Walking the Tightrope of Speaking Up While Female

In the second article in their series of four essays on women at work, Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant discuss why women stay quiet at work. Published Jan 12, 2015 in The New York Times, this article discusses the reality and the consequences of one implicit bias that exists in the workplace setting with regard to the sharing of ideas.

When a woman speaks in a professional setting, she walks a tightrope. Either she’s barely heard or she’s judged as too aggressive. When a man says virtually the same thing, heads nod in appreciation for his fine idea. As a result, women often decide that saying less is more.

Particularly disturbing is a study they cite wherein men who speak up receive higher performance evaluations whereas women do not. In the absence of a “Do Not Interrupt” policy, it seems like a no-win situation for women.

Here is a link to the full article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/opinion/sunday/speaking-while-female.html

The comments on the article are also interesting.

Has this happened to you? What ideas do you have for improving this phenomenon in the workplace?

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Expressions of Emotion in the Workplace

Expressions of Emotion by Women in the Workplace Diminish their Status

This is the first spring 2015 workshop on Achieving Gender Equity in Science. The entire schedule can be found here.

In this meeting we will discuss gender differences in the professional impact that emotion plays in the workplace. We will discuss the following paper (linked in the title):

Can an angry woman get ahead? Status conferral, gender, and expression of emotion in the workplace (2008) Brescoll, V.L. & E.L. Uhlmann, Psychol Sci 19: 268-75.

Although the title mentions anger, the paper also discusses the impact of sadness. Take a few minutes to look it over before the workshop so you’ll be prepared to participate in the discussion.

We will meet in Jenkins 107 at 6pm. Pizza and beverages will be served. If you think you will attend, RSVP Karen so she can order enough pizza. It would be a bummer if we ran out of pizza!

Please spread the word about these workshops. A flyer for posting is here: 2015_0120_AchievingGenderEquityFlyer.

The Spring 2015 schedule can be found here. Mark your calendars now for the future workshops:

Tuesday, March 24: Gender bias in letters of recommendation; and

Tuesday Apr 21: Faculty Panel on Women in STEM