For most women, the op-ed by The Wall Street Journal’s Joseph Epstein represents something that’s all too familiar. Without giving it too much more air time, his general argument was that Dr. Jill Biden should consider dropping the “Dr.” from her title since she is not a medical doctor. He goes on to mock her dissertation on “Student Retention at the Community College” Level: Meeting Students’ Needs,” and suggests that her title feels “fraudulent” and “comic.” The condescension, the defense that his argument was directed at both men and women, and the clear disdain for ambitious and accomplished women is something women have dealt with — and continue to deal with — for years.
There has been much fury over the decision by the Wall Street Journal to publish this, and many have rushed to Dr. Biden’s defense. However, there are many women who deal with this type of attitude that don’t benefit from national outrage and begin to internalize these sexist attempts to diminish our accomplishments. Often, they are less egregious and less public than this op-ed, but nevertheless, common and real.
I will never forget the time when I was excited to meet a well-known elected official. I was introduced as the President of my organization. The person responded – you are too young and pretty to be President. I felt my face get red, luckily it was an evening event in a dark room. I was left speechless and simply shook his hand. I walked away feeling as though I did not “own the role.” But, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was his problem, not mine. Unfortunately, he is in a position of power and has the ability to make decisions about women and their careers. This incident happened before the # MeToo movement and I often wonder whether that same person would be more aware of how he speaks about women leaders now.
In the words of Michelle Obama (who defended Dr. Biden in a recent Instagram post), “We’re all seeing what also happens to so many professional women, whether their titles are Dr., Ms., Mrs., or even First Lady: All too often our accomplishments are met with skepticism, even derision. We’re doubted by those who choose the weakness of ridicule over the strength of respect. And yet somehow, their words can stick — after decades of work, we’re forced to prove ourselves all over again.”
Indeed, their words can stick. So my message to any woman reading this today is that next time your accomplishments, whether personal or professional, are belittled, ridiculed or diminished, remember that that is a sign of their weakness. You are not an imposter and there are many people out there who see your hard work and respect it. Tell another woman about your experience, commiserate together, and then commit yourselves to speaking out loudly when you see it being done to other women.
We are all experiencing a big shift in the way we work. Even prior to the pandemic, more people were working remotely than ever before. Now, 42 percent of the U.S. labor force is working from home full-time, according to new research from Stanford University. Most of the stigmas about working from home have eroded as we all adjust to this new reality. Although there are some who crave a return to office or want their teams to return to the office, I think leaders can and will play an important role in creating flexibility in where we work. I am hoping that in our post-COVID world, we will have a more flexible, work-from-home economy.
I work at a place where most of the staff have been on site at the bedside or in exam rooms caring for patients. But, we still have more than 5,000 people working from home. I also sit on boards that have held all of their meetings remotely for the past 8 months. I could never have imagined this kind of shift. So how do leaders play a role in ensuring that we learn from this new normal and develop new and sustainable work habits?
It starts with modeling the right behaviors and ensuring that you don’t tolerate what I call “AWA (alternative work arrangement) shaming”. I do a combination of AWA and working on site, so that I am visible to those that need to be physically there. I believe that visibility goes a long way towards showing that I value and support their work. At the same time, I am trying to ensure that our leaders get much more comfortable with the idea that oftentimes their teams are more productive at home.
I practice and get comfortable with my new normal. When I can, I take walks if I have a break during the day. Clearing my head is really important and gives me the opportunity to think and act more purposefully. Until recently, I would have never built that time into my day. I have also been trying to create some boundaries when I work at home. When you are working from home, it is easy to start working from the time you open your eyes until bedtime. I needed to stop that behavior by putting boundaries around my work time and I needed to express that to my leadership team.
Now that 90% of my closet — the part that comprises my business attire — has been dormant for many months, I have gotten more comfortable with “dressing down”. In the past, I was much more formal at work and hence created a more formal dress code atmosphere with the people around me. That will change now that I have gotten more comfortable with a relaxed business attire at home and in the office. Today I actually wore black jeans and a cardigan sweater to work. I would have never done that in the past but I am committed to creating a new, more comfortable trend.
I do miss being able to grab a tea with a colleague or go to a happy hour networking event after work. But, virtual happy hours and cooking demonstrations have become a new evening event for me. While it is not the same as in-person connections, it is a way to meet our deep need for human connection during this isolating time.
My husband and I often remark about how lucky we are that our kids are grown and we are not homeschooling them while working from home. I’m fortunate to have a living situation that allows me to work from home successfully, but I know a lot of people who don’t have that same luxury of privacy or a designated workspace at home. I have seen some of my colleagues get very creative. One works from his garage to give him space from his children who are attending school virtually. I do worry about the long-term effects caused by the disparity in home offices, and women are disproportionately affected due to child care responsibilities.
The separation between our work and personal lives can be hard to distinguish right now, so setting boundaries anyway we can is imperative to our success and wellbeing. I am committed to making sure that more flexible working arrangements are sustainable in the future. In the meantime, we are all learning as we go and doing our best to model an “it’s okay to work from home” mindset with our teams.
This week, I was reviewing a few important projects with one of my team members, when I asked about two of the women who had been leading the work. My colleague shared with me that both of the women were on voluntary furlough so that they could care for their young children due to childcare provider closures from the pandemic. She told me about a third high-potential woman who is struggling to home school her children now that their school went back to remote learning. Later that same day, I was talking to an employee who told me that she needed to reduce her hours in order to help her daughter with remote learning. I was crestfallen to hear these stories for two reasons. One, I came to the conclusion that at my organization, we are losing the talent of these young women and two, what does this say about the future of women in the workplace?
After doing a bit of research, I realized the situation we are seeing at my organization is not anecdotal. In September alone, almost 900,000 women dropped out of the workforce in the U.S. According to an analysis by the Center for American Progress (of these, 324,000 were Latinas and 58,000 were Black women.) Millennial mothers are nearly three times more likely than millennial fathers to report being unable to work due to a school or childcare closure from the pandemic. While this massive exit from the job market by young mothers is shocking, this statistic is not a product of the pandemic alone. It represents the intersection of many complex issues.
For many decades, we’ve focused on the progress women have made in narrowing the wage gap, advancing their careers while also having children and generally, “having it all.” But when you really talk to young women who are doing this, they still feel like they’re walking a tightrope and could fall off at any moment. Women are still responsible for the majority of childcare and household duties, as study after study continues to show. Despite being highly educated and represented in the workforce at unprecedented levels, Millennial women are making less than Gen X women. This is in part, due to entering the workforce during the largest economic downtown since the Great Depression. According to the Atlantic, “The generation unlucky enough to enter the labor market in a recession suffers “significant” earnings losses that take years and years to rebound, studies show, something that hard data now backs up.”
The verdict is that this resulted in a full decade of lost wages for this generation of women.
As leaders, it’s important to recognize that what working mother’s feel did not happen overnight. In 2018, just 28% of mothers with children under 18 said that working full time was ideal (according to the Institute for Family Studies). While I worry deeply about the long term effects of this current crisis for our young working mothers, I am also more committed than ever to supporting the conditions that lead to bringing them back in enthusiastically. This means advocating for changes in how we fund childcare and childcare workers, continuing to look for ways to close the wage gap between not just men and women, but also between women of color, millennial women and older generations, and continuing to push organizations to think about how they support parents to navigate this very complex issue.
While I have seen and written about some positive aspects of working from home, I have also been thinking a lot about younger women who may be missing out on opportunities to advance their careers during this time. When working in an office setting, there is opportunity for incidental and informal contact – a way to be seen. It’s the networking and informal meetings that often lead to important “drive by” career discussions. These informal meetings are also helpful to me. I recently met a long tenured social worker at my organization in the cafeteria, she provided me with some very good insights on the topic of racism and social injustice. That quick cafeteria discussion gave me new information that helped me better understand what my employees were thinking and feeling.
With so many young women in this position, how do we build an infrastructure to ensure their career progression? I’d like to share some strategies for continuing to advance your career while you are working from home.
Investigate Digital Platforms for Career Advancement
I serve as a mentor for CSweetener, a digital platform that is designed to mentor women to lead in healthcare. With this platform, I am able to mentor women from other organizations and provide them guidance and most importantly, make connections for them. I am thinking about creating something similar in my own organization so that our pipeline development does not suffer.
Talk to Your Boss about Challenges Your Organization is Facing
By understanding the biggest needs and challenges your employer is facing, you can find opportunities to volunteer your services and expertise to help. Look for how to get involved in work outside of your day-to-day job so that you have the opportunity to get “in front of” more people – even if that’s just through your email signature. Letting your boss know you want to step up during challenging times will go a long way.
A new feature on LinkedIn (also a great place to network) allows you to explore over 16,000 free and paid courses.There are many that are extremely relevant to our current moment, as well as options to learn a new skill. A few highlights include:
“Digital Body Language”
“Starting a Memorable Conversation”
“Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging”
“Remote Work Foundations”
“Time Management When Working from Home”
“Data Analytics for Business Professionals”
“Inclusive Leadership”
Reach out to Your Contacts for a Zoom Date
Now is just as good a time as ever to reconnect and ask others what they’ve been doing to stay engaged. You’re armed with an instant topic of conversation since we’re all in the same boat. Are they participating in any groups you could join? Have they developed any practices or habits to help them through working from home? Of course, remember that some people are stretched incredibly thin right now, so be sure to be sensitive with any requests.
Join a Professional Facebook Group
Facebook groups can be an effective place to request or share information with like-minded people in your field. It’s best to find one that’s locally based, so that you’re connecting with people who you could possibly carry relationships into the real world with, but even national groups can help you bounce ideas off of other professionals and be of help to those that are looking for it. Ask around your network and see if your friends or colleagues have found any groups they enjoy.
Virtual or Outdoor Happy Hours
Remember to find ways to connect that don’t involve meetings, business goals or requests for help. Look for ways to have fun with colleagues. If you have Zoom fatigue, find an opportunity to connect outside (socially distanced and masked of course!). Have everyone bring a colleague from their department so you can meet new people.
Leaning into an Opportunity for Change
In a recent Harvard Business Review article, reporter Herminia Ibarra cites a poll asking participants to describe how they’re responding to the Coronavirus, “50% of the 2,000 people who responded reported that it has given them ‘opportunities to try new things or learn new skills.’” She says, “In some cases, these new skills are directly related to working remotely.” Now is a great time to reinvent yourself, follow a path you’ve been too afraid to go down, or use the time you’re not commuting and getting ready to plan your next move.
After being at home every day with my two-year-old daughter and my husband for 10 plus weeks, we’ve found some new clarity on how we want our family life to operate going forward. Over the weekend, a conversation about egg muffins became an a-ha moment. For those who’ve don’t know about this Pinterest-inspired convenience breakfast, they are mini frittatas that you can make ahead of time for a week of busy mornings, everyone rushing to get ready for work and daycare. I casually mentioned that we hadn’t made them in a while, and we should make a batch. As the words left my mouth, I realized – we don’t need to eat breakfast quickly (or in the car) anymore. We’ve enjoyed eating three meals a day at our dinner table together as a family for almost three months. No one is commuting, we’re not doing daily pickups and dropoffs at daycare. There is simply more time.
Another a-ha moment was on our daughter’s birthday. We had a big party planned to celebrate her turning two, which we were sad to cancel. But when the day came, we realized that she was probably happier spending time with just us rather than having a house full of people singing happy birthday to her (I still have video of her crying as we all sang to her at her first birthday party). As we sat there with her eating pizza and Face-timing with family, we also reflected on how much more exhausted and less present we’d be if we were entertaining for 50 people.
There is a silver lining to this virus that I think many families can relate to. We typically have (exhausting) play dates, work commitments and weekend plans with friends and family. We spend time researching 30 minute meals and efficient meal prep ideas, we take late-day phone calls from the car to maximize our workday before daycare pickup, we spend all weekend cleaning the mess that our hurricane of a schedule creates in our home. We enjoy only a few hours each weekday with our daughter. Now, we have almost 40 extra hours a week to watch her grow and change. While the stress of balancing two careers without childcare has been hard, we’ve found a way to share the load and make it work (though that is not the case for many women). We realize how much we can actually get done in fewer hours, and we’ve made the decision to reduce how many hours she’s in daycare for the future. We’re lucky to have this option, but it made me realize how much I wish it was the norm. Many families have no choice but to go along with the 40+ hour workweeks that our culture has deemed the “right” way to do things.
In our social circles and our workplaces, there seems to be a new level of acceptance of putting family first. The expectations on our time and energy have lowered. I don’t feel bad when I’m on the phone with a client and my child is yelling for more crackers in the background. We’re seeing how easily meetings can be phone calls, emails or video conferences. We’re all in the same boat, and the important work still gets done. Yes, we are missing the connection that physical proximity brings, but it’s giving us the chance to reset and learn which obligations fill us up, and which take away from our precious energy. It’s given us the mental space to re-evaluate our priorities and try to change our lives in any way we can to align with them. It’s not possible for everyone, but it’s my hope that American work culture can start to change, allowing people to more easily put family first.
I have always had a high bandwidth for work and for social commitments. A typical week for me is often overscheduled, and a peek at my calendar is something that would probably provoke anxiety for most people. For example, the first week of May was supposed to look like this: Friday night alumni event for my husband’s medical school, a 10:30am Saturday morning work event, a Saturday afternoon 2nd birthday party for my granddaughter, a Saturday night event for work, leaving Sunday for Seattle, then back on Wednesday for a two day-trip to Washington DC.
But, what actually happened that week?
I watched my granddaughter open her presents on Facetime, I attended two video conference meetings to replace my meetings in Seattle and Washington and I participated in video meetings and visited my team at the hospital.
I almost always have events on weekends, dinner meetings and travel, but now, I’m not sure when those types of activities will resume. I’m realizing that this significant change in schedule is not all bad for me, and I have been reflecting on the positives of this new pace. I have had dinner with my husband every night since March 12th. Despite having to work from home on the weekends during this time, I have not worn a suit or heels for almost 12 weeks. More time to connect with loved ones (even if it’s via video or phone), working in yoga pants, not wearing makeup; these are all things I could really get used to doing. I’m adjusting to this change in pace and realizing that I was truly overscheduled.
Although the work has been grueling and extremely stressful, and at one point I had not had a day off in six weeks, there has been something good about spending more time at home and less time running from Philadelphia, to Seattle to DC all in a week. I am wondering how I will adjust to the demands of my job when they shift back to my former schedule? Can I do a better job of controlling it? Will we all have new approaches to how we schedule our work? I hope so.
I know that many of you have also had time to think about your lives, schedules and routines during this unprecedented time. I’d love to hear from you about what you’ve learned and how you think your routines may change post-quarantine. I asked my 35-year-old daughter-in-law (a self-employed mother of a two-year-old) the same question, and HERE is her perspective on what staying home has taught her.
