Podcast: Download
16 Minutes
Tip 54: Fit in, but do not become one of the boys.
There is a line that a woman should never cross. Once you do, your feminine individualism goes adrift. I am talking about women that feel they must act like a man to be accepted as a leader.
Relate to men? Yes. Understand men? Yes. Conform? Hmm, depends on how you define that.
You are undeniably you, and that includes being female, including the assets and liabilities that accompany the gender. Burying those qualities is robbing others of the opportunity to appreciate them. Stick to your guns.
PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION
[MUSIC PLAYS]
Hello and welcome to the Skirt Strategies podcast! The podcast for tips and techniques you can use to increase your confidence and project a powerful image to get the job with a client, the raise or the promotion you deserve.
Katie: We’re back again with Carol and Katie.
Carol: I’m Carol.
Katie: I’m Katie. The book is full of rich, rich tips.
Carol: It is.
Katie: Carol and I are spending a little bit of time on each one of them in the podcasts.
Carol: So the book is available on Amazon. Skirt Strategies: 249 Success Tips for Women in Leadership.
Katie: You can get a little insight into it at the website too at skirtstrategies.com/book – If you want to get a little peek inside and then order it from there.
And this tip itself – Tip Number 54: Fit in, but do not become one of the boys.
Carol: Powerful!
Katie: I put this in there because many of you know – I came from a male-based work environment technology. My first career was in Engineering. I thought I had to be one of the boys to fit it in. I was young.
Carol: I’ve been there.
Katie: Now, think about what that does for you and what it does against you.
So those of you that are listening, think about the work environments that you are in – even if it’s not male-dominated and it might be male-based.
Most of our followers are in most of their situations with mostly men. Most, most, most.
Carol: And interestingly, most businesses because you know, the business model was started many, many years ago. Most businesses are male-dominated or male-based.
Katie: Based on commanding control.
Carol: Yes. Based on the way men wanted.
Katie: Think, look. And let’s talk real quickly about it because we’re going to talk about how not to be one of the boys.
Let’s talk real quickly about what our definition of the difference between men and women is – because we have a philosophy.
Carol: Well, the most basic difference…
Katie: Not physiological, Carol and hormonal. Because the hormones that are in men drive them differently than the hormones that are in women.
Carol: That’s true.
Katie: That almost is the bottom line right there.
Carol: Yes – beyond physiological differences. Well, and then brain differences as well.
Katie: Let me talk about the hormone differences. Because testosterone brings out a win/lose competition. It creates a fighter fly type dominance.
Carol: Have I told you my testosterone story?
Katie: I thought you’re going to say – “Have I told you my testosterone is through the roof?”
Carol: No. This is just a little aside.
Katie: Okay.
Carol: And I probably shouldn’t reveal this on a podcast, but I think it’s very interesting. It was an experiment in what testosterone does.
I went to my doctor and she said, “Well, let’s do hormone replacement therapy because you’re getting a little bit older now and Hot Flashes are a problem.” And she said, “Let’s just mix in a little testosterone with that estrogen and [Inaudible][0:03:29.8].”
And so, she did. And I used it as a cream. It was horrible. I was irritable with everything all the time. It was awful. I just felt like I was mad. My husband called it “bitch cream.” So it was this very strange experiment with somebody else’s normal being.
Katie: Yeah, because your bitch cream wanted you to make him your bitch.
My friend, KC did the same thing and she got off it so fast. She said, “I was nothing more than angry.”
Carol: I was so mad.
Katie: She said, “I was angry.” And her observation about it – I thought was so interesting because she said, “I can completely see why all of our prisons are full of men.”
Carol: Oh, yes.
Katie: It just promotes that sort of behavior. Now, this is not a male-bashing statement. I am really not saying that.
Carol: No. Most men keep it under control. And it’s not to say that I couldn’t have kept it under control, but I really didn’t want that in my life.
So no, this is not male-bashing. We forgive you for having this hormone in your body.
Katie: And we do have something natural anyway.
Carol: Yes.
Katie: And the way I put the difference between men and women is – most, because we genderalize. Carol and I call it “Genderalization.” Most men are different than most women.
Carol: Right.
Katie: That doesn’t mean that there’s not some women that are tomboys or a little more commanding control ish. And there’s not some men that are a little bit more feminine or sensitive.
We all have a little bit of everything. But most men are different than most women.
Carol: Right.
Katie: So one of them is the hormonal levels. And of course, that changes through different times of life.
Carol: Yes, it does.
Katie: The other thing is the way that our brains work. So a man’s brain – if you put a functional MRI which was measuring the blood activity through it. You know, whichever part of the brain is firing at whatever time. And I’m not a neurologist so don’t hold me to any of this.
Carol: She read about it though.
Katie: But I did read about this and I do study some of this.
The men’s brain is very focused in certain areas at certain times. So they have a stronger natural ability to concentrate and to block out the things around them.
Carol: Yes.
Katie: When he’s in watching the football game or when he’s reading an article on the paper and you’re saying, “Honey. Honey. Honey.” And five minutes later he goes, “Huh? What?”
It’s because he has an ability to focus in on certain parts of the brain and that blood movement stabilizes that part of the brain that he’s using.
Carol: And historically, we kind of move that all the way back to the fact that men were hunters. They needed to focus on prey and knowing where it was and be able to focus on tracking and all of that.
Katie: Right. Yeah. So it does have some history to it – some evolutionary history and it has value to it.
Carol: Sure. Absolutely! And it still has value.
Katie: And a lot of women push back and they say, “Oh! You cannot compare men and women today to what they were in the cave.” But you know what? There are a lot of things that have not changed.
Carol: Right. Yeah.
Katie: So the difference now in a women – is if we look at the functional MRI, what’s happening in the motions in her brain. We see her whole brain light up. We see a lot of activity in a lot of different areas. The threshold between the left brain and the right brain is – there’s actually a physical bridge that’s much bigger, more built out than in the men’s. And so, we can switch back and forth between left brain and right brain quite readily.
Carol: We’re not quite so focused.
Katie: Exactly.
Carol: So I mean, there are good things and bad things with both brains.
Katie: Well, you know in our assessment in the Intuition Model in the assessment. One of the things we ask people – women who take it as, “How well do you multitask?”
Carol: Right.
Katie: And we know that women are naturally good at multitasking because of that ability to bounce around our brains. But it also has a downside – as does any strength. It has a downside of looking scatter brained.
Carol: Right. So what’s the evolutionary reason for women’s brains to be this way? Because there isn’t evolutionary focus?
Katie: Because we’ve got a lot of family around us, we’ve got homework keeping. (I mean, I’m talking evolutionary here.) We’ve got a lot of different worlds that we’re living in all at once. If you think about a modern day woman. Who’s the primary person in charge of the family?
Carol: Oh! Yeah. What don’t we do?
Katie: Who’s the person in charge of the volunteer work? Who does the community stuff? Who figures out what you’re going to do socially with your friends?
Carol: What groceries to buy?
Katie: “We’re going out on Friday night with the Jones’s.” The groceries to buy. Who figures out what the menu is for the night?
Not that the man doesn’t do it, but a woman has a lot of balls in the air – a lot. So we are switching around. I mean, look at what you do when you come to work?
Carol: Yeah.
Katie: You focus on the project and your phone rings and of course, you have to think – “Okay. That might be one of the kids at school so I need to at least check it.”
Carol: Right.
Katie: It’s exhausting!
Carol: So the evolutionary piece to that – is that women were hunters, gatherers. Well, we were all hunters and gatherers. But women would go pick the berries. And we had to remember where the berries were and go back to those berries.
And we had children hanging around us. So we had to make sure and know exactly where the kids were at all times. So we were more of the multitaskers without the focus – necessarily.
Katie: Yes. Very useful!
Carol: Yeah.
Katie: So when we talk about the difference between men and women in a workplace – You and I believe, Carol that there is a femininity that can be brought to the table that is so valuable.
But when we’re in an environment where it isn’t the way things are done around here – in other words, like collaborative thinking, collaborative decision making or empathy. It’s not the way we do it around here because it’s a male-based workplace.
We [Inaudible][0:09:52.4] that and we think, “Well, I don’t know. I don’t want to look…” I want to look competent so I’m going to be commanding control.
That’s what I mean by trying to be one of the boys. And the other piece of that is the social aspect of it. Because I was buddy-buddy with a lot of the engineers that I worked with and they went so far as to sometimes, say something a little raunchy in front of me.
And of course I was like, “I don’t care.” But at some level, it felt a little bit disrespectful because I did not stand up for – “Hey! I’m different. I have much better raunchy jokes than you do.”
Carol: And don’t…
Katie: Don’t even try. And I tell them in a much more composed fashion.
No. But I wanted to feel like I was a part of them so I felt like I had to act like them – rather than letting them know I’m different. That felt like it was risky because so many of them might be uncomfortably because of – “There’s a girl in the room.”
My mom said to me at one point. She was the one that actually said this to me. “Don’t be one of the boys.” And I was shocked when I heard her say that because I was like, “Mom said don’t be one of the boys.”
And I looked back at how he’s behaving and I kind of thought, “I am kind of trying to act like one of the boys when I was an engineer.” I tried to dress like one. I always had a dark blazer on and didn’t look feminine and acted kind of like a tomboy.
And I don’t think it did me any good. I think it probably kept me from sticking out a little bit more. But what caused me was the natural value of the female strengths coming to the table.
Carol: Right. So you’re squelching those in order to be one of the boys.
Katie: Aha.
Carol: And we really talk about strengths and feminine strengths in particular, building relationships. Help me here. We have 16 of them.
Katie: Yes.
Carol: And it’s important to grasp onto those strengths – rather than those commanding control male strengths. And for one thing – When a woman is commanding control, it just isn’t accepted like it is when a man is commanding control.
Katie: Unfortunately, that is true.
Carol: And I don’t know if it’s unfortunate of fortunate.
Katie: Maybe it’s fortunate. Maybe it keeps you from…
Carol: I don’t think we have to be commanding control. I think we can show people a new way of leadership. And especially in this day in age – In this day in age, what are you managing if you’re not managing relationships?
Katie: Exactly! There’s more women that are… There’s too many women. I want to say there’s too many men, but I don’t really mean that. There’s too many women that move up into leadership and try to lead the way the guy did before her. And she goes down in flames because not only is it not natural, it’s not genuine and it’s…
Carol: And people don’t accept it.
Katie: Then people don’t accept it because then it looks too much like she’s trying to play something.
Carol: And you know honestly, we’re tiptoeing around things here and that is – We want women to feel very strong and very capable in a workplace.
Katie: Yes, yes.
Carol: We just think that we may be going about it a little bit wrong. And in order to feel comfortable in the workplace, we need to embrace our strengths and do those really, really well and then it won’t be even noticed that we’re not doing commanding control. Collaborative decision making – for one.
Katie: Yes. That’s one.
Carol: Okay. So I bring people into the decision making process. I asked people what they think because it’s their jobs that are usually on the frontline of these things.
Katie: Okay. So can I say what the downside of that is?
Carol: Uh-hmm.
Katie: If a man were to try that, he would have a downside. Now, I will say that there are some benefits.
If we were to do that, people know that – “Oh, it’s a woman. Yes, that’s the way she does it.” If a man would do it, he’d be seen as wishy-washy. But when a woman does it, she’s seen as indecisive as well.
Carol: Right.
Katie: But it’s a strength of hers. My point being – We’ve got to adjust the way that we see things. We’ve got to adjust our perspective. And so, when Carol uses an interactive decision making or collaborative decision making process, the workplace needs to see that as a strength.
Carol: Yeah.
Katie: Same thing with empathy. We need to see that as – That’s great because it’s not – “Oh! I’m so sorry.”
It’s not that. It’s a reflection. Empathy is a reflection on – “I understand why you feel that way. I understand how that happened.”
It’s a great skill. Men don’t use it as a go-to as quickly as women use it as a go-to.
Carol: And again, in this day in age, we’re managing people. And one of the big things is – the workforce is shrinking. I mean, honestly, we’ve got to keep people. We’ve got to keep them happy and keep them productive.
And so, is the way to do that commanding control? And for some people, it may be. Or is the way to do that building relationships and asking them to be a part of the decision making? Well, I would say the ladder is the up and coming way of leadership.
[MUSIC PLAYS]
Katie: I think so too.
Carol: And I think men are going to have to embrace some of those female leadership qualities too.
Katie: Probably.
Carol: So that’s the point. The point is that – fit in, but don’t become one of the boys because we have our own strengths and we need to embrace them and use them.
Katie: Amen, sister!
We’re so glad you joined us for this episode of the Skirt Strategies podcast. We’d love to hear from you with questions or comments. Email us at info@skirtstrategies.com or interact with us on Facebook. Now more than ever – the world needs powerful, confident female leaders and that’s what we are.
[END OF TRANSCRIPT]