Sheryl Sandberg wrote an interesting article in the New York
Times on the myth of the “catty woman.” The idea that women are each other’s
enemies is statistically untrue. A study showed that when a woman was made
chief executive, a woman had a better chance of joining senior management than
when the chief executive was a man. This article also discusses the idea behind
“queen bees” and how their behavior isn’t inherently female, but rather a
natural way human beings in general react to discrimination when belonging to a
nondominant group. Interestingly put, Sheryl writes “queen bees aren’t a reason
for inequality but rather a result of inequality.” She sounds hopeful in
stating that as more woman advance in the workplace, queen bees will no longer
exists.
Leah Hunter, writer for Fast Company writes about how the
gender pay gap increases dramatically in the 80th and 90th
percentiles. The numbers speak for themselves and it is evident that this is
clearly an issue. One possibility as to why women are earning less than men in
higher up positions may be that they feel so fortunate to be in those positions
that they sell themselves short and worry that asking for a higher pay may put
their job security at stake. Again, it goes back to the problem of women
masking their talents and not self-promoting.
Silkarmour wrote a nice piece in inpower coaching on why
women tend to have imposter syndrome more than men and how we can go about
overcoming it. Starting from a young age, girls are taught not to speak highly
of themselves and to remain humble. This has led women to become perfectionists
with the “disease to please.” This article gives some pointers on how we can
stop feeling like we aren’t good enough to achieve success and how we can feel
more confident about ourselves.
