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A Career handbook for young women

 

1. Another career book?

When my book "Confessions of a sexist” was released by Uppsala Publishing, 2005, I held lectures at companies, organizations and colleges all over Sweden. At each college I got questions about careers, recruiting and interviewing. Questions like: How should I dress in an interview? How do you answer if someone asks if you are a feminist? And comments like: “Men only look at how big your boobs are!” As you can tell, women posed these questions; young men always believe they have all the answers, especially if they are in a group setting.
The questions I got at companies and organizations were of a different character, but in the same sphere. How do I handle men who do not see me? Why don’t women help each other the way men do? How do I negotiate about my salary? I know that my male colleagues make more than me.

After listening to those questions, it became clear to me that there was a need for a career book that looks at the situation young women are in.  The ones who are looking to find their first job and for the ones who have a few years experience.
The books I found in Swedish often addressed people who have already reached a certain level.
I wanted to target young women, because that’s the future.  I know young women have a real interest in the issue. That said, I do think men of all ages should read the book and learn something about them.

This book is based on the years of mentorship I have provided to young women during my career as a recruiter. I have also interviewed ten women, ages 27-35.

There is only one way to develop as a person, and that is to look at oneself and take note of how one reacts in various situations. You should challenge preconceived notions, stereotypes and attitudes; let your guard down for a while. Challenge the nice, helpful girl inside you and wake the sleeping lioness. There are big opportunities for young women in the workplace, but you have to make your own way and dare to be Visible. Of course it’s not enough, but it’s a good start.

We, the middle aged men have to help and open our networks. We play a key role in this change. We should look at the advantages with more women in leading positions, and set an example for young me. They will do as we do, not as we say.
(Ok, a large amount of middle aged men do not see an advantage of letting women in, but let’s leave them behind and focus on the future, instead of the people who wants to live in the past; they’ll never win this fight.)

By listening to women, we will evolve and learn a lot about life. We will become better people, better managers, better fathers and more apt to meet all life’s challenges. Young men who look at women and see them as a threat to their own careers should listen and learn. The job market will be tougher for them as women become more prominent. It will be harder for them to get a position as they will have to compete with women, but they will be better for it; and the company will gain. Today more and more companies are starting to realize   that women in leadership positions  affect the bottom line positively.

 

Young Women
Can a middle-aged man write a book for young women?
Of course, but only if he sees the light at the end of the tunnel and believes in a future where skills are more important than gender. We have to make use of the power and knowledge women possess to use it in a good way.
The future belongs to those companies who look at competence and do not blindly look at gender, myths and old stereotypes. A workplace where one can have a family and at the same time be able to face the competition.  

Most factors play to women’s advantage. They are more competent, get better grades than young men, more focused, work harder and there are simply more of them. They have waited long enough to get ahead. The latest report from the Swedish department of education (skolverket) show that boys are falling behind in all areas.
As far as grades, boys only have better grades in PE. There is resistance among young men today who are see women as competition and the “dinosaurs” in the workplace who want men to keep the power at any cost.

By nature, men try to pass the girls, at any cost. Resistance can appear in different ways- everything from illegal actions during recruiting and hiring to bulling. One of the women I interviewed for this book told me as a young woman you often become invisible in meetings, but you get used to it. Get used to it?

Many young men talk about gender equality as if it isn’t a problem for them, but as soon as their wife/partner becomes pregnant, they act suspiciously like their fathers.
Traditionally, the mother is responsible for the child rearing, and the father “helps”.   Sweden is one of the most equal countries in the world and has very generous parental leave- for both parents. The father and the mother have the right to take paid parental leave.  It is possible for the couple to split the time away from work equally, but only 3 % of all relationships in Sweden share the parental leave equally. When the child is sick, it’s mom that stays home from work. 60 % of the dads don’t take any time of at all. Not one single day. But it has gotten better. Young Swedish fathers are taking more responsibility and share the childrearing responsibilities in a much different way those prior generations. It’s not unusual to see Swedish dads with their kids in the park, but so far it’s not showing up in the statistics.
In the United States, it’s a sad, harsh reality. Women have the responsibility to take care of the children. It’s not even a question.

Many Swedish couples say it has to be up to the couple to decide what arrangement fits their family best. That usually means the mom is in charge of raising the children. Is that wrong? It’s a hard question, maybe it’s wrong for the child to not have access to dad?
I don’t think young dads want to stay home with their children, I think it’s that simple.
Financial reasons are the most commonly used excuse, but I don’t thing that is the real reason. Give up a few rounds of golf and a couple of bottles of whiskey, the trip to Agadir and a few more things and I am convinced that many families will be able to carry the burden.
What prevents young women to have a career? Is it only factors in the workplace? Maybe not. At many companies I have worked at, women have been offered a higher position, only to turn it down because their husbands were not supportive. Many men feel threatened if their wife is getting ahead, so they use the guilt trip: “but what about the children and our home”?

When I say career, I mean the urge, will and power to want to climb the ladder in a company and move ahead in the ranks.  If you have the willpower and energy, you should have the same opportunities and rights and not be stopped by invisible barriers and glass ceilings. Maybe the young woman will be the CEO, if that is her dream and goal of life. If that is the case, invisible outdated structures should not stop her.

To be successful and have a career is a choice one makes, it’s not a necessity. It’s fun, but it has a price and you have to make sacrifices that you may not have imagined.
Today it could mean that you have to sacrifice having children and that’s not the way it should be.  But the day men realize that children are important, this will resolve itself, but until then, women will have to fight, try to impact and change from within.

Equality

Gender Equality is about having the same rights, responsibilities and opportunities as men.  It rules relationships among women and men at work and private life.  Equality is a larger encompassing term and means equality among all individuals and groups in society. Gender equality is therefore the most important equality issue. There is a risk in putting gender equality in the concept of affirmative action because you risk losing your focus.  Some companies they use this tactic to avoid having to work with gender equality. There are a lot of various groups in society that need help. Immigrants, people of certain religious beliefs, homo and transsexuals, lost dogs etc. We can’t let these tricks sidetrack us, in this book we are focusing on what it’s all about, i.e. human rights.

Pros and Cons of gender equality

There are only gains to be made for the individual and the company if you are looking to implement gender equality. The whole education system has to work with the issue; it has to be part of education, every week, every year and has to be treated as any other subject. Educators on all levels must be educated, including preschool teachers where one often works according to old routines and experiences and homemade theories.  Anyone can take care of kids, can’t they? Actually no, that’s the point. Boys are taught early in preschool that it pays off to be heard and seen, it doesn’t matter what they do, and girls are taught to be the teacher’s aide and be good. And quiet of course. In today’s preschool, media propaganda for unequal gender roles and uninformed parents the boys consistently win and the girls are short changed. 

In a gender equal society there will be fewer conflicts, and that can affect a whole generation will to go to war, research shows where there are women in positions of power, the will to use conflict resolution.  Women seek consensus, men want a clear winner, which usually end with everybody loosing. For young women, the gain is clear. They are let in to the rooms of higher powers and can join in impacting our lives. Is there anyone who thinks it will be worse then? I doubt it.

As a man, being able to let go of some of the machismo and be allowed to express the more feminine sides of one self. They do exist and it’s easier to let them out if we have a society that allows it. Older generations of men have to show the way.
What men lose in a gender equal society is apparent. They will lose power and influence and many men think they will be short changed. Many men see life as a competition and the person with the most possessions when he dies wins. That’s not the case. Gender and power is associated and the only way to divide power is to give women more room. We need to let the women in, but it’s not going to happen automatically or voluntarily from the men’s view. Women have to get into the inner circle and the men who have realized the advantages of gender equality have to help.

People born in the 70ies and 80ies.

Sometimes I hear comments like “once the next generation takes over, everything will be different”. That is obviously not the case. One generation has never taken over from one day to another, people from all ages interact all the time and overlap each other’s lives and that is a problem in its own. Good ideas and experience is of course good, but you also transfer preconceived notions and stereotypes. Most people try to fit in and assimilate when they start a new job.  It’s hard enough starting a new job and most people do everything to avoid rocking the boat.  What is it that is the most natural in a new group? Sticking with the standards and rules that are already in place. Many of us do things we don’t agree with just so we can be accepted by the leader of the pack. (I.e. the boss or a group).

I often meet young men and women born in the 70ties and 80ies, who think they are “enlightened” and live in a gender equal relationships. But if you scratch the surface, you realize quickly that it’s just for show. . Who wants to say that they are NOT living in an equal relationship?  I got a question once about what is more important, love of gender equality?
My answer is of course equality; since I cannot understand how there can be love if one partner is dependent on the other. If that is the case, the relationship is built on dependence and we have conditional love; i.e. do as I say otherwise don’t come to me if it doesn’t work out.

The ten women  I  interviewed (27-35 years) for this book say it’s easier to work with middle aged med because they don’t see young women as a threat. And Many of them are nearing the end of their careers and don’t care as much anymore. The of course there is the fact that many men are flattered by the attention of young women. But it could also be that a lot of us have started to think.

According to the consulting firm Kairo’s Future, a company that analyze the world around us, there will be a need for 250 000 new managers over the next 10 years, depending on retirement, firings etc. That means every 4th person born in the 70ies, independent of gender has to become a manager. The question is do they want to? And will they be capable? How many will be prepared?

So what do the people born in the 70ies say? According to Kairos Future, a swedish company doing looking into the future, there are a number of deciding factors. The size of the group, expectations from others, and how do you handle conflicts. The two most important factors are flexibility to take care of one’s family and mentorships. The company must be family friendly if you are looking to recruit women. I don’t think it’s realistic to imagine a workplace where you can bring your kids to work, but there are ideas out there creating work cultures where you can bring your kids to work, in some places it may even be desirable, but that is an idea created in the hippie age of the 70ises. I can’t imagine adult, serious people who will partake in something like that.
And why punish the poor children by taking them to work? Let them be with other children in preschool or at home. Why can’t there be adult zones and children’s zones? And is there really anyone who believes that Swedish industry will improve if we are more scattered than we are today?

Mentorship is another important way to train your co-workers. It could be a replacement for the management preparedness courses that are sometime discussed but doesn’t materialize very often. For some reason it´s “self-evident” a man can become a boss or manager over night.  The 80íes there were discussions of preparing promising talent before they were nominated to management positions. But this good idea was never established. Why would it? Men are your bosses, raised by their mothers and the Swedish educational system. Of course this is ironically written, there are a lot more bad male bosses than there are female bosses.

At one of the companies I was lecturing at, a man suggested that I mentor a young woman who was regarded as a rising star. I of course wanted to help if she thought that I was the right man for the job. The young woman looked at me, smiled and said, “I’ve read your book, confessions of a sexist and I think I am the one who should be mentoring you. She was of course right. It is much more appropriate that we men learn something about young women and how they view life, instead of using men as a template and norm and think women are bad, different, copies of men.

If the people born in the 70ies are not that different than previous generations, what about the people born in the 80ies? I fear that the people born in the 80ies will be the worst generation in many years when it comes to gender equality, both at home and at work.

It’s easy to get scared if you look at society today. In this area of reality TV and lifestyle magazines, the images of women that are being portrayed, little girls dreaming of being like Paris Hilton, it can scare the living daylight out of most of us. Ban reality TV because it has no purpose. I don’t think anything will solve itself and I don’t believe the people growing up today are born with a sense of gender equality. I believe that many civil rights people (mostly boys) have been born to so called curling parents will turn out to be little monsters (spoiled brats) that will grow up. This is a threat to all young women because the image of women today is very negative.  A young woman has everything to lose in this scenario. Wherever you turn today you see a scantily clad woman in a suggestive pose. And don’t think that image is only a picture in a magazine that men forget the minute they step into the office. The image remains and since men have a tendency to relate to women in plural, the girl in the picture turns into “all women”. Plastic surgery is no longer anything strange or out of the ordinary, and it’s the women who are getting it. Can the objectification of women get any more obvious? There are even dads who are buying breasts implants for their daughters!

The changes in the media industry have increased the access to pornography. Today one out of every ten 18-year-old boy watches pornography every day. According to
Medierådets rapport (Sweden, 2005) this doesn’t mean that the pornography causes psychological damages, it is a sign that these boys had mental problems before. Among girls, 3 percent are regarded as big consumers of pornography. They watch it at least once a week. So there is a difference. We already know that girls are feeling bad. The reports about depression and the increase in suicide speak for itself.
So how does this affect your career? Everything in society affects your life, the view of women and your ability to rise in the ranks.
If the images are showing accommodating girls and victims, it will taint all girls, even if many men are not aware of this. And it’s what you do, say and how you act that is more important. I once asked a young woman why we should hire her and she answered:  "because I’m not like the other girls, I keep my promises, I don’t gossip and I produce results. She has been very successful, but she would have been even more successful if she herself would have believed her own words.

Salaries, salaries and salaries.

Salaries have been a hot topic for many years. Sweden became a democracy in 1921, and that was late compared to many other countries. But democratization did not affect salaries and compensation. In many circles many people felt and still feel that men and women should not be equally compensated.  Sometimes people think this is only in certain professions and types of work, but that is not the case. Salaries in all parts of the society are to the women’s disadvantage. That includes preschool teachers, doctors, project managers at advertising firms and administrative assistants in the government.  We can call these “female salaries”.
The concept in itself relates to two different salary levels and it’s easy to end up in the wrong one as a young woman. Many women believe men who say “you are going to get a little less than you deserve but we will fix this next year.” Don’t believe it, it’s just a trick for the person to get rid of the question and to be able to show his boss “Look how good I am; I managed to hire her for this amount, even though with her experience, she should have gotten more.”

In government jobs unequal salaries are justified by saying the responsibilities are not quite the same. Is it for budgetary reasons? Saving for personal reasons? Hardly, it’s not the bosses’ money.  It’s a deep rooted belief that men are actually better than women despite all the facts saying differently.

What do you as a young woman do when you are applying for your first job? You are sitting in front of a middle aged man offering you a job with a salary that you know is three thousand dollars less than you know it should pay. It’s a hard question and most of your friends will accept a lower salary. They are happy to have gotten the job in the first place, and think they can fix this later. But it’s not that easy, and many women immediately slip behind their male counterparts. It’s very hard to catch up. So what can one do?

You should not accept to get a lower salary than your male colleagues, not even as a starting salary. Switch out the word “female salaries” for Black or Hispanic salaries- and do you think the word would even be allowed to exist? How much is a black person worth? It’s only women who as a group will let themselves be treated like second class citizens. This must end and it can only begin with young women, the next generation if you will, putting a stop to it... Various forces such as unions, lawmakers and employers must work for this goal. Different salaries for the same work is unfair and a violation of human rights, a form of bulling. It’s also against the law, one of the few laws you can break in Sweden and the United States and nobody cares at all. As you can understand, a woman with the same salary is expected to do a better job than the male colleague, “let's see if you can stand the pressure”. As a young woman you may also think, a few bucks here and there, it’s not that big of a deal. Think again! It’s going to add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars throughout your work life. The head of the think tank Agora, Anna Thoursie, has done some research on this topic in her book Why women earn less, (2005) where you can see exactly what it´s all about.  (Don’t get scared off by the boring title and layout, it’s really worth reading.

Stereotypes and truths
There are many stereotypes, myths and tales about women that men keep repeating. That is bad enough, but even worse is the fact that many women buy into these as well and support men in these false assumptions. Why is that?  One explanation is that women from the time they are born are programmed to please and fulfill men.  Be pleasant, be helpful. Nobody likes a bitch. All men like a young, pleasant, accommodating woman
Below are some preconceived notions, you probably know some of them.  Don’t think it’s just for fun; this is what many men and women still believe in 2007.

Women are not looking for a career

 

Women don’t want to be bosses.

 

Women have kids or are going to have kids

Women don’t help each other

 

Women gossip

 

Women want to be provided for, it’s in their genes.

 

Women are happy being number two.

 

It takes a man to do the job.

 

There are of course many more myth’s, the above is just a few selected ones. I’m sure you can find more. Reflect on where your values come from. Are they really your own, or is it something you have been taught.

To think about
Is this true?

“Your salary is what determines if you are worth something and if you deserve respect.”

 

Women have lower salaries than men at the same level.

 

Gender equality works until you have children.

 

Do you have to live in an equal relationship if you want to have a career?

 

Note: I am very well aware that not all people are heterosexuals, but to keep things simple I use the terms man and woman when I talk about families.

There are a lot of statistics about how men and women act at work and at home. I’m not going to go in to this in detail in this book. If you’re looking for numbers, go to the labor department’s homepage in Sweden (google). There is a good resource for these numbers.
True, Sweden has come far when it comes to gender equality, but it’s also true what Claes Borgström, the gender equality ombudsman in Sweden says. It’s either equal or it’s not. There’s nothing in between.

2. What women in the beginning of their career are saying?

Is it really that hard? Aren’t we living in a society where qualifications and competence determines if you’ll get the job or not?  Over the years I have met hundreds of young women, but I’ve never asked them “how will you succeed” and “do you think you´ll have any problem getting there?” until I started doing research for this book. I asked ten women 27 – 35 how they picture the workplace.
The first thing that hit me was that women, young and old often have another definition of success than men have. Women aren’t necessarily looking at a career as climbing the ladder. Instead they see it as evolving as a person, you are successful when you learn and grow. For many women, a job needs to be fun and one isn’t willing to sacrifice personal life.
It’s good to have a career plan, but many women don’t. Maybe women don’t see a reason to plan because they feel   they can’t affect anything. Since childhood they are used to having someone else decide for them. Their father makes the decisions during the girl’s childhood, only to be replaced by the husband as the father walks her down the aisle and hands her over  
Then you get pregnant it’s all going out the window anyway.
But in today’s society you have a choice. You don’t just “get” pregnant. You make the decision to become pregnant.
One of the women I met had it all planned out. She envisioned her career path, and could account for step by step how her life would play out even if it meant waiting to have children. Her biggest role model was her dad.

Tip and thoughts from young women to even younger women.

 

The above quotes are from the interviews I made in Stockholm 2007. Stockholm is considered one of the most equal cities in the world, the quotes gives a picture of men that is not very flattering.  But to make changes and improvements it is necessary to look at today’s reality and it will take both men and women to make a change. We can’t have half of the population suppressing the other.  Apartheid is abolished even in South Africa. It’s not enough that large companies like Volvo try to change the workplace. Volvo   had the campaign “Walk the Talk” where men (managers) were taught how their actions affect the people around them. “Women to the top” is an EU program run from Gothenburg It actively works with implementing new ways of viewing the workplace.
ResursCentra, also based in Gothenborg in Sweden is a third example of active and result driven measures on a European basis.