Chelsea, another baby boomer, offers a more detailed criticism: “The Gen Ys want it all now; they have a sense of entitlement. I studied hard and worked hard, and my husband and I started off with a run-down house before trading up. We had old furniture for years. These days, they want to start off with the lifestyle it took us thirty years to earn. They don’t want a job unless it pays well. They expect to start their own company and be successful overnight. They don’t have self-sacrifice or humility. I don’t appreciate the way they look me up and down with obvious disapproval about my dress sense, either!”
Marj, a baby boomer executive, has a different perspective: “There are many eager Gen Xers and Gen Ys who soak up advice and are willing to work for next to nothing in order to obtain an opportunity. They are zealous, enthusiastic, innovative, and flexible.”
In fact, what some older women label flippant behavior is really fast-paced. Younger women’s ability with technology, social media, task variety, and ad hoc work is nonlinear dexterity that augers well for the future. Their ideas on gender roles are less fixed, and they have a camaraderie that transcends geography, qualifications, and status.
Since generational differences have been identified throughout history, it is likely that they will persist today and will extend into the future. Whether you are at home or at work, a useful solution to seeing the glass half full rather than half empty is taking the time to reflect, to communicate, and to locate common goals. For example, reflecting on assumptions held about each generation may enable you to review your own attitudes and interpretations of the other woman’s behavior. Increasing and improving your communication skills might yield different responses. Clarifying work outcomes may resolve some difficulties with the different routes or idiosyncratic styles different generations take to get there. There are joys and sorrows for each generation, and it is wise to never assume anything, major or minor. As Elisha discovered, “my boss at work glowered at me and made sarcastic little asides, just like my mother. When we finally had a coffee one day, she told me how much she loved my quirky style and got pleasure from the different color combos I wore to work. I got it wrong—I thought she disapproved.”
Some people think the diversity of age in organizations is a myth, that the reality is either the older core group hanging on for grim death, firing anyone who is different, or the new younger group recruiting to their own image.
Julie, Gen X, Consulting
I am a consultant for corporate firms where the females are—typically—women in their midthirties, with a background in big firms and with similar personality profiles to each other. They want homogeneity. They like people who suck up. If you speak your mind, you’re dog meat. They employ language techniques in meetings after you say something. “Oh, really?” they ask quizzically, while screwing up their faces in disbelief to make you sound foolish. Striding past, they may ask how you are doing with everything. I might say, “I’m busy.” They respond with the familiar slow drawl, “Oh, really?” attempting to belittle and confuse. They put you down in every interaction regardless of how well rewarded and regarded they are.
Workplaces have been changing dramatically over the last twenty or so years. Many organizations have been redesigned through countless restructures and as a result some have become toxic and unhealthy. They tend not to take into account the human condition and the need for people—women in particular—to connect. They don’t create work environments that support and enhance individuals to be their creative best. In addition, organizations of all sizes have been put under increasing pressure to continually do more and better with less and less. Where there is heightened tension and sustained pressure, we struggle to work well and often fall into behavior we may not usually exhibit. Stressful environments and stressed staff don’t encourage the best, tending to bring out the worst in individuals.
Penny, 50s, Human Resources
Penny works in a large organization and has observed that the nature of work needs to be rethought and redesigned. She suspects this is happening despite itself; while some of us are still dragging ourselves up the stairs, the tower is crumbling. Other workers are playing with different designs, and no one is clear about the architecture that will ultimately materialize.
In tough times, some people find it easy to find fault with others; it’s a form of protection from the painful truth about oneself. Of course, there are people who seem to operate from this perspective all the time. While historically women may have had to put up with unjust behavior—bullying, workplace violence, unfair dismissal, questionable work practices, intolerable work stress, or injury—we are no longer willing to put up with it. We are speaking up.
Staff are saying no to the added pressure on workplaces, refusing to buy into this old model and wanting flexible options. They are not tolerating the ridiculous impositions of organizations. But while organizations have brought in a range of flexible work options, they have left the same old structures and leadership models in place. This creates lots of tension in workplaces and feelings of being squeezed, constrained, and dried up.
Penny also notes that people are increasingly reluctant to call their colleagues on unacceptable behavior.
In my father’s generation, if you behaved badly, someone in your peer group took you aside and told you that your behavior was not right; you had mentors and elders to guide you. Over the last few generations, we have seen the rise and rise of the individual who seems to have a mantra of “I can do what I want,” and we don’t seem to have the right to give feedback about behavior. In fact I think as a society we are scared to take someone aside. I think we have become feedback-phobic. We step back and let people do whatever, under a notion of personal freedom. We need to be better at providing supportive feedback. If a colleague needs to hear some confronting truths about their behavior at work, who takes them aside and checks how they are, to understand their fears and assist them to explore other options?
Times have changed, and the upside is that now that behaviors are named, blaming the victim no longer cuts it—these problems can’t be swept under the carpet anymore. Women are refusing to cut off their arms and legs just to accommodate an existing workplace that refuses to stretch to accommodate them. When behaviors are identified, named, and brought to public attention, action must follow, as we’ve seen in the case of workplace bullying. But good old-fashioned communication should never be ignored as a possible course of action when things at work are going awry.
Let’s look at the different experiences of the groups of women in the workforce. By doing so, we can seek to understand and appreciate the particular skills and experience they bring to the table with the aim of working together. They are grouped into three loose categories: older women who have been working since the 1960s; midcareer women encompassing baby boomers and Gen Xers; and the younger members of the workforce, Gen Ys. There is a lot of crossover between these groups, obviously, but the purpose of looking at working women in this way is to highlight where potential conflict could arise. If you’re aware of what can happen, you might rethink your own situation and discover you’re not working with a mean girl after all—she’s just younger or older than you and has different ways.
Working with Young Women: Gen X and Gen Y
The mother line of extended family and community was lost in the industrial revolution, and one of the consequences of the social revolutions of the late 1960s through the 1990s was the shrinking family unit. Since the 1980s, technology has changed the patterns of human relationships that took centuries to evolve.
From the late 1960s and the 1970s onward, parents have generally been less available for their children—from choice or circumstance, more women in the workforce has meant more day care and more juggling of female roles and responsibilities. A deep need for protection pursues those who grew up in day care, but they don’t expect protection. Marriage, job, family, neighborhood, community, government services for those in need—nothing can be relied on anymore. This is
not to say that all girls who are put in child care grow up to be bitches at work; we’re simply looking at the major social changes that have taken place and their possible effects on the way we work today.
Some researchers believe that what leads a woman to behave in a bitchy way is the mess of having been badly parented. The neglected child of a busy parent who is absent at work and emotionally remote feels deep pain and either fears that she won’t ever be loved or that she won’t be able to love.
On the other hand, peer groups may be taking over from parents in performing the central aspect of transmitting gender roles from one generation to another. Perhaps in the twenty-first century, we are refashioning new connections as we’re returning to multigenerational living, a situation that is mirrored in the workplace. Great-grandmothers, grandmothers, mothers, and babies are now sharing homes—coming and going alongside husbands, partners, boyfriends, nephews, nieces, aunts, step and blended relatives, and friends.
What about the future? Are the current girls markedly different from earlier generations? Members of this generation have a tribal or an idiosyncratic work style preference and definitely know what they won’t be doing: they won’t be residing in organizations long term, kowtowing to managers, or propping up old systems. Apart from some who enter existing career structures, they expect that work will be more of an expression of who they are, not what they do. While every generation does share some common trends, this is the first group where members say, “I won’t take a job I don’t like. I shouldn’t have to put myself out. I won’t put up with being treated poorly.”
Gen Y women tend to be more fluid, open, questioning, and flexible in their thinking. They are more spontaneous, and they can see things from many angles. They hate feeling trapped into things. They’ll get in, get somewhere, or get out—or not go at all. Some are happy to try corporate while others meander into emerging work situations that are often of their own making.
Some young women can be quite scathing of managers, in a perennial us-versus-them split. Unlike former younger generations, who were more prepared to bide their time for a corporate climb, this generation has no interest in vertical structures. Gen Ys are not as accepting of working additional hours to build the history that develops expertise. Nor do they understand the reasons that underlie status and role differences.
Martina, Gen X, Banking Management
I was frustrated by a graduate who started straight out of college on a salary of eighty thousand dollars, and she thought she should do my job. I’m far more senior. She refused to complete any menial tasks and wanted to do my assignments. I tried to explain that while she might have some theoretical appreciation for what I did, she didn’t have the expertise, track record of achievements, established relationships with people, and sensitivity for the complexity that time provides. She could not comprehend the subtlety of a lot of my moves and insisted that she was better than me and should be moved up. She complained far and wide; some of the very senior men thought she was charming. I tried to get people to see that we actually pay someone to do the jobs listed on the job description. Because she wanted to do my job, she wouldn’t finish any of her tasks. I had to performance-manage her, and I was told I was a bitch, by her and some of the men.
The postfeminist era includes some women who don’t comprehend what feminism is about and do not identify with the term. Some young women are determined that the gains made by older women will not be lost, but they also believe that women must be respected for any choice they make, including a decision to rear their children full-time. Several full-time Gen-Y mothers have mentioned receiving nasty comments from other women who disapprove of their choice, thinking they should maintain a career as well.
Some young women are flabbergasted that not so long ago, women had to leave their job because they got married, or that they weren’t allowed to pilot a commercial plane. Some older women feel annoyed that their efforts and sacrifices are not valued by the younger women who appear to take the gains for granted. Other older women are delighted that young women expect an equal world and are gutsy enough to reject defective work models and create their own.
Other young women are adroitly spearheading new ways of working toward the not-yet-known careers and work situations. They might volunteer, instigate community or social projects, create part-time businesses, and percolate ideas for collaborative work with friends. Many women turn up to offer their services for free to friends who are creative—filmmakers, musicians, and new media specialists. If a project seems interesting, worthwhile, or fun, they are happy to donate their time. Nomadic clusters of friends are pulled together for interesting things to do together. Many younger women are gravitating toward a tribal model of working with friends and like-minded people. They are designing work arrangements that suit them, understanding that the only security is the security of the self. They are more determined to be themselves, living congruently with who they are, and will tolerate messy, delayed, or emerging new careers in uncertainty to do so.
Younger women are also tribal in the way they assist and accompany their friends. They’ll work with groups of friends on a part-time or casual basis while they study or when they graduate; if one woman gets a job in a call center, sales, or marketing admin position, she usually brings in her friends, and conversely, if a woman is let go or decides to leave, the others follow. If one encounters a bitch at her part-time job, she’s likely to leave and take her friends with her.
Younger women are savvier about the ways of the world and won’t be bought. Self-reliant, they’re skeptical about promises from multinationals. Propinquity, or chance-luck circumstances that rely on a quasi-intuitive response, is more likely to determine career outcome than last century’s rational decision-making. Historically there was some evidence that having a goal meant a better career outcome, but this is far less likely to be the case in our changing times, where young women want the flexibility of bringing their whole person to work.
Jaya, 25, Student
I am studying art, a career that is inextricably linked to who you are. There can be challenges to overcome. I find it hard dealing with unpredictable or volatile people. Art courses can attract students with problems—we’ve usually had traumas and problems—it drives us to do the work! There is anxiety. We are looking for more in life; we are more likely to reflect and be introspective. The other students are more feeling-preferred, and I am thinking-preferred. To me, they can get overemotional and too touchy. I have made analytical comments in class, which they misunderstand or take offense at. I want to tell them to get over it and listen to what I am actually saying, but I recognize that they find it hard.
We were putting on a show, and two friends were helping each other hang their work. One dropped the other’s photo and creased it—ruining it. She refused to admit it, yet we all saw her do it. She made this emotional scene. It blew up into this big ranting and crying by everyone. She wouldn’t admit it, let alone apologize, so the friend whose photo she wrecked wouldn’t speak to her.
I notice that feeling-preferred females can be highly nasty, punitive, and bitchy. I’m rational and logical and sensitive and get attacked by the sensitive and explosive feelers.
I spend more time with males as I find them easier to work with—they are not two-faced or superficial, and they are more innocent of guile.
You see self-promoting artists who are cliquey, and I resent that you seem to be judged by who you know, not what you do. I am not impressed by bitchy artists who put on the social face and the party, kissy-kissy persona or who boss everyone around because they think they are so special. Fortunately, there are some role models who have succeeded on their own, and they give me hope that you can be yourself.
Working with Midcareer Women: Baby Boomers and Early Gen Xers
It might help to have a little history to understand where the boomers and early Gen Xers are coming from. The feminist movement of the 1960s—campaigning for women’s rights on the grounds of
equality between the sexes—and women’s liberation occurred around the same time as did greater access to education and employment opportunities. Alongside civil rights and women’s rights, the advent of the pill enabled sovereignty over females’ bodies. Many baby boomers remember that the pill was a big deal, because of the freedom and independence it gave.
In discussions with me, academic Mike Slusher nicely summarized and explained the transformations that occurred for women during the revolutionary 1960s:
From the end of World War II through the 1950s and into the 1960s in the United States as in other countries, women transitioned from the home to the workplace and college in ever-increasing numbers. Perhaps this transition took place slightly more easily in the United States than elsewhere as a widespread junior college system combined with scholarships, grants, and government loans, and no shortage of places enabled ease of access.
In the United States prior to the 1950s, women had little encouragement to seek higher education unless it related to those occupations traditionally reserved for women: teaching, nursing, and perhaps business. By the beginning of the 1960s, however, an upswing in the numbers of women attending university and wanting to attend college occurred. Part of this upswing resulted from the population crest caused by the post–WWII baby boom, but part of it came as a result of a cultural shift generated by many elements, ranging from the wartime experience of women working in industry to the appearance of the contraceptive pill, which allowed women the sexual freedom traditionally enjoyed by men. Through the 1960s these elements joined with the counterculture and the rise of feminism to create a sense of possibility, often couched in ideological terms. Such ideological constructs asserted that no barrier was insurmountable; no inequality could not be changed; all women were joined by a common bond of sisterhood. Women entered the workforce and enjoyed unparalleled levels of freedom in all spheres of their lives, but the archetypes and archetypal images of their interactions accompanied them, and despite the promises of the counterculture and feminism, those images continued to wreak havoc with women’s relationships.
Working with Bitches Page 20