded. You can get cynical. It’s hard not to see all the bad in people. You can’t stay completely optimistic when you deal with so much negative. After a while you get less sensitive. You get a hard edge.”
Then again, she says, “You need that edge to be able to do the job. You need to be pretty tough inside. You don’t need to be as strong physically as you do mentally. You need a bitchy attitude I guess you could say.”
Her colleagues, mostly men, are terrific. “There’s great camaraderie, great team spirit.” Orientation at the Academy deals with issues of protocol between officers. “They treat me just like another guy.”
She has not felt that being a woman has held her back in the least. In fact, maybe it helped her get her job. She is confident that she can make her own future on the force. “In Sacramento, there was a woman sergeant and a lieutenant. They’d like to have one here, too.”
So let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. How do the bad guys react when she tells them they’re under arrest? Well, it turns out that a trace of chivalry still lives under dire circumstances. Jennifer thinks they’re actually a little more cooperative, maybe because they don’t feel as personally threatened as they might with a male officer. “They seem to just go with the program.”
“Women are a different story. They don’t like another woman telling them what to do. They don’t listen. They argue.”
I wondered whether being a police officer had affected her life outside work. It seems like a way of life, not the kind of job you leave at the office. “It can intimidate in your social life. Guys don’t like control. I was always pretty assertive, but this job makes you more so. You get used to taking control of situations. My boyfriend’s a police officer, too (in a different city) so sometimes we butt heads.”
She can’t deny, though, there’s something about a woman in uniform. “I get hit on a lot if I’m out with the public. It’s rather annoying. It must be the whole uniform-fantasy thing.”
Watch it, Buddy.
Police Officer
City of Carlsbad, California
‘Protecting and serving’
“Sometimes, when an incident’s over, I’ll think, ‘Wow, that could’ve really gone bad.’ But I don’t think about any danger when it’s happening. The training prepares you to just do what you’re supposed to do.”
It’s not just the training that makes Jennifer Johnson so capable. It was soon obvious to me that she has what anyone needs to be a police officer, including genuine confidence, a stable personality, and the ability to make good decisions independently.
I first met Jennifer at Starbuck’s before she went to work. In her beige tracksuit, with her latte, she looked like a pretty, fresh-faced college girl. At 5’6” and 125 pounds, she does not look like she’s about to take down a “perp”, except maybe on T.V. I was surprised to hear that most of the female officers she knows are similarly built. Later, when we went to the station and she suited up for work, I could see that there’s a lot of uniform involved in the Police Presence. I long to try one on!
Jennifer does patrol. She answers calls, including all kinds of disturbances, traffic collisions, domestic incidents, gang activity. She takes crime reports, and she apprehends criminals. Helping where needed is another part of the job. Police are there to help, just as our parents told us. Community service, representing the force both on and off duty, is a part of Jennifer’s life.
Jennifer’s studies in Loss Prevention at Sacramento State University led her to work apprehending shoplifters. Though this piqued her interest in law enforcement, the money was not great. She went on to earn a degree in Criminal Justice. She applied for a job at the Sacramento Police Department, and was hired as a Community Service Officer. In time, she was upgraded to Police Officer.
She later applied to the Carlsbad Police Department, north of San Diego, and near her family.
Of course, the police department had it’s own education. How hard was it to get through the Police Academy? Hard! It lasted six months. For the most part, it was a combination of daily academics, physical conditioning (especially running and weight training) and nightly firearms training. Stephanie described the atmosphere as “very military... bootcampish”. Right, so exactly how much running was there? The goal was a certain number of miles within a certain time frame. In her case, she recalls reaching a set goal of five miles in about 35 minutes. Hang in there, Ladies. It sounds worth it.
Jennifer loves her job. She’s happy not being in an office. She loves the independence, the discretion she gets to exercise. “It’s different every day. I’m dealing with all kinds of people. I see a lot. I see it all. I have many unusual experiences.”
On the other hand, Jennifer says there’s a downside to seeing a lot. “You can get very jaded. You can get cynical. It’s hard not to see all the bad in people. You can’t stay completely optimistic when you deal with so much negative. After a while you get less sensitive. You get a hard edge.”
Then again, she says, “You need that edge to be able to do the job. You need to be pretty tough inside. You don’t need to be as strong physically as you do mentally. You need a bitchy attitude I guess you could say.”
Her colleagues, mostly men, are terrific. “There’s great camaraderie, great team spirit.” Orientation at the Academy deals with issues of protocol between officers. “They treat me just like another guy.”
She has not felt that being a woman has held her back in the least. In fact, maybe it helped her get her job. She is confident that she can make her own future on the force. “In Sacramento, there was a woman sergeant and a lieutenant. They’d like to have one here, too.”
So let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. How do the bad guys react when she tells them they’re under arrest? Well, it turns out that a trace of chivalry still lives under dire circumstances. Jennifer thinks they’re actually a little more cooperative, maybe because they don’t feel as personally threatened as they might with a male officer. “They seem to just go with the program.”
“Women are a different story. They don’t like another woman telling them what to do. They don’t listen. They argue.”
I wondered whether being a police officer had affected her life outside work. It seems like a way of life, not the kind of job you leave at the office. “It can intimidate in your social life. Guys don’t like control. I was always pretty assertive, but this job makes you more so. You get used to taking control of situations. My boyfriend’s a police officer, too (in a different city) so sometimes we butt heads.”
She can’t deny, though, there’s something about a woman in uniform. “I get hit on a lot if I’m out with the public. It’s rather annoying. It must be the whole uniform-fantasy thing.”
Watch it, Buddy.
VII. ARE YOU READY TO DO MEN'S WORK?
“A bend in the road is not the end of the road---unless you fail to make the turn.” -Ed “Too Tall” Jones
Are you a trailblazer? It takes a strong woman to do Men’s Work. Its not always physical strength that’s required, but rather, that which the English call ‘intestinal fortitude’. It is not always the nature of the work itself that’s the greatest hurdle, in non-traditional employment. It can also be the ambience of the work place. What should a woman consider before choosing a ‘man’s job’? What is the difference in the mentality needed?
Say you decide to leave your job at the hair salon, where your boss, also a mother, always understood if you needed to leave for an hour to pick up your son from school and take him to baseball. A customer, Art, offers to train you to repair air conditioning units. The pay is much better, plus you would have benefits, a set schedule, and no weekend hours! Art is a nice guy, although most of the girls are nice, you won’t miss the catty atmosphere that sometimes tainted the air at Ruby’s Cut ‘n Curl.
At first, you are subjected to a few chortles as the manager, Mac, and the all-male parts team work through all the double-entendre they can summon related to your requests for various hoses, clamps and screws. Some of the old time customers are even worse. You muddle through and the teasing subsides. You also survive the filthy unisex bathroom in the service department.
On your third day at work, you listen to your cell phone messages during your lunch hour (you can’t take calls at work, like you could at Ruby’s). It’s your son, Freddy, calling to say that his best friend didn’t show up for school, and you were counting on your son hitching a ride with him to scouts. When you tell Art, he looks at you blankly, not getting the connection. Nobody leaves the service counter at Art’s before the next guy is on duty. Nobody.
You often wonder if Art is pleased with your work. He doesn’t say much. You spend part of your time at the rather grubby sales counter, and part of it in a small service cubicle by yourself. You love doing the repairs. Each one’s a puzzle and you get a great feeling of accomplishment when you solve it, but you often wonder if you’re learning or working fast enough compared to others.
Art gave you the blank look again six months later when you said your mom had offered to take you and Freddy with her on a 3-week cruise to Alaska. You’re still months short of earning your first week of vacation.
You’re thinking you might have to go to part-time. You realize you might sacrifice benefits. You try to chat with a couple of the guys about your difficulties, hoping they’ll work with you on some plan to pinch hit for you when you need it, but they just shrug and say, “I guess you’ll have to ask Art.” You finally do ask Art if you could get off duty at three each day. That is not an option. You last about 3 more months but can’t pull it together. One day, when Art seemed to think you should be finished with the fan installation you were doing, and Freddy left his lunch in the car, you quit, with tearful apologies. Art is pretty chafed that he took a chance on his first female technician and spent all this time training you. He thought you were just about ready to go on house calls, and now has to get someone else. He tells Mac. “This time, I’ll get a guy.”
When you go back to Ruby’s part time, you’re immediately impressed with the empathy you receive as you tell your story to both coworkers and clients. At Ruby’s you know that you can deal with almost any situation that arises by working with the rest of the girls to find a solution. Ruby herself would pick up Freddy if it came to it! You soon miss the money, though---only half what you made at Art’s---and the challenge. You start wishing you had planned things better and had put everything in place to do the job right when you had the chance. You wonder if you should find a teenage girl to pick up Freddy after school, take a class in HVAC and give it another shot somewhere else.
This little tale is meant to illustrate the following: Men’s Work often includes less part-time opportunity, less scheduling flexibility, less vacation flexibility, less tolerance of outside/personal life influences. There is often more of a sense of isolation on the job, more expectation to work independently. There is less opportunity for decision emanating by consensus, group support and reinforcement of action. There is less structure, more flexibility inherent in many of the jobs typically sought by women.
Accentuate The Positive
It is important that women who take jobs traditionally held by men realize that they are paving the way for other women who hope to have more options that they can count on to support their families in the future. They have a responsibility to be committed to performing the job as well as, and as reliably as, a man. They must be prepared to both meet the job description and adopt the style of the existing work context. The hiring of a woman in the Men’s Work world is sometimes viewed by the employer as an experiment. He has shown his optimism by the hiring itself. Now the pioneering woman should do all she can to make the experiment a success.
While reform is certainly needed in all sectors of the job market, and while the mentality of the job environment should reflect the needs and working styles of both men and women, we are certainly not there yet when it comes to “Men’s Work”. We can expect change to take place gradually. If we accept that women have more sensitive natures than men, and that they work differently to men in some ways, then we can see that compromise in the non-traditional workplace would consist of some increase in sensitivity on the part of the workplace, and some decrease in sensitivity on the part of the women pioneering the occupations. The decrease might have to come first. Expecting politically perfect accommodations, could result in the slamming shut of doors just beginning to open a crack. If you want to do the work, you must accept that male-dominated environments will, for the time being, have male atmospheres. The modus operandi will suit the male nature.
Not long ago, in a London newspaper, I read featured two incidents in one glaring headline: “Women Take One Step Forward and One Back”. The one step forward was the promotion of a 51-year-old mother of six to a top position in a major London corporation, Tesco. The one step back was a lawsuit being brought against Merrill Lynch by a woman suing for 7.5 million pounds, claiming sexual discrimination, bullying and unequal pay. 22 bankers all backed Merrill Lynch’s contention that the woman was “out of her depth” professionally, and “did not have the leadership skills or other qualities necessary” for her marketing job. The newspaper immediately interpreted the second occurrence as a step back for women. Especially as the suit came on the heels of a one-million pound award to a female Merrill Lynch Lawyer who claimed a colleague “made lewd comments about her cleavage and invited others to do the same” (the British reporting almost made it sound as though it happened over tea and biscuits). Even though, when such litigants prevail, some future disrespect might be deterred, there is a price to be paid by women generally, as companies nervously wonder if they should risk someday having to pay a hefty price for a careless mistake or misstep. While a case like this may need to occur to create parity for the individual victim it is not an advance for career-womankind.
Success Is The Best Revenge
While, in this day and age, women should not tolerate abuse, neither should they be especially touchy as they define inappropriateness, especially if they want to gain ground in the non-traditional job market. When working in a context of men unused to considering their presence on the job, there will be mistakes, awkward moments, maybe even an irksome or startling one here and there. Sometimes confusion might result, while men struggle with their youthful training to be solicitous and helpful to women, risking the implication that a woman cannot carry her own weight as well as a man. Over time, if her behavior is consistent, and she does carry her own weight, she will be treated increasingly as a person on the job, not a woman on the job. If women constantly accentuate the differences and sensitivities, progress for women in non-traditional employment will be slowed. The goal is that the gender difference becomes invisible, or at least unobtrusive, at work.
Another part of making this happen has to do with a woman’s demeanor at work. Parlaying her sexuality to her advantage or exploiting her femaleness, even in subtle ways in the workplace, will only cause eventual disruption of the work atmosphere. This is no place for her to boost her ego regarding her womanliness. For her own sake, and that of the next woman to apply, she should save this behavior for her personal relationship(s), and then, enjoy it all she likes! There is no doubt that men and women are different, but the place to ‘vive la difference’ is not at the office or job site.
Some men might feel threatened by increasing numbers of women entering their fields. Their own jobs seem slightly less secure than they used to be, as more women assume responsibility for family support, and more women take work seriously. On the other hand, other men are beginning to want more personal time to enjoy interests and family life, and, so, there will, over time, be less dichotomization of male and female roles. Ideally, men will, more and more often, enjoy the benefits of having help with the breadwinning and more personal time. Women will have more confidence and satisfaction in the workplace, less guilt at home. These changes in attitude will take a long time. Be prepared for a mixture of responses from the men you have chosen to work with. Try to be tolerant and take your time before reacting. Be larger than the small incidents that challenge you. Be thick-skinned, resilient, and flexible. Take pride in being a woman who is a little ahead of her time.
On the other hand, while you are staying aware, and making adjustments for the sensitivities of the men you are working with, do not lose sight of your goal---to be successful at the job and advance in your work. Do you know that women actually tend to feel guilty when they do so well that they overtake their co-workers on the success track? Women sometimes go so far as to suggest that another, more senior, worker be given a new responsibility. She would rather keep good feeling among her colleagues than accept the opportunity to show what she can do. This phenomenon would likely be even more apparent when a woman is in an almost all-male, competitive environment. Making this mistake would also differentiate you on the job, in a negative way. Accept any progress quietly, graciously, and without self-effacement. That is how you will best gain respect over time.
“...You can’t get ahead without passing people.”- Marilyn vos Savant
The woman pioneering Men’s Work needs to be reliable, resilient, thoughtful, and thick-skinned. She needs to take pride in being a woman who is a little ahead of her time. she needs to adjust to the conditions of new territory. If that sounds like you, do it for yourself, do it for all of us, but if you don’t think you can, step aside and let someone else blaze the trail.
PLAN To Have It All
“The difference between what we are doing and what we are capable of doing would solve most of the world’s problems.”- Mahatma Ghandi
All working women are challenged to keep the rest of their lives, apart from their job, running smoothly, but once a woman decides she has the temperament and determination to take on Men’s Work, she needs to be especially careful to arrange her life into a condition that allows her to get the job done.
Is this more of a task for her than for her male co-worker in most cases? Yes. Is that fair? No, but that’s the way it is, and it may take some real strategizing for some women to arrange their lives into and around their very best job opportunity. Be ready to juggle, maneuver, bend and stretch.
When my oldest daughter was finishing middle school, a luncheon was held for the girls of her small graduating class. One of the mothers gave a presentation while the girls had tea and sandwiches in their white ruffled dresses. The theme of the speech was “You CAN have it all”. I still mean to tell this woman (Lynn H.) what an impact that afternoon had on my life, and how often I’ve recalled her words to my girls and my friends.
The girls were about thirteen at the time, thinking about the party to come that evening, and I doubt they paid full attention. They’re all thirty now and if they weren’t listening, its time they get this message!
Lynn was an attractive attorney, wife, mother of two, and active in local politics. (She also happened to be a good golfer and tennis player, too!) She was a real rarity in our community—one of the few moms employed outside the home. She was trying to tell the girls that they did not need to choose between career and family any more than a man had to. They could anticipate having satisfaction in each area of their lives—career, children, relationship, and more—but that it took careful choices to have it all.
Many women are married, have children, and work, but many of those slog through the workday filled with guilt that the kids don’t have a parent at the soccer game. Some women are married with children, but long for the satisfaction of some work outside the home. Some ‘have it all’ but find it to be much too much. With the housework and family duties, they can’t imagine the luxury of reading time or other personal pursuits. Lynn was a living example of a woman who understood the art and science of planning life. She had it all. I have used the inspiration of that afternoon to derive a formula to maximize the chances for career success in the context of real life. Here are the main points she made, with elaborations. Keep in mind, she was addressing girls who were young enough to start from scratch and build their lives from the ground up. Those of us who have already built rather complicated structures of ours can use the advice to remodel, improvise, and make the best of our situations.
PREPARE AND ESTABLISH
It seems obvious, but without knowing what you want, it is not possible to set goals. Once goals are set, you must strategically place yourself exactly where you need to be to get the best preparation, develop the best contacts, and secure the best position possible.
Researching jobs, finding the source of the best possible education/training to do the job of choice, selecting the best locale for employment in your chosen field, refining your profile to suit the particular job you want---all of these go into preparation to have your destination career.
TIMING IS EVERYTHING
Most women want many things from life. Patience and wisdom are required at a young age to assure that a woman takes timing into account in making her choices. Many of us wish we had traveled more before settling down. Some of us know we should have established a solid career that we could later build on before having children. Many of us wish we had made our minds up about what really mattered to us before we selected our mates!
The more patient and careful a girl can be especially in making decisions that, to some extent, will affect the course of her life (e.g. mate, kids), the better. This is very easy advice to give, very hard to take. You need this advice most when you are young, and yet when you are young, you are least inclined to accept it.
Even if you didn’t get the timing quite right in the past, even if you now have four kids, are divorced and renting, it is not too late to use careful timing to your advantage. Intuitively, most of us know what we should take care of first in our lives. With maturity, we actually do begin to deny our impulses and do first things first more often.
I have known and admired women who knew that they needed to prioritize and dwell on their children during the young years, but who regretted not developing careers before families. A couple of them found time--- nap time, late night time, borrowed time, to prepare for careers that they could begin once the kids were school age. With determination, they were successful, and, with careful planning, their families wound up feeling proud, not shortchanged.
Have you ever noticed that for every old, insightful-seeming maxim in existence, we can come up with another that means just the opposite? For example; ‘Strike while the iron is hot’ versus ‘Haste makes waste’, or ‘He who hesitates is lost’ versus ‘Good things come to those who wait’? Well, the fact is, they’re all true, and what makes the difference is timing!
How do you time your life correctly? How do you make the right moves, focus on the right things, at the right times? I am a believer that you actually know, intuitively, based on living inside your own skin all of your life, what you should be focusing on at any given time. You can go to a counselor to dig out and help you face what you already actually know about yourself and your best course. Chances are, he will be facilitating the process of you being honest with yourself. With concentration, perhaps aided by reading and studying, you can learn to avoid procrastination, and you can learn to control your impulses, be more patient and stick to plans. You can ‘parent’ yourself, stop making excuses, quit wasting time, and admonish yourself to do what you know you should be doing at any given time in your life. For all that “women’s intuition” is famous, women often do not trust their intuition.
Research is beginning to substantiate our natural ability to turn the experiences and knowledge we have gained in our lifetimes into good decisions without deliberate exhaustive analysis or repetitive rethinking. Daniel Goleman, researcher and author of Emotional Intelligence, makes the case that our gut is "intelligent"; it knows things ahead of our rational mind. It certainly seems likely that there is an area of the brain that extrapolates information from all our previous inputs to enable us to make good decisions without all-new information. Dr. Antonio R. Dimasio and others at the University of Iowa College of Medicine have actually identified the part of the brain---the frontal lobe---which specializes in intuitive decision making. Their research shows that we intuitively know what isn’t working well for us.
Be sure that you listen to the voice inside you, not just the loud voices all around you. With fewer distractions, focus on your own inner gauges and steer yourself each day, as you know is truly best. There will be a right time, and time enough, for everything you want to do with your life.
ORGANIZATION IS KEY
It’s all about time management, time conservation. The more of the big, important things you want from life, the more efficiently you must learn to deal with the hundreds of small tasks that make up the mechanics of life. The more systems you can put into place so that these things occur automatically, the less you will have to focus on them and take attention away from your career (and children, and husband, etc.).
If your life is relatively simple, then you only need to organize your domestic and personal scene so that little time is wasted on unimportant but intrusive details of daily functioning.
Regardless how complicated your scene is, many things can be done with next to no thought. Bills can be automatically paid, irrigation timers can be installed, ovens and coffeemakers can be pre-programmed, chore routines can be set in stone, taxes can be deducted, palm pilots can jog your memory, personal trainers or math tutors can show up three times a week, gifts and flowers can be prearranged, and a kid can pop a chicken in the oven at 5 every Tuesday and Thursday! Housework shortcuts are an art in themselves. Many books have been written about the art of speed housekeeping. All of these devices help you to manage niggling details, avoid frustration and procrastination and get past the mundane, so that you can use time to create new successes.
FIND THE RIGHT PARTNER!
Notice the exclamation point on this subheading. Most of us would agree that its pretty ridiculous when a man and woman marry and then it turns out that one wants kids and the other doesn’t. This sort of issue should be resolved before people attempt to build a life together. Likewise, life partners need coordinating goals. Each needs to actually want the other partner to achieve his/her aims, and be willing to facilitate and exert personal energy to help make them happen. They should each own the other’s goals as surely as their own and participate in their execution by giving genuine and heartfelt support. That means actually adjusting one’s own goals and movements to the degree necessary to enable the goals and movements of the other. This artful designing of dual-career life to facilitate two sets of goals is not easy. As I recall, Lynn H. needed her husband, also an attorney, to have the flexibility to attend school ball games some weekday afternoons, and he arranged his life accordingly. Your husband may need to mind the kids every Saturday so that you can pursue your real estate career on that prime market day. You may need to be home every Wednesday evening while he’s out of town.
If it’s too late for you to find that ideal partner and you’re going to make the best of the one you have then you’ll just have to pay extra attention to this next section!
TRAIN YOUR PLAYERS
I’ve become convinced that almost all kids, many husbands, and some friends, will take from you all the services and goods you are willing to give, no limit. Nature wants children to have as many resources as possible to advance the species, so children are born with an almost unlimited appetite for attention. We, their mothers, create the limits in order to accustom children to the harsh realities of the world (not to mention, save our own sanity so that we will be around to make dinner tomorrow). Unfettered, kids can come up with more needs than you ever imagined.
It’s hard to get the family used to participating in its own care. Each new behavior is a hard battle won. For this reason, you want to make sure that each modified behavior is a lasting modification. Don’t battle to have the dishwasher unloaded each and every time. Establish a workable routine that will become second nature to your players.
Do not think of delegating chores, and sharing the duties of domestic life, as shifting the weight of your responsibility. Think of it as teaching self-reliance and training great new partners of the future. Your son might marry the first female President of the United States. Its time we had a First Gentleman!
STICK TO YOUR GUNS
Now I must tell you that I happen to know there were times when Lynn’s daughter, Sarah, wished that Lynn baked more chocolate chip cookies, especially in our community of stay-at-home moms and privileged children. I also happen to know that now, at 30, Sarah is an attorney herself, and credits her mom with inspiring her to be all that she could be.
The trick is to honestly internalize a good feeling about the choices you have made to improve the quality of life for yourself and your family. Don’t waste energy and arouse your own guilt by constant second-guessing and doubting of your decisions. If you’ve already thought your situation through, and acted in good faith when you started on the road to your training or career goal, then move forward with determination and complete all the steps of your plan.
“Well-behaved women seldom make history.”- Laurel Thatcher Ulirich
Expect there to be difficulties doing something new that seems alien to your family, friends, and yourself. Human beings are reluctant to change. Family members might actually fear changes that disrupt long-standing patterns, no matter what the eventual benefits. Children are especially inclined to express embarrassment if a parent is unconventional. Remember that, even if your kids come first, you are a person, not just a parent, and you have a right to choose the work in life that you want. Stay strong and remain sure of yourself when kids or others make you feel beaten down, as they might. Keep telling yourself that change and adaptation can be good for everyone. You cannot please all of the people all of the time. Cast yourself as an example of a person who does not give up. As Marilyn Vos Savant (apparently, the person with the world’s highest I.Q.) said, “It has been my observation that being beaten is often a temporary condition; giving up is what makes it permanent.” A non-traditional goal might be harder to achieve, require more adjustment by those around you, and therefore arouse more complaint. You have the opportunity to rise to the challenge and teach your family a valuable lesson in perseverance by your success.
We’ve taken a look at a myriad of factors that might, to some degree or another, explain the status of women in the work world. In the long run, women will collectively benefit from changing their employment profile. Today, each woman can take more control of her future by considering hundreds of jobs she never before thought of doing.
Whoever you are, whatever you are now doing, you have choices. As you read about these non-traditional jobs, be open-minded. Be particular. Be fearless. Get what you want.
Are you a trailblazer? It takes a strong woman to do Men’s Work. Its not always physical strength that’s required, but rather, that which the English call ‘intestinal fortitude’. It is not always the nature of the work itself that’s the greatest hurdle, in non-traditional employment. It can also be the ambience of the work place. What should a woman consider before choosing a ‘man’s job’? What is the difference in the mentality needed?
Say you decide to leave your job at the hair salon, where your boss, also a mother, always understood if you needed to leave for an hour to pick up your son from school and take him to baseball. A customer, Art, offers to train you to repair air conditioning units. The pay is much better, plus you would have benefits, a set schedule, and no weekend hours! Art is a nice guy, although most of the girls are nice, you won’t miss the catty atmosphere that sometimes tainted the air at Ruby’s Cut ‘n Curl.
At first, you are subjected to a few chortles as the manager, Mac, and the all-male parts team work through all the double-entendre they can summon related to your requests for various hoses, clamps and screws. Some of the old time customers are even worse. You muddle through and the teasing subsides. You also survive the filthy unisex bathroom in the service department.
On your third day at work, you listen to your cell phone messages during your lunch hour (you can’t take calls at work, like you could at Ruby’s). It’s your son, Freddy, calling to say that his best friend didn’t show up for school, and you were counting on your son hitching a ride with him to scouts. When you tell Art, he looks at you blankly, not getting the connection. Nobody leaves the service counter at Art’s before the next guy is on duty. Nobody.
You often wonder if Art is pleased with your work. He doesn’t say much. You spend part of your time at the rather grubby sales counter, and part of it in a small service cubicle by yourself. You love doing the repairs. Each one’s a puzzle and you get a great feeling of accomplishment when you solve it, but you often wonder if you’re learning or working fast enough compared to others.
Art gave you the blank look again six months later when you said your mom had offered to take you and Freddy with her on a 3-week cruise to Alaska. You’re still months short of earning your first week of vacation.
You’re thinking you might have to go to part-time. You realize you might sacrifice benefits. You try to chat with a couple of the guys about your difficulties, hoping they’ll work with you on some plan to pinch hit for you when you need it, but they just shrug and say, “I guess you’ll have to ask Art.” You finally do ask Art if you could get off duty at three each day. That is not an option. You last about 3 more months but can’t pull it together. One day, when Art seemed to think you should be finished with the fan installation you were doing, and Freddy left his lunch in the car, you quit, with tearful apologies. Art is pretty chafed that he took a chance on his first female technician and spent all this time training you. He thought you were just about ready to go on house calls, and now has to get someone else. He tells Mac. “This time, I’ll get a guy.”
When you go back to Ruby’s part time, you’re immediately impressed with the empathy you receive as you tell your story to both coworkers and clients. At Ruby’s you know that you can deal with almost any situation that arises by working with the rest of the girls to find a solution. Ruby herself would pick up Freddy if it came to it! You soon miss the money, though---only half what you made at Art’s---and the challenge. You start wishing you had planned things better and had put everything in place to do the job right when you had the chance. You wonder if you should find a teenage girl to pick up Freddy after school, take a class in HVAC and give it another shot somewhere else.
This little tale is meant to illustrate the following: Men’s Work often includes less part-time opportunity, less scheduling flexibility, less vacation flexibility, less tolerance of outside/personal life influences. There is often more of a sense of isolation on the job, more expectation to work independently. There is less opportunity for decision emanating by consensus, group support and reinforcement of action. There is less structure, more flexibility inherent in many of the jobs typically sought by women.
Accentuate The Positive
It is important that women who take jobs traditionally held by men realize that they are paving the way for other women who hope to have more options that they can count on to support their families in the future. They have a responsibility to be committed to performing the job as well as, and as reliably as, a man. They must be prepared to both meet the job description and adopt the style of the existing work context. The hiring of a woman in the Men’s Work world is sometimes viewed by the employer as an experiment. He has shown his optimism by the hiring itself. Now the pioneering woman should do all she can to make the experiment a success.
While reform is certainly needed in all sectors of the job market, and while the mentality of the job environment should reflect the needs and working styles of both men and women, we are certainly not there yet when it comes to “Men’s Work”. We can expect change to take place gradually. If we accept that women have more sensitive natures than men, and that they work differently to men in some ways, then we can see that compromise in the non-traditional workplace would consist of some increase in sensitivity on the part of the workplace, and some decrease in sensitivity on the part of the women pioneering the occupations. The decrease might have to come first. Expecting politically perfect accommodations, could result in the slamming shut of doors just beginning to open a crack. If you want to do the work, you must accept that male-dominated environments will, for the time being, have male atmospheres. The modus operandi will suit the male nature.
Not long ago, in a London newspaper, I read featured two incidents in one glaring headline: “Women Take One Step Forward and One Back”. The one step forward was the promotion of a 51-year-old mother of six to a top position in a major London corporation, Tesco. The one step back was a lawsuit being brought against Merrill Lynch by a woman suing for 7.5 million pounds, claiming sexual discrimination, bullying and unequal pay. 22 bankers all backed Merrill Lynch’s contention that the woman was “out of her depth” professionally, and “did not have the leadership skills or other qualities necessary” for her marketing job. The newspaper immediately interpreted the second occurrence as a step back for women. Especially as the suit came on the heels of a one-million pound award to a female Merrill Lynch Lawyer who claimed a colleague “made lewd comments about her cleavage and invited others to do the same” (the British reporting almost made it sound as though it happened over tea and biscuits). Even though, when such litigants prevail, some future disrespect might be deterred, there is a price to be paid by women generally, as companies nervously wonder if they should risk someday having to pay a hefty price for a careless mistake or misstep. While a case like this may need to occur to create parity for the individual victim it is not an advance for career-womankind.
Success Is The Best Revenge
While, in this day and age, women should not tolerate abuse, neither should they be especially touchy as they define inappropriateness, especially if they want to gain ground in the non-traditional job market. When working in a context of men unused to considering their presence on the job, there will be mistakes, awkward moments, maybe even an irksome or startling one here and there. Sometimes confusion might result, while men struggle with their youthful training to be solicitous and helpful to women, risking the implication that a woman cannot carry her own weight as well as a man. Over time, if her behavior is consistent, and she does carry her own weight, she will be treated increasingly as a person on the job, not a woman on the job. If women constantly accentuate the differences and sensitivities, progress for women in non-traditional employment will be slowed. The goal is that the gender difference becomes invisible, or at least unobtrusive, at work.
Another part of making this happen has to do with a woman’s demeanor at work. Parlaying her sexuality to her advantage or exploiting her femaleness, even in subtle ways in the workplace, will only cause eventual disruption of the work atmosphere. This is no place for her to boost her ego regarding her womanliness. For her own sake, and that of the next woman to apply, she should save this behavior for her personal relationship(s), and then, enjoy it all she likes! There is no doubt that men and women are different, but the place to ‘vive la difference’ is not at the office or job site.
Some men might feel threatened by increasing numbers of women entering their fields. Their own jobs seem slightly less secure than they used to be, as more women assume responsibility for family support, and more women take work seriously. On the other hand, other men are beginning to want more personal time to enjoy interests and family life, and, so, there will, over time, be less dichotomization of male and female roles. Ideally, men will, more and more often, enjoy the benefits of having help with the breadwinning and more personal time. Women will have more confidence and satisfaction in the workplace, less guilt at home. These changes in attitude will take a long time. Be prepared for a mixture of responses from the men you have chosen to work with. Try to be tolerant and take your time before reacting. Be larger than the small incidents that challenge you. Be thick-skinned, resilient, and flexible. Take pride in being a woman who is a little ahead of her time.
On the other hand, while you are staying aware, and making adjustments for the sensitivities of the men you are working with, do not lose sight of your goal---to be successful at the job and advance in your work. Do you know that women actually tend to feel guilty when they do so well that they overtake their co-workers on the success track? Women sometimes go so far as to suggest that another, more senior, worker be given a new responsibility. She would rather keep good feeling among her colleagues than accept the opportunity to show what she can do. This phenomenon would likely be even more apparent when a woman is in an almost all-male, competitive environment. Making this mistake would also differentiate you on the job, in a negative way. Accept any progress quietly, graciously, and without self-effacement. That is how you will best gain respect over time.
“...You can’t get ahead without passing people.”- Marilyn vos Savant
The woman pioneering Men’s Work needs to be reliable, resilient, thoughtful, and thick-skinned. She needs to take pride in being a woman who is a little ahead of her time. she needs to adjust to the conditions of new territory. If that sounds like you, do it for yourself, do it for all of us, but if you don’t think you can, step aside and let someone else blaze the trail.
PLAN To Have It All
“The difference between what we are doing and what we are capable of doing would solve most of the world’s problems.”- Mahatma Ghandi
All working women are challenged to keep the rest of their lives, apart from their job, running smoothly, but once a woman decides she has the temperament and determination to take on Men’s Work, she needs to be especially careful to arrange her life into a condition that allows her to get the job done.
Is this more of a task for her than for her male co-worker in most cases? Yes. Is that fair? No, but that’s the way it is, and it may take some real strategizing for some women to arrange their lives into and around their very best job opportunity. Be ready to juggle, maneuver, bend and stretch.
When my oldest daughter was finishing middle school, a luncheon was held for the girls of her small graduating class. One of the mothers gave a presentation while the girls had tea and sandwiches in their white ruffled dresses. The theme of the speech was “You CAN have it all”. I still mean to tell this woman (Lynn H.) what an impact that afternoon had on my life, and how often I’ve recalled her words to my girls and my friends.
The girls were about thirteen at the time, thinking about the party to come that evening, and I doubt they paid full attention. They’re all thirty now and if they weren’t listening, its time they get this message!
Lynn was an attractive attorney, wife, mother of two, and active in local politics. (She also happened to be a good golfer and tennis player, too!) She was a real rarity in our community—one of the few moms employed outside the home. She was trying to tell the girls that they did not need to choose between career and family any more than a man had to. They could anticipate having satisfaction in each area of their lives—career, children, relationship, and more—but that it took careful choices to have it all.
Many women are married, have children, and work, but many of those slog through the workday filled with guilt that the kids don’t have a parent at the soccer game. Some women are married with children, but long for the satisfaction of some work outside the home. Some ‘have it all’ but find it to be much too much. With the housework and family duties, they can’t imagine the luxury of reading time or other personal pursuits. Lynn was a living example of a woman who understood the art and science of planning life. She had it all. I have used the inspiration of that afternoon to derive a formula to maximize the chances for career success in the context of real life. Here are the main points she made, with elaborations. Keep in mind, she was addressing girls who were young enough to start from scratch and build their lives from the ground up. Those of us who have already built rather complicated structures of ours can use the advice to remodel, improvise, and make the best of our situations.
PREPARE AND ESTABLISH
It seems obvious, but without knowing what you want, it is not possible to set goals. Once goals are set, you must strategically place yourself exactly where you need to be to get the best preparation, develop the best contacts, and secure the best position possible.
Researching jobs, finding the source of the best possible education/training to do the job of choice, selecting the best locale for employment in your chosen field, refining your profile to suit the particular job you want---all of these go into preparation to have your destination career.
TIMING IS EVERYTHING
Most women want many things from life. Patience and wisdom are required at a young age to assure that a woman takes timing into account in making her choices. Many of us wish we had traveled more before settling down. Some of us know we should have established a solid career that we could later build on before having children. Many of us wish we had made our minds up about what really mattered to us before we selected our mates!
The more patient and careful a girl can be especially in making decisions that, to some extent, will affect the course of her life (e.g. mate, kids), the better. This is very easy advice to give, very hard to take. You need this advice most when you are young, and yet when you are young, you are least inclined to accept it.
Even if you didn’t get the timing quite right in the past, even if you now have four kids, are divorced and renting, it is not too late to use careful timing to your advantage. Intuitively, most of us know what we should take care of first in our lives. With maturity, we actually do begin to deny our impulses and do first things first more often.
I have known and admired women who knew that they needed to prioritize and dwell on their children during the young years, but who regretted not developing careers before families. A couple of them found time--- nap time, late night time, borrowed time, to prepare for careers that they could begin once the kids were school age. With determination, they were successful, and, with careful planning, their families wound up feeling proud, not shortchanged.
Have you ever noticed that for every old, insightful-seeming maxim in existence, we can come up with another that means just the opposite? For example; ‘Strike while the iron is hot’ versus ‘Haste makes waste’, or ‘He who hesitates is lost’ versus ‘Good things come to those who wait’? Well, the fact is, they’re all true, and what makes the difference is timing!
How do you time your life correctly? How do you make the right moves, focus on the right things, at the right times? I am a believer that you actually know, intuitively, based on living inside your own skin all of your life, what you should be focusing on at any given time. You can go to a counselor to dig out and help you face what you already actually know about yourself and your best course. Chances are, he will be facilitating the process of you being honest with yourself. With concentration, perhaps aided by reading and studying, you can learn to avoid procrastination, and you can learn to control your impulses, be more patient and stick to plans. You can ‘parent’ yourself, stop making excuses, quit wasting time, and admonish yourself to do what you know you should be doing at any given time in your life. For all that “women’s intuition” is famous, women often do not trust their intuition.
Research is beginning to substantiate our natural ability to turn the experiences and knowledge we have gained in our lifetimes into good decisions without deliberate exhaustive analysis or repetitive rethinking. Daniel Goleman, researcher and author of Emotional Intelligence, makes the case that our gut is "intelligent"; it knows things ahead of our rational mind. It certainly seems likely that there is an area of the brain that extrapolates information from all our previous inputs to enable us to make good decisions without all-new information. Dr. Antonio R. Dimasio and others at the University of Iowa College of Medicine have actually identified the part of the brain---the frontal lobe---which specializes in intuitive decision making. Their research shows that we intuitively know what isn’t working well for us.
Be sure that you listen to the voice inside you, not just the loud voices all around you. With fewer distractions, focus on your own inner gauges and steer yourself each day, as you know is truly best. There will be a right time, and time enough, for everything you want to do with your life.
ORGANIZATION IS KEY
It’s all about time management, time conservation. The more of the big, important things you want from life, the more efficiently you must learn to deal with the hundreds of small tasks that make up the mechanics of life. The more systems you can put into place so that these things occur automatically, the less you will have to focus on them and take attention away from your career (and children, and husband, etc.).
If your life is relatively simple, then you only need to organize your domestic and personal scene so that little time is wasted on unimportant but intrusive details of daily functioning.
Regardless how complicated your scene is, many things can be done with next to no thought. Bills can be automatically paid, irrigation timers can be installed, ovens and coffeemakers can be pre-programmed, chore routines can be set in stone, taxes can be deducted, palm pilots can jog your memory, personal trainers or math tutors can show up three times a week, gifts and flowers can be prearranged, and a kid can pop a chicken in the oven at 5 every Tuesday and Thursday! Housework shortcuts are an art in themselves. Many books have been written about the art of speed housekeeping. All of these devices help you to manage niggling details, avoid frustration and procrastination and get past the mundane, so that you can use time to create new successes.
FIND THE RIGHT PARTNER!
Notice the exclamation point on this subheading. Most of us would agree that its pretty ridiculous when a man and woman marry and then it turns out that one wants kids and the other doesn’t. This sort of issue should be resolved before people attempt to build a life together. Likewise, life partners need coordinating goals. Each needs to actually want the other partner to achieve his/her aims, and be willing to facilitate and exert personal energy to help make them happen. They should each own the other’s goals as surely as their own and participate in their execution by giving genuine and heartfelt support. That means actually adjusting one’s own goals and movements to the degree necessary to enable the goals and movements of the other. This artful designing of dual-career life to facilitate two sets of goals is not easy. As I recall, Lynn H. needed her husband, also an attorney, to have the flexibility to attend school ball games some weekday afternoons, and he arranged his life accordingly. Your husband may need to mind the kids every Saturday so that you can pursue your real estate career on that prime market day. You may need to be home every Wednesday evening while he’s out of town.
If it’s too late for you to find that ideal partner and you’re going to make the best of the one you have then you’ll just have to pay extra attention to this next section!
TRAIN YOUR PLAYERS
I’ve become convinced that almost all kids, many husbands, and some friends, will take from you all the services and goods you are willing to give, no limit. Nature wants children to have as many resources as possible to advance the species, so children are born with an almost unlimited appetite for attention. We, their mothers, create the limits in order to accustom children to the harsh realities of the world (not to mention, save our own sanity so that we will be around to make dinner tomorrow). Unfettered, kids can come up with more needs than you ever imagined.
It’s hard to get the family used to participating in its own care. Each new behavior is a hard battle won. For this reason, you want to make sure that each modified behavior is a lasting modification. Don’t battle to have the dishwasher unloaded each and every time. Establish a workable routine that will become second nature to your players.
Do not think of delegating chores, and sharing the duties of domestic life, as shifting the weight of your responsibility. Think of it as teaching self-reliance and training great new partners of the future. Your son might marry the first female President of the United States. Its time we had a First Gentleman!
STICK TO YOUR GUNS
Now I must tell you that I happen to know there were times when Lynn’s daughter, Sarah, wished that Lynn baked more chocolate chip cookies, especially in our community of stay-at-home moms and privileged children. I also happen to know that now, at 30, Sarah is an attorney herself, and credits her mom with inspiring her to be all that she could be.
The trick is to honestly internalize a good feeling about the choices you have made to improve the quality of life for yourself and your family. Don’t waste energy and arouse your own guilt by constant second-guessing and doubting of your decisions. If you’ve already thought your situation through, and acted in good faith when you started on the road to your training or career goal, then move forward with determination and complete all the steps of your plan.
“Well-behaved women seldom make history.”- Laurel Thatcher Ulirich
Expect there to be difficulties doing something new that seems alien to your family, friends, and yourself. Human beings are reluctant to change. Family members might actually fear changes that disrupt long-standing patterns, no matter what the eventual benefits. Children are especially inclined to express embarrassment if a parent is unconventional. Remember that, even if your kids come first, you are a person, not just a parent, and you have a right to choose the work in life that you want. Stay strong and remain sure of yourself when kids or others make you feel beaten down, as they might. Keep telling yourself that change and adaptation can be good for everyone. You cannot please all of the people all of the time. Cast yourself as an example of a person who does not give up. As Marilyn Vos Savant (apparently, the person with the world’s highest I.Q.) said, “It has been my observation that being beaten is often a temporary condition; giving up is what makes it permanent.” A non-traditional goal might be harder to achieve, require more adjustment by those around you, and therefore arouse more complaint. You have the opportunity to rise to the challenge and teach your family a valuable lesson in perseverance by your success.
We’ve taken a look at a myriad of factors that might, to some degree or another, explain the status of women in the work world. In the long run, women will collectively benefit from changing their employment profile. Today, each woman can take more control of her future by considering hundreds of jobs she never before thought of doing.
Whoever you are, whatever you are now doing, you have choices. As you read about these non-traditional jobs, be open-minded. Be particular. Be fearless. Get what you want.
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