In a world of inspirational memes and #girlpost Instagram posts, it’s easy to forget that we all occasionally get stuck at work, or feel like we can’t find a way forward. Sue Unerman is the Chief Transformation Officer at MediaCom and Kathryn Jacob OBE is the Chief Executive at Pearl & Dean. Together they wrote The Glass Wall: Success Strategies For Women At Work And Businesses That Mean Business. Here, they answer your work questions with pragmatic, honest advice that’s proven to work…
Q. Sometimes I find that it’s other women who can be the hardest to please. I understand that they’ve had to be tough in their careers to progress, but it can feel as though they are kinder on men. Is that unreasonable? I bring this up because I have a female boss who I feel is being unfair on me. Should I say something – and if so what? Or should I just keep my head down?
Kathryn: First things first. Sometimes, we hold other women to higher standards than we might do men. There is an expectation that we’ll get an extra helping hand simply because we share a gender. I think that’s why men sometimes find it hard to cope when they feel their men bosses show a preference for a talented woman.
Sue: Some women find it easier to take criticism from a male boss, but also some women bosses find it easier to criticise men that work for them rather than another woman, partly because they find it too easy to empathise with how she might feel whereas it’s less of an issue with a man. So just check in with yourself and make sure that you are being fair, and not taking it more personally than you would from a bloke. However, it is also true that just as there are great men bosses and awful men bosses, there are, of course, great women bosses and terrible women bosses. Frankly, we’ve both had experience of both in our careers.
Kathryn: Some bosses see pushing people to their limit as a way to drive them forward. It could be that she has very high expectations of you and uses this type of feedback as a way of making you better. It’s clearly not working for you, however. So perhaps you should have a session with her as part of your review process and find ways to get a more productive circle of feedback.
'It is not enough to be right; you have to be able to justify why you are right in some detail, to a boss sometimes not in the best of moods.'
Sue: Yes, you do need to feedback to her in some way about her feedback to you. Look, life is too short to work for someone who is actually upsetting you. The worst feedback I have ever had at work, was from a woman boss early in my career. It did certainly drive home a lesson for me. She had queried a detail in my work, and although I was correct, I had been unable to explain why I was correct in this instance. I learnt, the hard way, that it is not enough to be right; you have to be able to justify why you are right in some detail, to a boss sometimes not in the best of moods. I learnt a lesson. I’ll never forget it and have never allowed myself to be in that situation again. I wasn’t happy though and in the long run my career has benefitted from working with people and bosses who want me to be happy, and to thrive, rather than to catch me out in mistakes. At that point in my career, I would not have known how to get her to treat me differently. My only resource would have been to leave, because she was fundamentally interested in someone who would obey rather than challenge and invent. What could I have said Kathryn?
Kathryn: I think the important thing is to take the emotion out of these situations because it is quite easy to react and imagine a pattern of behaviour that maybe doesn’t really exist. You end up expecting things to be harsh even when an independent observer would say that they were neutral. Over a period of time work out if a) this is something that you can tolerate and which won’t stop you achieving, or b) if you need to find a way of moving out of this woman’s reach. It’s very difficult to work with someone who you feel doesn’t value you. Give yourself a period of time to analyse and observe rather than react emotionally and you’ll be in a better position to decide what’s best.
Sue: I do have a very counterintuitive suggestion too, which the earlier me probably would have rejected, but which I have used since to great effect. This is to take the criticism, go out of your way to thank her for it, and then make a point of showing that you have listened, have changed your behaviour and that it has worked. This is probably the last thing that you feel like doing. That makes it probably exactly the thing you should try. She won’t be expecting it, and let’s remember, she is a human too. She is probably aware that she has upset you and won’t exactly be pleased about it. She may not be that skilled at giving constructive feedback for all sorts of reasons as you suggest in your question. Therefore, defusing the situation won’t just be good because it’s so unexpected, it may well mean that your relationship goes to a whole other level. There’s an old saying: keep your friends close but your enemies closer. She probably isn’t an enemy of your progress, though it might feel like it now, but the closer you can stay to her the better.
Kathryn: This may feel like a difficult situation, but actually it’s great learning for how you will treat your colleagues, whether men or women, when you are in charge.
Have you got a question you’d like Sue and Kathryn to answer? Email your questions to feedback@graziamagazine.co.uk. Please note, we will be unable to respond to every single question we receive, and will not be able to respond to any questions personally.