Exhaustion, Empathy, and Inequity

Last Friday, I keynoted the CXO NOW’s power hour for women in leadership across the country. I was asked in January to speak so my topic was Impression Management. But the world changed, and my topic evolved to the title above. The last two months are by far the most challenging of my professional life. While my family is happy and healthy, which is my top priority – my patience is thin, the mental gymnastics are high, and I am exhausted. I am not alone with these issues as working women and working mothers are increasing in popularity – over half of the workforce is female and 73% of mothers are working.

So, why am I singling out the working mothers? Because it’s hard – we were exhausted before this COVID environment rocked our professional and personal lives. We were living in two siloed environments of work and home. Most of us outsourced a majority of our lives, cooking, cleaning, teaching, landscaping, etc.

Overnight we became teachers, cooks, cleaners, technology experts, and commander in chief of the household. I am not ashamed to say that I personally have not printed anything in years and I don’t even know how a printer works. That is how outsourced my life was two months ago.

So what do we need now? Employers, we need you to look at how you are doing business with women. There are insurmountable data surrounding women’s inequality at work and at home. Now that both of these worlds are colliding, it’s a perfect storm for working women.

If you find your company is beginning to look at layoffs, start making sure that it isn’t impacting women unfairly. Recently the Labor Department published some alarming statistics regarding layoffs disproportionally impacting African Americans, Latinos, and women. As employers, we need to be aware and make adjustments to ensure that there is equity across all employees. Create actionable and equitable policies for all

employees.

Consider offering more flexible timelines for work that isn’t mandatory. The world is moving at a slower pace which offers businesses a more fluid timeline. Reprioritize what is necessary and let the rest slide. And just a note to employees – it doesn’t all have to been done tomorrow. Prioritization should happen twice a day in times of change. Once in the morning and again in the evening.

Engage your employees in an empathic manner. Even if you cannot relate to what is happening to 73% of mothers with children in the home that are working, a simple nudge of “good job” or a meaningful “how are you doing?” can make a difference in the day. I often greet employees children over the phone, which is something I wouldn’t have even thought of doing two months ago. Employees, let your boss know your limits and offer realistic timeframes for completing tasks. You can also help with setting expectations.

Also, let’s be real for a minute – video conferencing isn’t necessary for every meeting. If you are communicating data or bullet points to an individual, an email will suffice and offers flexibility to the individual on the other end. Video conferencing is great for building consensus and influencing individuals, but a video conference only to communicate data is annoying and a waste of time.

Photo by Anna Shvets on Pexels.com

In short, be the boss you would like to work for right now and do not undermind the grief we are all experiencing as a society. Most of us are in a season of grieving. We may have experienced loss in different areas with some of us losing loved ones. But all of us are losing our way of life, even if it does end up being a temporary loss – it’s a loss all the same. I would urge you to recognize this loss as an employer and not push your stress to your team. Instead elevate the stress to create awareness and equity for those around in the C-Suite. When the world looks back on COVID 19, I hope the silver lining will be how many women held this country together, both at home and at work.

Grace under Fire

Uncategorized

Tips for maintaining professionalism in chaos

In the last three weeks, our world has been turned upside down by something well beyond our personal control. For many professionals whose careers have been built by discipline and control, it’s a real issue. While trying to figure out how to keep our businesses financially viable, we suddenly find ourselves as teachers, maids, cooks, and personal care professionals. It’s overwhelming, exhausting, and irritating.

In a crisis, an individual’s character is truly exposed. I’d like to share a few tips for the professionals that are also parents out there that feel like you are losing control. It has helped me maintain my composure while dealing with an immense amount of stress.

I’ll start by saying my family is in a dual-income scenario in which we outsource everything. Between my husband and myself we own two businesses, one of which has payrolled employees, the other has 1099’d and my husband is also an executive at a Fortune 50 company. This is my audience, so please disregard if you are in the great fortune of having a stay at home parent.

Routine: Not much has changed in my routine. I still wake up at the same time to get my workout in prior to work. Same bat time, same bat channel. My kids, for the most part, wake up at the same time as a regular school day (6AM), and they need to get dressed and get downstairs by 7AM for class. This expectation was set as soon as we realized that we would be in this for several weeks. Fortunately, their school work is relatively easy as they are still in elementary school. One of my sons has been late for school twice this week and paid the consequence by folding laundry.

I still get my toughest work done in the morning, it’s just an hour later. My business runs somewhat in a regular albeit shorter schedule. If someone were to look at how my company runs on the inside, they wouldn’t see much difference from January to today other than more virtual conferences.

Dinner and bedtime are still on the same schedule as well. This keeps my family on track in terms of expectations. While my kids know what is happening in the world, it doesn’t impact their daily expectations, same for employees.

Personal Appearance: Once they are started on their schoolwork, it’s business as usual for me. I still dress for work. A crisis is a time in which you need to be hyper-sensitive about the things you can control. Control the way you present yourself, get dressed, put on your makeup and do your hair, even if it’s not professionally groomed at this point. The psychological effects of maintaining your physical appearance in a time of immense stress are irrefutable. Personal hygiene and presentation are forms of self-care and this isn’t the first time I have been meticulous about my appearance. Three years ago I lost both of my stepparents within a month of each other. The only thing that I could control was how I showed up. My brother commented on my “grace” during this time period and it wasn’t that I had mastered grace, it’s that I displayed it in my appearance.

I have the same expectations for my children. They are to get up and be dressed just like they would for school. This gives them the sense that this is a regular day in which they need to be held accountable, just as they would be at school.

I have the same expectations for employees even though I cannot mandate it.

Patience: Understand that this is all just temporary. It may be a few more months prior to adjusting back to some of the way we operated in January. I use the word “some” because I hope that we bring some of the things we’ve learned in the chaos forward and incorporate it into our new normal. But for now, we can practice patience in all categories of our lives. Practice patience with your family, your profession, your expectations in the market, and your expectations with yourself.

This article may be irritating to some. It’s even a little irritating to me, but I hope that it will shed a little light on the importance of routine, personal accountability, and patience. As we navigate this, focus on the things that you can control and practice patience with the things that you cannot.

Style Matters

Business, Work Wear

“It all seems so vain and selfish”, is what an acquaintance of mine said regarding my position on impression management. To tell the truth, I thought the same way early in my career, and it showed. However, what we wear speaks volumes in just a few seconds. Social psychology tells us this as well as a boatload of facts and data, but if it’s hard to wrap your hands around the vanity of choosing style, let me arm you with my own personal style journey.

Continue reading →

Photo Cred: https://www.adp.com/spark/articles/2018/04/advocating-for-gender-equality-in-the-workplace.aspx#

Negotiate Like A Man

Business

I was recently engaged in a search in which very few people in the US are qualified: under 15, to be exact. Interesting enough, the final candidate pool consisted of 2 qualified individuals – a male stepping into the role and a female with a few more years of experience than the male co-candidate. Several rounds of negotiation ensued with both candidates and the end result didn’t surprise me: The male candidate ended up negotiating his compensation to a level more senior than the more experienced female. The male got the job.

Continue reading →