Three guys from the sociology department of the University of Toronto recently got a long opinion piece in The New York Times, titled “When Leaning In Doesn’t Pay Off.”
In it they discuss their findings of what often happens when women do just what Sheryl Sandberg suggests and demonstrate the will to lead: they frequently feel dissatisfied with their efforts even if they do attain greater authority in the workplace. Why? Because authority and the appropriate remuneration and influence that should go with it are not necessarily related.
Even if women do achieve upper echelon jobs, on average they are less well paid for them than men in the same position. And while men cite high levels of job satisfaction with positions that carry authority but little actual influence, women do not. For women, “job authority that feels symbolic might not be experienced as rewarding.”
Really? How odd.
Interestingly, aside from a brief nod towards recognizing that “tokenism” might have something to do with some women’s corporate advance and that, since women don’t get off on 1) less pay for more work and responsibility and 2) titular power displays as much as men, the psychosocial rewards of advancement (tokenism or not) are less satisfying for them, authors Schieman, Schafer and McIvor make no other attempts are explaining why “leaning in” might not be all that wonderful for the gals and why some (no matter how much Sandberg and other enthusiasts crack the whip) either refuse to do so, or are choosing to “lean” elsewhere.
I might not be a sociologist, but it seems pretty obvious to me: women are just too damn smart to fall for it. Either that or we’re just too tired. Maybe both.
Since the 1970s women have entered the workforce en masse—by necessity joining the guys in their game. There was no other game than the guy’s game! Right?
Since then we’ve learned to pony up, anti-up, get it up and get on with it. We’ve learned the ropes, learned the “spiel,” burned the midnight oil and shattered a million glass ceilings. And what do we have to show for it?
Women currently hold 4.5 percent of Fortune 1000 CEO positions and 18.3 percent of the U.S. Congressional seats. At the same time women reporting high job strain (and who wouldn’t be strained working more for less money, subject to everything from sexual harassment to tokenism) face a 40 percent increased risk of developing cardiovascular disease and an 88 percent increase in risk for heart attacks.
According to journalist Gabrielle Glaser, author of Her Best-Kept Secret, one way we’re coping with the stress is drinking. Between the early 1990s and the early 2000s it’s up across the board for women—24 percent amongst white women; Hispanics, 33 percent, and black women, 42 percent. And hospitalizations for alcohol overdose? The numbers jumped 50 percent for females age 18 to 24 alone between 1999 and 2008.
And let’s not get started on the pills.
Speaking of ignoring things, I’ll also neglect to talk about where all the high-powered political and corporate leaning has so far gotten the environment, the elderly, the 99%, and the 1,065,794 students the US Department of Education recently discovered are currently homeless.
Albert Einstein is credited with one definition of insanity, which is “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” Perhaps women’s disinterest in following in their masculine mentors’ footsteps, jockeying for the same positions in the guys’ game is a good thing and a move in the direction of sanity?
Maybe some of us are beginning to realize the guys’ game isn’t all it’s cracked up to be?
Which perhaps is why, according to Forbes magazine, women are “leaving the workforce in droves in favor of being at home. Not to be a homemaker, but as job-making entrepreneurs.”
Maybe my social world is an anomaly, but 100 percent of all my women friends are entrepreneurs. They’re filmmakers and writers, massage therapists and store-owners, artists and architects, hot sauce makers and sustainability consultants. Obviously their interests vary widely. But amongst them all runs a common thread: They all want a better world. They all want to feel proud of their accomplishments and satisfied with their contributions.
It’s a key word, contribution—a word that doesn’t set well with the political and corporate elite unless it somehow ties in with a deliberate PR campaign to make an oil company somehow appear concerned with the environment, or a congressman appear genuinely interested in his constituents’ interests.
Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai once said, “Women, I think, have a capacity to care for others, to see beyond personal gain. Many women, I believe, are at their happiest and best when they are serving. I myself am at my happiest and my best when I am serving.”
Contribution—it’s a word that sociologists Schieman, Schafer and McIvor might try on next time they wonder why women choose influence over authority. And why they’re looking elsewhere than the mainstream for channels to focus their abilities and power.