Wingtips for Women: Success Without Compromise

MY STORY

Excerpt from Wingtips for Women: Success Without Compromise

I remember the first time I realized that men and women were perceived differently in the corporate world.

At home on Thanksgiving break from my new job, I was in the kitchen helping my mother make a traditional Southern recipe called “beaten biscuits.” Appropriate for their name, one takes a wooden mallet and strikes the dough over and over to achieve the right texture and to incorporate air into the mixture. When baked, the result of this process produces a cross between a soda cracker and a baking powder biscuit—a sort of puffy cracker. As I vented my anguish that men in my business unit treated me as less capable than they, my mother said, with a frustrated swing down onto the dough, “I thought that I and my generation had overcome these hurdles for you and your sister’s generation, but it seems you are facing the exact same challenges.” With that, she passed the mallet to me and suggested a few hearty blows to get my own frustration under control.

In that job, I learned the hard way that men and women were expected to act differently and, more devastating to my ideal picture of corporate America, to achieve differently.

Thirty-plus years later, the subject of gender discrimination remains controversial. While there is non-stop research and dialogue about inequities between men and women in hiring, promotion and compensation, especially for leadership positions such as the chief sales executive, both men and women seem to remain stuck in somewhat intractable and opposing views. Now, after years of being up to my earrings discussing women in leadership roles, I conclude that both sexes, as if by reflex, dig in their heels to defend their position instead of learning more about the topic—and possibly developing new insights and implementing positive changes. For many, accepting such a novel mindset would mean moving out of a comfort zone created by tradition, necessity and opportunity. Yet, by learning about and embracing the still unfolding notion of women in leadership roles, both men and women can sow the seeds of progress for themselves and their organizations.

Within that context, our research team began seeking facts and insights to fill the information void about how women overcome obstacles to achieve and succeed as business leaders, a triumph that continually mystifies men and women alike. This book documents that quest using the sales function as our learning laboratory.

My own story of growing up is one that still causes me to chuckle. It served to protect me from narrowing my horizons too early in my career, yet it also gave me a less than realistic expectation of how the world would see me as a woman on a fast-track career.

You see, my parents had the same educational background, Ph.D.s in physical chemistry, and taught in the same university at the same level. I did not know that most people’s parents had separate and unique roles. At home, both my parents cooked, cleaned, helped with homework and packed lunches for four school-aged children. I was the eldest of the four—two girls, then two boys. I acquired the role of trendsetter for my siblings of both genders. My younger brothers came to me to learn to tie knots or build a fort, as well as to learn the finer arts of cooking an angel food cake as a surprise on Mother’s birthday. No one had ever pointed out to me that boys could do things that girls could not.

Later, it was my seventh grade math teacher, Mrs. Haggard, who as a role model further solidified the concept in my young mind that girls can do anything that boys can do—period. A large and formidable woman whom you did not want to disappoint, she “cut no one any slack,” boys or girls. She was also the most demanding teacher I ever had, but as is often the case, the one for whom I worked the hardest and whose good marks made me extraordinarily proud.

Much later in graduate school, with an average of 100 going into the statistics final exam, my professor recognized my ability with numbers and logic and steered me toward a career I had never even considered. A retired IBM executive, he exempted me from the rest of the semester and suggested I apply to IBM in sales.

With this new-found realm of career options laid before me, I was eager to demonstrate that I could be successful in the male-dominated world of computers. I appeared at my IBM interview prepared to talk numbers and dazzle the hiring manager with my mathematical acumen. However, to my surprise, we spent the entire time discussing the junior year of college I spent in France. He was more intrigued by my poise, flexibility and comfort level when faced with new and unique situations than in exploring my technical background. He offered me a sales job on the spot. A year later, during my performance review, he revealed his real reason for hiring me without any dialog surrounding my technical expertise. He heard, in my recounting of my year abroad, the ability to assimilate diverse bits of data, analyze them, eliminate irrelevant facts, and construct a viable solution.

Thus began my IBM experience, with its world-class training that served as a solid foundation for the rest of my business career. I continue to be indebted to that professor for pointing me in a new direction, and to that original hiring manager for seeing in me qualities that I did not even realize were valuable to success in the business world.

As a young IBM sales rep, I became the sole female survivor of my initial sales training class. It was lonely. One day an outside speaker came in to tell us how to dress to impress clients. I was excused from the rest of the session after he could not answer my question as to where to find five-pound wingtip shoes in ladies’ sizes!

On the other hand, as a “cute young thing,” I often gained entrance into industrial, testosterone-filled manufacturing plants where my male colleagues had failed to be admitted. But once inside, I still had to prove myself and sell my company’s wares. The most effective method was to relate stories of how other IBM clients had used that hardware to increase sales, reduce waste, increase production or whatever was important to that prospect.

Sure, the company provided copious pages of statistics that I could leave behind for later reading, but it was the stories that had staying power. They were about real people and real successes, not lab results and promises that my male sales counterparts typically reverted to in their quest for a sale. Anecdotes resonated with my male audiences because they knew the numbers stood behind them. Using stories, I turned a fact-ridden product into an emotional, feeling experience. That was my natural style.

Ultimately, I came face-to-face with raw gender bias in the workplace, and it was a rude awakening. Yet, I am grateful that I did not know about limitations set by society until I had already launched myself into the business arena. If I had been convinced as a young girl to lower my expectations, would I have chosen a less challenging occupation? Would I have settled for less and assumed it was my due? Perhaps.

Clearly, other female IBM sales reps have been successful. Today, IBM’s sales force touts 40 percent women, well ahead of the industry standard of 25 percent for other high-tech employers.3

In a real sense, the concept of a successful female business leader stood as a contradiction to mainstream culture as played out in 1950s’ television programs such as Leave it to Beaver and Father Knows Best. The prevailing cultural premise: the woman is first at home, the man is first at work; the woman is sweet, the man is wise.

Reflecting those ideals, many of my generation carry an indelibly etched picture of the successful “career woman.” A female in the top sales leadership position must surely be a forceful, controlling, “b-word” sort of a woman, right? She takes and commands control over all facets of her life—she is in control at home and at work. To be a take-charge woman at work must surely mean her home life is a wreck. What self-respecting man would be married, long term, to such a strong woman? Obviously, her husband must be some oddity or weakling. Promote that successful career woman to the top sales executive in the organization, and all sorts of embellishments are added to that original image, none of them very flattering to womankind.

The reality is quite different from the image. Our research shows strong women leaders take time to have successful marriages, play with their children, raise families and serve in the community. Meanwhile, many also take the time to share their tribal knowledge with the next generation of women leaders.

At the same time, we, both men and women, unwittingly seem to hold onto that 1950s’ view of women as primarily homemakers and care givers. About 71 percent of American women who are also mothers do work in some professional capacity, whether inside or outside the home.4 These women earn a “second,” but not primary, income. When family commitments grow too heavy, the woman is usually the parent expected to drop or decrease her career obligations for the sake of the family. Today, when daycare centers and nannies beckon on every corner, rarely does childcare interfere with the mother’s work life. The obstacles more likely come from other family situations, i.e., establishing a household, putting a spouse through professional school or caring for aging parents or in- laws.

Even today, that 1950s’ perspective simmers in the background of our culture and seeps into hiring and developmental decision-making in the business world. Somehow, we have forgotten the strong women who quite effectively ran the country during World War II.

Yet, the traditional view obstructs the path of younger workers. If the hiring executive is evaluating these workers in light of his or her expectations of proper roles for men and women, there may be a disconnect for both parties. It may be difficult for an older business person with more traditional views of men’s and women’s home and hearth roles to understand that younger workers may not be thinking about marrying and having the traditional 2.3 children. They may not even be thinking about building a career, but rather, the next adventure. Jobs, to this new breed of employee, are often stepping stones to the next life experience, but not a rung on a career ladder.

A recent study found that when it comes to marriage, women of Generation Y (generally those individuals born after 1982 and commonly referred to as Millennials) are less conventional and more cynical than the men. In fact, it is the Millennial women who lead the generation’s redefinition of marriage. Although these young women are eager to get married themselves, they are less likely to believe parents must be married, much more likely to question marriage as a way of life and more discouraged about prospects in their peer group—49 percent believing most of the men they know are not responsible enough to get married.5 These attitudes will turn upside down the expectations of a hiring executive if he or she is not ready to think outside traditional roles for both men and women in this age range.

But there are other surprises for the older hiring executive. It is my privilege today to teach business courses to Millennial young people at a local college. My observation is that this generation does not have some of the basic business skills I expected to be well developed by this point in their education.

As the professor to business majors nearing graduation, I occasionally pose a deep question or make a profound statement about the topic at hand. When I do this, invariably a loud silence fills the room, punctuated by the quiet clicking of fingers over keyboards as students “Google” to find the answer or validate my statement. They do not even pause to contemplate an appropriate response before using Google as a crutch. Instead, they instantly access their group- oriented technology to “percolate” an answer. If not accessing Google, they just as easily put a question out to their Facebook or MySpace community to collaboratively arrive at a response. These are Millennials in action. They have no fear of contradicting me or embellishing my statement, based on what their Internet responses reveal.

Another disconnect between the mentality of my generation and the Millennial mindset recently struck me in full force. I met with a graduating business senior who planned a career in sports and entertainment sales and marketing. He had dressed for a meeting with me, one of his major professors, in his “best” tee shirt, shorts and flip-flops. He twiddled a toothpick in his mouth during our conversation. About halfway through the dialogue, I asked him, “If I were actually the person who could offer you a job, would you change anything about this interview?”

Astounded, he paused and considered the question, thoughtfully twisting the toothpick between his teeth. Eager to keep this conversation thread moving, I asked if he thought the toothpick might be something he could give up for a job interview. Yes, he finally agreed, he supposed the toothpick could go. We never got to the question of attire. It was my turn to be astounded.

I realized the basics of interview dressing had evaded this young man’s realm of knowledge. His lack of perception was less about how to dress and act in an interview, and more about how to present oneself as an adult businessperson. He just did not get it! In subsequent classroom exchanges, I have come to realize that the female students are just as clueless as the males about what hiring managers deem to be a professional image.

Clearly, learning the basics will be essential for building a solid foundation for a successful career. The Millennials must realize that although their mode of attack on the business world is different from that of their predecessors, and may ultimately prove to be equally productive, getting the first “foot in the door” to wage that war involves interaction with already established professionals. It is not their peers who will be hiring these new graduates. Management will have a difficult time seeing past the seemingly lackadaisical, apathetic and disrespectful attitude evidenced by an unprofessional image, despite the individual’s actual potential.

Although male and female Millennial workers can learn the basics of business and much more, with appropriate guidance, society continues to create environments outside the office that make it more difficult for female sales leaders to be effective, compared to the relative ease experienced by males.

Societal factors, along with an ingrained, historical preference for men in the workplace, stand as fundamental reasons why more women do not occupy top leadership positions, especially in sales. Societal norms reinforce a woman’s natural affinity to nurture a family and keep the home fires burning. However, when those societal standards spill over into the work world, they present new challenges for aspiring female leaders. Top revenue-producing females are reluctant to pursue promotions due to the steeper, rockier grade they need to climb, often involving lower pay and sacrifices they will have to make at home. Globalization, 24/7 obligations and travel add to this challenge, and lines between professional and personal lives become blurred.

If you are among the approximately 5 million saleswomen in this country, hopefully this book will inspire you to set your course, put action to desire and position yourself for continued growth, advancement and success. If you are in a position to recruit or hire sales executives, our desire is that these stories will prompt you to gain new insights and seek out qualified females to revitalize your organization.

And, if you need the recipe for my mother’s beaten biscuits, feel free to email me at emorris@morris-group.com!

Emma

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