Wingtips for Women: Success Without Compromise

If you have read “My Story,” posted earlier in this blog, you know that I was already in the work force before I learned that men and women were treated differently. Thankfully, my parents had protected me from that expectation-limiting message. I am the eldest of four children, two girls, then two boys. My parents held the same degrees (PhDs in physical chemistry–not for the faint hearted!) and the same jobs at the university. They were both fabulous cooks, campers, tutors, parents. I simply saw no differences other than my mother preferred sewing to my father’s gardening.

So it was a rude awakening and, quite frankly, very confusing to me when I encountered the first colleague to create the impression that the two of us were different in the eyes of the boss, the client and the world. Although I did not really understand why he thought we might have different opportunities, I was in no way deterred. In fact, it just made me more determined.

At the same time, I became aware of other women who had learned this message of difference much earlier than I and who had taken the comments on as not just chips, but boulders on their shoulders. Truthfully, I wanted to distance myself from those women as fast as I could. That is where attitude kicks in.

Women on successful career tracks don’t have to, and quite frankly should not, be like men to succeed. It is our differences that often make a team more successful than an all-male or all-female team. We do think differently. We act differently. We look different…but all for a good reason that the good Lord decided way back in the beginning!

But male or female, our attitude about ourselves and those around us speaks louder than our gender. No one wants to work with someone who lives assuming everyone is against her (or him!). So lighten up and be all that you were made to be. There are few limits you don’t have major control over.

The women in the book know who they are and they take the hill, day by day, always giving their very best, rarely thinking about gender. These women are the role models for both men and women coming behind them, beside them and one day ahead of them!

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As we outlined the book, we soon came to the question of whom to interview. That led us straight back to one of the earliest secrets of the sales trade. Networking is not new to the last decade. The tools may be different, but successful sales people, male or female, have naturally done networking for millennia. Sure, it may go by different names, but whether you call it networking, social networking, netweaving (http://netweaving.com/heartOfNetweaving.html), connecting with people is an integral part of sales. After all, you need to get in front of people (literally or figuratively, physically or electronically) in order to sell your product or service.

So that is what we did. We reached out to our network of executives and within a few days, we had found and contacted most of the women we ended up including in the book. The simple act of asking friends and colleagues to help us identify women at the top of the corporate sales ladder was a great reminder that it is often who you know and not just what you know. At first, I thought women might respond out of ego to our request for an interview. But it was quickly evident from their responses to our questions that they were serious about sharing their hard won experiences with men and women just starting out on the sales career journey. And I do mean ‘men and women’ because most of these women never distinguished between men and women unless we asked the pointed question. That, in itself, is a key learning. These women know they are different from many of their colleagues, but they do not see that first and foremost. They see successful sales people, some of whom are women and some of whom are men. They treat everyone equally and expect others to do the same. That is not to say there can be different issues as a woman in sales, but those differences are to be embraced and not carried around as heavy chips on one’s shoulders.

But back to networking! Even at the highest rungs of the ladder, busy women responded to the requests of those who knew them and made a simple request for an interview with me, a complete stranger. They say we are separated by 6 degrees, but I don’t think it was more than 3 degrees of separation for any of the women in our book.

The power of networking is in the give and the take. If you are out there collecting emails or cards without giving value to your new contacts, you aren’t networking. You are collecting. And when the time comes to find your top 20 influential contacts, they won’t be there for you. So start networking now. Give first and they will be there for you when you need help.

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I have been working with Emma on the Wingtips for Women (WT4W) project for the last two years. I can’t tell you how much I have learned about how NOT to manage a publishing project, and on the flip side, I’d do another one in a heartbeat. I realized so many things about my workplace that I am thankful for. The Boomer women in the book talk about how they have created a flexible workplace full of training. They also discuss the role of Mentoring as a key success factor. I have been so blessed to have had an executive career full of great people. Aside from working with Emma (I am a big fan), I have had two gentlemen that were keys to my success: Randall McCroskey and Rick Higdon. They didn’t, and still don’t, seem to get hung up on gender and are still part of the key group of advisors I turn to when making big decisions. Now, back to my workplace, which is really the nearest Starbucks. How else would a caffeine addict survive? Coffee is a big part of our corporate culture and it supports our desire to have home offices and the ability to meet all over Atlanta. I have always been encouraged to choose the path that suits my talents and that I find rewarding. I have applied lessons learned in order to have a very flexible work day so I can spend great quality time with my twins and go to ballet practice and skating lessons. I have kept my mind engaged with enough consulting work and with great clients that I don’t feel like becoming a mom turned my brain to mush. I have never forgotten how fortunate I am to have the luxury of making that choice. My only hope is that I can pay forward that encouragement and add value to the young people I will have the privilege of meeting and working with in the future! As WT4W continues to roll out I hope you find value in the pages and posts to follow.

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