July 1, 2020 • 32 mins
Michelle King is a leading global expert in gender equality. She’s spent her career advocating for women at work, and today we helps us dismantle the myth of meritocracy. According to her research, as women gain more work-life experience our confidence and aspirations fall. Yet focusing on self-improvement is not the solution or the way to get ahead. It’s not us, it’s the work culture that needs to get better. @michellepenelopeking @michellepking #TheFixPodcast
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So one of the challenges today was sort of current
diversity and inclusion in issues. If they make people aware
of boasy, but they don't tell you how to take action,
they don't hold you accountable for making it a practice.
And so for me, the one way we can support
each other is to understand what the barriers look like,
how they different for all women. And so I always say,
you know what what women want for men and organizations,
(00:20):
they have to be prepared to give woman of color,
which is understanding the challenges and speaking up and being
an ally. Thanks for joining us on the road to
somewhere where we talk about exploration, adventure, major life change
and transformation. It's about not necessarily knowing where we're going,
(00:42):
but having the faith that the journey will be worthwhile.
I'm Lisa has and I am Chill Herzig, and I
have to say one of the things that I am
most grateful to work for is you. I would never
have found you without work. Well, this is true, Yeah,
I am Matt working on I technically worked for you.
(01:04):
You were the boss. You didn't actually we were partners
and crimes we are here. But um, it's just it's
sort of one of the things that I think bonded
us is that we went through sort of somewhat of
a difficult There were thorny political situations we were dealing
with the magazinue we were working at UM that had
nothing to do with the people on our staff, but
(01:24):
everything to do with the sort of condition of the
industry and the parent company and all of it. And
it was just so incredible to have somebody who I
UM felt such respect for and also just had good
chemistry with to talk to and confide in about how
as particularly as women, we should be navigating everything that
(01:47):
we were encountering, all the challenges and obstacles that we
were encountering so well, I felt exactly, this is a
public way for me to thank you for your ally ship. Well,
thank you. And I I do think that the workplace
can be particularly challenging UM for women, which is why
(02:07):
we have our expert on today who's going to help
us navigate that those stormy waters. She's a global expert
on gender equality and director of Inclusion at Netflix UM
which seems like a super inclusive place, and she's also
the author of the Fix Overcome the Invisible Barriers that
are holding women back at work Michelle King, thank you
(02:28):
so much for being with us today. Thank you for
having me today. And it's so nice to hear the
two of you champaign each other. So that's great. We did,
and the Sisterhood lives. Sisterhood is alive and well. Although
one of the things I really appreciate, appreciated about your
book is that it does not put it all on
women to figure out this problem. Yeah, you know, it's
(02:51):
so interesting. Um. When I first started researching this, I
selfishly was really trying to understand the barriers that I
had encountered in my work LEAs and why it was
that was like, you know, countless qualifications and really high
performance ratings and so many years experience. I was finding
sort of less qualified, less capable men um, you know,
(03:12):
sort of about performing me in terms of promotions. And
I already wanted to unpack it for myself, and I
started researching it, you know, really around women and how
workplaces need to be fixed rather than women and how
capable we are. And I found all this interesting research
and then I presented it to a room full of
four hundred white male partners and a big professional services firm,
and I got these sort of blank stares back at
(03:34):
me and their squirrel faces, you know, and just like
this look of like I'm being excluded. Um, and it
was it didn't resonate with them at all. And I
tried and lean into my discomfort and understand, you know
what it was that wasn't resonating. So I went back
into all the data that I had, all the interviews,
all the surveys, and I removed all the women and
I just looked at male responses. And what I found
(03:56):
consistently was that men experienced organizations and specifically gender inequality
in a very negative way. And it's not something we
talk about. It's not something you know, we notice. Like
when I looked at my research, the number one varied
and men's advancement at work is the advancement of diversity
and inclusion initiatives focused on women. Because these initiatives really
(04:18):
aim at fixing women, and they ignore sort of men
and the challenges that men face, and they don't address
sort of how to enroll men. And you know a
lot of people focus on business cases and all these
other things, except we don't actually spend time talking about
how the workplace doesn't work for men and how living
out to what I call this Don drape in ninetien
fifties ideal of leadership and workplaces actually doesn't serve men, right,
(04:40):
it's silences men. Men aren't free to talk about the
challenges the experience of work Men face tremendous bullying and
pressure to accept marginalization and discriminatory behaviors. Men aren't free
to explore their identities outside of the bread winter image. Um,
you know, men are getting the promotions, so they are
getting the promotions. But what I would argue is actually
that workplaces are the work for a very small number
(05:01):
of people, and we're seeing this inn research showing you know,
currently in culture of inequality, you're really only advancing people
who fit this Don dreper ideal, right, which is a white,
middle class, hetero, sexually able bodied mail. But importantly, if
someone who is wanting to engage in sort of dominant, assertive, aggressive, competitive,
and even exclusionary behaviors to get ahead, and so the
more ways you fit on, the easy it's for it
(05:23):
is for you to advance. Um. The counter is also true, though,
so research has come out and showing them in cultures
of equality, we don't really have this Don Dreper ideal. Right,
it's more what we call a values based organization. You know,
men are twice as likely to ase to senior leadership
positions and women are six times more likely because we're
no longer advancing like a small number of people who
fit the don Draper ideal. And the thing I would
(05:45):
argue is, even if men get promoted and it works
for you, and I've had this conversation with quite a
few men, it's not without its costs. So we see
the stress and emotional strain, and you know, from male silencing,
we see sort of the this play out in higher
depression rates from in and a lot of the challenges
that men encounter in workplaces. And my message to men is, hey,
you know, if this is challenging for you, there's roughly
(06:06):
only six bars you're encountered in the course of your career,
but women is roughly, on average around seventeen. So you know,
it's much harder for women. And that's really my way
of enrolling men said, if we see you, but this
is how it's much harder for women. So I'm just
going to push back a little bit because that's who
I am. I love playing Devil's advocate, I would say
that off on the opposite side, as even as a
(06:29):
non male, if the Don Draper type is highly effective
and highly productive, and the goal of most corporations is
not to be like your social club or your therapist,
and it's unfortunately, to make money. And if you're a
stock owner and you invest in a company, and what
all you care about is that they make money, and
(06:50):
you're an annoyed if they're not, if they're not highly productive,
and then men, unfortunately, mostly men or women, the few
who are rising to the top and being the most
productive are sacrificing their personal life. That's the goal, isn't
it of a corporation that's making money. Absolutely love this
question because it's so inherently misogynistic. So I love this
(07:14):
question because what we're saying, and I've been asked by
it by white men, is that, hey, Michelle, doesn't the
dondree for prototype work for us? Right? So when men
ask me that, I have to take a breath and
I have to say because it is inherent misogynistic, because
what we're saying is a white male prototype is what
good looks like. And to be fair, that's what society says.
So it's a reasonable But there are women like that too,
(07:35):
there are women like We can get onto the women
piece in a minute, but I just want to address
this idea that this is successful. Right. So I had
a room full of ten male partners in a very
well known professional services firm say this exact, questioned me.
And my question to them was, well, let's just consider
this for a moment. So you're saying it's successful now,
(07:57):
but your organization has received numerous complaint of sexual harassment itself,
numerous instances of inequality, moments of marginalization and discrimination, and
complaints from both men and women. And even if we
park all of that just purely on a financial basis,
there are hundreds of studies that show more diverse teams
are more effective, more productive, and more profitable. And even
(08:18):
if we park all of that in terms of current state,
research shows that in the future world of work within
the next three to five to ten years, the changes
that are coming from technological advancements like AI robotics nanotechnology
require different ways of working. And let me just give
you an example of how acute this is. So I
did a survey because I was so interested in this,
(08:38):
and I said to seven thirty two. Men and women, Hey,
what are the top five capabilities out of a list
of twenty that are required in the future world of work?
And they gave me things like per suasion, collaboration, emotional intelligence,
working with others, managing people to achieve results. And then
I said, great, what are the capabilities that women have?
(09:00):
Women have four out of the five capabilities that are
acquired in the future world of work. According to men
and women, men have one. And the reason for that
is the nineteen fifties Don Dreber prototype was built when
organizations first began, and it doesn't really work for us now,
and it's definitely not going to work for us in
the future world of work. And that's why I say,
(09:20):
men need this more than we do. And I just
want to say one more thing on this idea that
the prototype works. What we need to own as the
prototype doesn't actually work for organizations. It actually works for
those men who are in those positions of power. And
that's what they're actually saying. They're questioning, Hey, this work
for me, so surely that makes it okay. And I'm saying, no,
it worked for you at the expense of the well
(09:41):
being of the people you work with at the expense
of your organization's productivity, organizations, innovation organizations, ability to problem
solve and engage in sort of diversity of thought and
all the things needed to innovate. And you know, we
see this play out in cultures of equality. If you
have them, employees are six times more likely to innovate,
which is something that is critical and going to be
a cool differentiator for the corporate success. So my argument is,
(10:05):
I think there's an opportunity here to actually redefine that,
to lean into that into question did we get here
in a way that's truly successful and what is our
definition of success? Because you can be a lot more
financially successful with more diverse teams. So you're saying it's
almost a fiduciary responsibility that you have and to your
shareholders returns in the future to evolve even if your impulses, Hey,
(10:26):
the status quo has has has me, you know, has
me sitting pretty yeah. And I think it's just challenging
for people, right because you know, if you're a leader
and you managed to get there by adhering to don
drepe of HAGD, then someone comes along and says, hey,
you know what that's not only created huge cultures of
inequality and you know, discrimination, marginalization of minority groups at work,
(10:47):
but actually it's not that effective. And here's all the
reasons why. You know that actually acquires individuals whom position
of power and privilege to question that and to really
do the work to become aware of how their privilege
is actually created in And that's why I say, you know,
this is actually a leadership issue. I mean I have
a whole chapter just the leaders on the work that
they need to do, because here's the truth. Right then,
(11:09):
equality employees experience in workplaces is a direct result of
the leadership because leaders get to decide every day what
behaviors get endorsed, rewarded, supported, ignored. They get to decide,
you know, how women are going to be treated, if
women are going to be valued in the same way
as men when they get to leadership positions, how men
are going to interact with women. And to me, that's
really the ultimate form of privilege. You know, to be
(11:31):
able to tackle inequality that yourself never have to experience
is really what privilege is. And so I think every leader,
what we're asking them to do, is ready to lead
to manage those day to day experiences of an equality.
That's where culture happens, that's how it gets created. And
so that's really what we need all leaders to do,
even those who might have lived up to DOT in
(11:51):
the past. You know what I'm asking them to do
is they don't live up to your privilege anymore. Spend
it by managing these moments and by taking action to
be an ally so and back, I wanna unpack what
success will look like in the future. Before the break,
(12:15):
you had mentioned, um, the five qualities that define success
in the future and leadership in the future, and I
want to just unpack who the future leader is and
what they look like, and how if you're not in
a leadership position now you can get there. So, UM,
(12:36):
I think I'll start answering this question at sort of
an organizational level and bring it back to leaders. So
when we think about what cultures, because leaders drive culture
right through their behaviors, they set the standard for it
and everybody follows that. They determine what culture looks like.
And in organizations where there's cultures of equality, what we
find is the value based cultures. So what this means
(12:59):
is we have to break up with Don Draper, and
we need to shift away from organizations where there these embedded,
outdated ideals of what good looks like. Um, you know,
where we don't really value difference, we just value one
type of ideal, to organizations that are built based on values.
So what we're seeing is increasingly and there's examples of
this like um just in the art and who's in
(13:19):
my book is the Prime Minister of New Zealand who's
building an entire government focused on one thing, one value,
which is kindness UM And that might seem too soft
for people. But we're also seeing this play out in
organizations where you know, increasingly they it's not the corporate
sort of lip service values, but values where they're very
clear on what good looks like based on what is
(13:40):
important to that organization. So for some it might be
what we call radical candor you're saying that is a value.
HBO has got some articles on it recently, where it's
very important in organizations that employees give feedback in real time,
that they're able to speak up and call things out.
And so what I'm saying is in a culture of equality,
you're very clear on what the value is. But importantly
given people a number of ways to demonstrate the value
(14:03):
rather than asking them to conform to sort of masculine
or feminine ideals. And this is important in global economies.
You know, we've got cultural differences embedded in that as well.
So for example, if radical candor is like a value
that your organization has, don't ask everybody to be done
and in the meeting assert themselves and talk over people. Right,
give people different ways to demonstrate that by maybe feedback
(14:24):
and one on one situations or providing an email or so.
Organizations need to build in the flex and how we
demonstrate the values. But right now, most people aren't clear
on any of this value based culture. So if you
ask employees, um, you know what good looks like in
the organization, and I've done this, they're going to describe
the Don Dreper prototype and that's that for them, is
(14:45):
what good looks like, rather than being very clear on
what gets valued in the organization. And so culture is
where they're clear on that. You know, they're really support
employees to kind of live up to that. And and
that's really what a leader's job is is to really
define what good looks like within their team means and
then give people the opportunity to display that using a
wide range of behaviors. So then help me out for
(15:07):
a second, because if my if I'm not in a
situation where my leadership is demonstrating values that resonate with me,
if I'm working at a company that is not purpose
driven and does not have much of a purpose filter,
let's say it's dog eat dog. Forget radical candor it's
(15:28):
just dog eat dog, it's and it's all about the
don draper. If I'm not in a position to make
changes in how my organization functions and what's modeled at
the top, what can I do from my mid, mid tier,
low tier, wherever tier I'm at. Yeah, so there's quite
a few things all of us can do, and this
is my message to both men and women. So I
(15:49):
just want to make that clear right off the bat.
I think there's three things all of us can do,
and it's really important that all of us do do this.
So the first is to um become away. One of
the things my research found is that we're actually all
in denial to some extent when it comes to gender
and equality. We either deny the experiences of it or
we deny the impact that it has or we deny differences,
(16:09):
and interestingly, research shows it's also extents to race, right,
so we sort of raise people's experiences of inequality and workplaces.
So the first thing is to become aware of your
different identities and how For example, I'm a white woman
and I have my whiteness and common with Don so
that makes it that much easier for me to advance
and organizations than it does black women and organizations, just
as an example. And so I think it's really important
(16:31):
to understand how your identity and living up to that
identity by engaging in Dundrey for behaviors, creates cultures of
an equality and experiences of an equality for others. That's
the first important point. And I think an easy way
to do that is to think about your whole career
and map up moments where you've witnessed or experienced inequality
and start to really understand how this has shown up
in your career. And then you can use resources like
(16:53):
my book to look at you know what is likely
to come down the pipeline, right, so what are some
of the barriers you like you don't encounter in a
few shire and you can navigate these challenges and cultures
of an equality by being an ally. But in order
to be an ally, and I will explain to what
that looks like, we really need to understand what the
barriers are. So one of the challenges today with sort
(17:14):
of current diversity and inclusion initiatives is they make people
aware of biases, but they don't tell you how to
take action, and they don't hold you accountable for making
it a practice. And so for me, the one way
we can support each other is to understand what the
barriers look like and how they're different for all women. Right.
And so I always say, you know what white women
want from men and organizations, they have to be prepared
(17:34):
to give to woman of color, which is understanding the
challenges and speaking up and being an ally and ally
ship is important because it's how we take that awareness
and understanding and make it a practice and navigated in
our workplace. And you know, I've got some examples as
to how this play is out for me, right, So
a powerful example I can share is I've worked in
an organization where I had the don drapers, and I
(17:56):
had a black woman who was reporting to me and
the drapers where we were looking to run this big
workshop and with all their leaders, and they questioned having
this black woman facilitate the session, and the question went
by this, Michelle, you know, we're just not sure she's
senior enough to facilitate the session. And so for me
(18:17):
in that moment, I know the barriers the black woman's face.
I know that they on average have their legitimacy and
capability question much more than white woman. I know they
have to outperform to be seen as just as competent
as you know, the white counterparts. And I know that
it's my job to really support and advocate legitimacy right
and push back on this inequality moment. And so in
that moment, I did something that I think everybody can do,
(18:38):
which is I asked why and why is such a
powerful thing because when you do that, you're putting the
owners on the individual who's engaging in the marginalization behavior
to explain it. So with this group of white men,
I say, look, why can you help me understand on
what basis you formed that opinion. Turns out they've never
spoken to her that had no background. They've just made
her a couple of times and had made that assumption
on the basis of how she looked, and by asking why,
(19:01):
you know, I had to get them to a point
where they admitted they actually had no basis for this.
And it was at that point that I said, well, great,
if we don't actually know that she can do it,
I know she can do because I know her background
and experience. Let's give her a shot. And she facilitated
the workshop and it was highly effective. But that's just
one example of encountering you know, the day to day discrimination.
But because you know the barriers, you know how to
(19:21):
be an ally in the moment, because you recognize the
challenges that minority space of work. So my message here,
everybody is alone. It's very hard to navigate these barriers.
I share some strategies for each barrier in my book,
but ultimately the aim is to be allies because together
we can push back on these barriers. And I hate
putting all the emphasis on women because I think it's
something importantly that men can do, and I talk a
(19:42):
lot about this in the book with reference to my
husband and how to reingly important that men, for example, share,
you know, when they're taking their son to the doctor,
and speak up and share you know, the challenges of
integrating work and home life. Just those simple actions of
not hiding their identities outside of work can really help
us when we con back. I want to talk a
little bit more specifically about the barriers that you mentioned.
(20:14):
So before the break, we mentioned, um, what Michelle had mentioned,
the barriers for women, and in your book you specifically
describe three times in a woman's career that they barriers
are specific to that to that time, Um, because they're
different barriers. They're different barriers for a woman who's just
(20:34):
entering the workforce than they are for like middle aged
people like me who have a whole different By the way,
we didn't touch on age discrimination, but that is very
very prominent, I think in the workplace as well. So
can you just walk us through those barriers that exist
for those three different phases of a woman's career? Sure? Um,
(20:56):
And you know, I just want to sort of stop
by saying that, you know, men and women's career is
unfolded in very different ways, right, and so for listeners
you might not know this, but women do have three
distinct phasors in their careers. And in my book, I
mapped the barriers to each phase. Um, and the reasons
of that is women have to integrate sort of work
and home life, whereas for men it's just sort of
this more linear path where some of those barriers I
(21:17):
mentioned earlier sort of show up along the way. Whereas
for women, they're really these three core phases. And the
first phase is what we call the idealistic achievement phase.
And so one of the barriers, just to give you
an example of how plays out in the sphase, is,
you know, when women start working life, what we find
is they're pretty idealistic about their ability to achieve right
in advance and organizations, and they believe that actually working
(21:39):
life is going to marry sort of school life, you know,
and that working hard will enable them to advance. It's
pretty much this idea that workplaces the meritocracy is right,
it's the smith and workplaces on because success discriminates, and
it discriminates based on who most closely for its prototype.
But not knowing this when that's down racing right and
but not no knowing this, women have what we call
(22:01):
conditioned expectations. So this is this first barrier, and so
they believe that like if if you know, it's unlikely
they're going to experience inequality and If they do that,
they alone can overcome it. But what we see is
that as women join organizations and they're faced with the
Don drip for prototype, they encounter something else called the
conformity bind where to be seen as competent, they have
to live up to Don. But when women stray from
(22:23):
the standards as society holes for how women are meant
to behave, which is the opposite of Don, it's meek, mild, unassuming,
you know, very maternal, very feminine. When women stray from
those norms to live up to Don, they saw differently. Yes,
so women face this trade off between being seen is common,
that's right, and likability is super important for promotions, and
(22:46):
so there's really this trade off and there's just no
right way to be a woman at work. And so
when women encounter this conformity binding organizations, what we find is,
you know, that's just one barrier. Because they've got these
conditioned expectations, they're start to internalize these challenges. And that's
why within the first three years of working life, women's
confidence in their ability to advance the senior leadership positions
(23:09):
drops by more than that's an amazing statistic, right, That
is because we don't arm young women with the awareness
that they need of how inequality plays out. And so
that's why I say, you know, for every parent everywhere,
you know, give your young graduate a copy of this
book and arm them with the awareness so that when
they encounter the barriers, they don't internalize them. And that's
(23:30):
just the first phase, which is which is really a
different message to parents because a lot of parents, I think,
I feel that the way to raise girls in particular
is to tell them you can be anything you want,
the world is your oyster, and that somehow that will
fuel them for what we do know is going to
be an uphill and difficult journey at times. But what
(23:53):
you're saying is just tell it like it is, tell
it like it is, because otherwise what you're doing is
you're actually gas lighting them. Right, Like, you can do
everything just right, you can get all the grades, you
can get all the performed scores, you can have everything
just right, can still not succeed. But there are ways
to get through these barriers. I mean there are. So
(24:13):
what do you do as a young woman starting out
now who's aware of these barriers is not they're not
blind to them, How do they get through them because
they some people do. I think the number one thing
in all honesty is not internalizing them. So it took
me a long time to do that. Right to have you,
in order to develop confidence in your own capabilities and
to truly see yourself and develop yourself from a place
(24:34):
of strength, you have to not internalize the barriers. Because
what happens is when we internalize the barriers, we engage
in a lot of what are called women fixing, you know,
where we go on the latest mentoring program, with the
latest negotiating program, on networking program. I mean more research
finds on average, women are really good negotiators, in fact
better than men men and women rate women better. And
so I'm trying to say, hey, don't invest your time
(24:56):
and fixing something that's not broken. Don't internalize these messages
that are going to bring you down. Recognize that it's
not you, it is your workplace, and see things for
what they are and realize just how truly capable you are.
And also pick organizations that are most likely going to
value you. You know, when you're having that first job interview,
one most important questions you can ask leaders is, hey,
how do you practice inclusive leadership? Or do you even
(25:18):
understand and equality works and work places, And I like,
I I do this, I've just done this. Like for me,
that's a really important question because you know, leaders might
not have the perfect answer, but if they have no
one swer, if they don't understand the challenges women face
the work, they're hardly going to be able to support
you in your career. So for me, it's up front,
it's pick organizations that can evalue us and then don't
(25:39):
internalize these barriers and learn to recognize them when they
pop up, so you know the different strategies for navigating
each of them, and every barriers different, so it has
different strategies. But it's really important that women know this's
early on. And I think the other thing to recognize is,
you know, these barriers never go away, like in the
second and third phase, which is the second is called
the endurance phase because it's when you have management and motherhood,
(25:59):
and the third it is when women lead. Because it's
the idea that there's one glass ceiling and that's just
simply not true. The barrier show throughout women's careers and
particularly when their leaders. You know, these challenges get harder
and harder and That's why when we look at women
in leadership positions. You know, my message to organizations is
they their exception, not the norm. You know, they represent
almost the hardiest of survivors of women who've managed to
(26:21):
endure workplaces in daw motherhood, enjaw, marginalization, and sexism. And
what we need is your great environments where we're not
just asking exceptional women to advance, but where we open
it up and give all women an opportunity to advance.
So I squorely place the activity with leaders in terms
of the actions they need to take to create these
right environments. Just just just when you say all people,
(26:42):
all women to advance, leadership is is a pyramid. There
are fewer leaders than you can only have like a
few people at the top. You can't when you say everybody,
we're not all going to be CEOs. And I don't
disagree with that. What I think is unfair though, is
only advancing a certain number of people based on characteristics
(27:06):
focused on their identity, whether that be why, able body,
middle class. You know, for me, this is about actually
advancing people based on their talent and capabilities. And quite frankly,
if we look at the research in terms of who
are the most capable people in organizations today. You look
at the fact that women are transformational leaders that men
and women or women is higher in terms of their
leadership capability. You know, if it was purely based on
(27:27):
merit and who's the most capable, women were ruled. And
so for me, this is really about understanding that right
now we're not actually judging this pure now on capability.
We're judging it based on who most closely fits the prototype.
That doesn't really work for workplaces. And so if we
bring it all back to capability, our workplaces would look
very different to how they look today, and our boards
would look different, The c suite would look different. It
(27:50):
might not be full of women, but it would be
fifty full of women at least at least. Yeah, I agree,
And look, I don't believe this is about men or women,
right I'm not. I'm not an anno. Its sounds like that,
but I'm not advocating men something have to behave like
women and women something if we are like man, That's
not what I'm saying. I'm saying let's give people the
freedom to demonstrate their capabilities, to bring their strengths to work,
to bring their different identities, because that's where we get
(28:12):
the cognitive diversity we need. And then let's advance people
who are the most capable leaders, and let's see where
that lands, because based on research, that should be woman.
So you know, it'll be really interesting when you create
these environments. And I think that's why that study shows
writing culture of equality, women is six times more likely
to advance. And it makes sense because in those environments
women have an opportunity to engage their skills to to lead.
(28:36):
We're talking about a very rarefied space. You you mentioned
privilege to see sweet and even top level corporate America
is a tiny percentage of the planet, but also of America.
How do you translate your message, which seems to make
sense in a corporate structure, how do you translate that
(28:58):
for someone who maybe isn't working, you know, as an executive,
who is working at McDonald's, or working, you know, as
a janitor, has a regular a regular job, a blue
collar job. How do they take the message of of
feminism and an empowerment into a non corporate environment. So
(29:20):
I love, I love this question because today UM actually
spoke at the U. S. Treasury Department and UM actually
had the reverse question, you know, how do you translate
this into corporate For me, UM, I think the reality
is is the inequality that exists in society, which is
the fact that we value men in masculinity more than
women in femininity. UM exists in workplaces, irrespective of your workplace.
(29:43):
The studies find, and it's been replicated over thirty years
across geographies, that when we think of managers or mail
you know, when we think of managers or leaders, literally
those two words, we think of males. There's the thing
manager think male phenomenant. It's very well established. And so
for me, this is actually about you know, serspective of
what role you're working in. It's likely that what good
(30:03):
looks like in that setting is a masculine ideal and
to engage in behaviors that are masculine in order to
fit that ideal. And you know, that's why I have
my weekly podcast where I interview people from a range
of backgrounds, from music, from surfing, from you know, blue
collar workers, you name it to really understand how inequality
is everywhere. And it's everywhere because patriarchy is everywhere. And
(30:26):
patriarchy is simply that belief that men and masculinity are
more valuable than women and femininity. And so my message
to everybody is, hey, we need to reset what we value,
you know, in our homes. We need to think about
do we value women's careers as much as men's. And
this is something you know, I have to work on
with my husband and already work through here. I need
you to value my ambitions and my career interests and
(30:46):
my value in contribution to society as much as you
value your own. And to do that we have to
share the load of work. And so this really plays out,
you know, in society, this idea that when we walk
into workplaces and we leave our biases and prejudice at
a harm. It's crazy. It doesn't matter what workplace you
work and you're likely to encounter an equality in it
because we have an equality in society. And that's why
(31:07):
for me, I almost feel like as an advocate, I'm
reversed to engineering a problem because I'm like, if we
can tackle in workplaces, you know, at least where boards
are holding these businesses accountable for you know, ensuring that
they are competitive and diversity the path of doing this,
maybe we can rewind back into our horns. Great conversation.
Thank you so much for being with us today, No problem,
Thank you so much. You can find Michelle King's podcast
(31:32):
at The Fix Stories of challenges and triumphs women across innovation,
technology and entrepreneurship. Her book again is The Fix, Overcome
the Invisible Barriers that are holding women back at work
and also connect with her on Instagram at Michelle Penelope King,
on Twitter at Michelle Peeking, or go to our website
(31:53):
Michelle Peeking dot com. The Road to Somewhere is recorded
in New York City. Make sure you share, subscribe, rate,
and review us and let us hear from you. Where
are you on your journey? Connect with us on Instagram
and Twitter at pod to Somewhere. Email us at road
to Somewhere at iHeartMedia dot com. Special thanks to our producer,
(32:14):
Alicia Haywood. Thanks for joining us on the Road to Somewhere.
Available on the i Heart Radio app, on Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
So one of the challenges today was sort of current
diversity and inclusion in issues. If they make people aware
of boasy, but they don't tell you how to take action,
they don't hold you accountable for making it a practice.
And so for me, the one way we can support
each other is to understand what the barriers look like,
how they different for all women. And so I always say,
you know what what women want for men and organizations,
(00:20):
they have to be prepared to give woman of color,
which is understanding the challenges and speaking up and being
an ally. Thanks for joining us on the road to
somewhere where we talk about exploration, adventure, major life change
and transformation. It's about not necessarily knowing where we're going,
(00:42):
but having the faith that the journey will be worthwhile.
I'm Lisa has and I am Chill Herzig, and I
have to say one of the things that I am
most grateful to work for is you. I would never
have found you without work. Well, this is true, Yeah,
I am Matt working on I technically worked for you.
(01:04):
You were the boss. You didn't actually we were partners
and crimes we are here. But um, it's just it's
sort of one of the things that I think bonded
us is that we went through sort of somewhat of
a difficult There were thorny political situations we were dealing
with the magazinue we were working at UM that had
nothing to do with the people on our staff, but
(01:24):
everything to do with the sort of condition of the
industry and the parent company and all of it. And
it was just so incredible to have somebody who I
UM felt such respect for and also just had good
chemistry with to talk to and confide in about how
as particularly as women, we should be navigating everything that
(01:47):
we were encountering, all the challenges and obstacles that we
were encountering so well, I felt exactly, this is a
public way for me to thank you for your ally ship. Well,
thank you. And I I do think that the workplace
can be particularly challenging UM for women, which is why
(02:07):
we have our expert on today who's going to help
us navigate that those stormy waters. She's a global expert
on gender equality and director of Inclusion at Netflix UM
which seems like a super inclusive place, and she's also
the author of the Fix Overcome the Invisible Barriers that
are holding women back at work Michelle King, thank you
(02:28):
so much for being with us today. Thank you for
having me today. And it's so nice to hear the
two of you champaign each other. So that's great. We did,
and the Sisterhood lives. Sisterhood is alive and well. Although
one of the things I really appreciate, appreciated about your
book is that it does not put it all on
women to figure out this problem. Yeah, you know, it's
(02:51):
so interesting. Um. When I first started researching this, I
selfishly was really trying to understand the barriers that I
had encountered in my work LEAs and why it was
that was like, you know, countless qualifications and really high
performance ratings and so many years experience. I was finding
sort of less qualified, less capable men um, you know,
(03:12):
sort of about performing me in terms of promotions. And
I already wanted to unpack it for myself, and I
started researching it, you know, really around women and how
workplaces need to be fixed rather than women and how
capable we are. And I found all this interesting research
and then I presented it to a room full of
four hundred white male partners and a big professional services firm,
and I got these sort of blank stares back at
(03:34):
me and their squirrel faces, you know, and just like
this look of like I'm being excluded. Um, and it
was it didn't resonate with them at all. And I
tried and lean into my discomfort and understand, you know
what it was that wasn't resonating. So I went back
into all the data that I had, all the interviews,
all the surveys, and I removed all the women and
I just looked at male responses. And what I found
(03:56):
consistently was that men experienced organizations and specifically gender inequality
in a very negative way. And it's not something we
talk about. It's not something you know, we notice. Like
when I looked at my research, the number one varied
and men's advancement at work is the advancement of diversity
and inclusion initiatives focused on women. Because these initiatives really
(04:18):
aim at fixing women, and they ignore sort of men
and the challenges that men face, and they don't address
sort of how to enroll men. And you know a
lot of people focus on business cases and all these
other things, except we don't actually spend time talking about
how the workplace doesn't work for men and how living
out to what I call this Don drape in ninetien
fifties ideal of leadership and workplaces actually doesn't serve men, right,
(04:40):
it's silences men. Men aren't free to talk about the
challenges the experience of work Men face tremendous bullying and
pressure to accept marginalization and discriminatory behaviors. Men aren't free
to explore their identities outside of the bread winter image. Um,
you know, men are getting the promotions, so they are
getting the promotions. But what I would argue is actually
that workplaces are the work for a very small number
(05:01):
of people, and we're seeing this inn research showing you know,
currently in culture of inequality, you're really only advancing people
who fit this Don dreper ideal, right, which is a white,
middle class, hetero, sexually able bodied mail. But importantly, if
someone who is wanting to engage in sort of dominant, assertive, aggressive, competitive,
and even exclusionary behaviors to get ahead, and so the
more ways you fit on, the easy it's for it
(05:23):
is for you to advance. Um. The counter is also true, though,
so research has come out and showing them in cultures
of equality, we don't really have this Don Dreper ideal. Right,
it's more what we call a values based organization. You know,
men are twice as likely to ase to senior leadership
positions and women are six times more likely because we're
no longer advancing like a small number of people who
fit the don Draper ideal. And the thing I would
(05:45):
argue is, even if men get promoted and it works
for you, and I've had this conversation with quite a
few men, it's not without its costs. So we see
the stress and emotional strain, and you know, from male silencing,
we see sort of the this play out in higher
depression rates from in and a lot of the challenges
that men encounter in workplaces. And my message to men is, hey,
you know, if this is challenging for you, there's roughly
(06:06):
only six bars you're encountered in the course of your career,
but women is roughly, on average around seventeen. So you know,
it's much harder for women. And that's really my way
of enrolling men said, if we see you, but this
is how it's much harder for women. So I'm just
going to push back a little bit because that's who
I am. I love playing Devil's advocate, I would say
that off on the opposite side, as even as a
(06:29):
non male, if the Don Draper type is highly effective
and highly productive, and the goal of most corporations is
not to be like your social club or your therapist,
and it's unfortunately, to make money. And if you're a
stock owner and you invest in a company, and what
all you care about is that they make money, and
(06:50):
you're an annoyed if they're not, if they're not highly productive,
and then men, unfortunately, mostly men or women, the few
who are rising to the top and being the most
productive are sacrificing their personal life. That's the goal, isn't
it of a corporation that's making money. Absolutely love this
question because it's so inherently misogynistic. So I love this
(07:14):
question because what we're saying, and I've been asked by
it by white men, is that, hey, Michelle, doesn't the
dondree for prototype work for us? Right? So when men
ask me that, I have to take a breath and
I have to say because it is inherent misogynistic, because
what we're saying is a white male prototype is what
good looks like. And to be fair, that's what society says.
So it's a reasonable But there are women like that too,
(07:35):
there are women like We can get onto the women
piece in a minute, but I just want to address
this idea that this is successful. Right. So I had
a room full of ten male partners in a very
well known professional services firm say this exact, questioned me.
And my question to them was, well, let's just consider
this for a moment. So you're saying it's successful now,
(07:57):
but your organization has received numerous complaint of sexual harassment itself,
numerous instances of inequality, moments of marginalization and discrimination, and
complaints from both men and women. And even if we
park all of that just purely on a financial basis,
there are hundreds of studies that show more diverse teams
are more effective, more productive, and more profitable. And even
(08:18):
if we park all of that in terms of current state,
research shows that in the future world of work within
the next three to five to ten years, the changes
that are coming from technological advancements like AI robotics nanotechnology
require different ways of working. And let me just give
you an example of how acute this is. So I
did a survey because I was so interested in this,
(08:38):
and I said to seven thirty two. Men and women, Hey,
what are the top five capabilities out of a list
of twenty that are required in the future world of work?
And they gave me things like per suasion, collaboration, emotional intelligence,
working with others, managing people to achieve results. And then
I said, great, what are the capabilities that women have?
(09:00):
Women have four out of the five capabilities that are
acquired in the future world of work. According to men
and women, men have one. And the reason for that
is the nineteen fifties Don Dreber prototype was built when
organizations first began, and it doesn't really work for us now,
and it's definitely not going to work for us in
the future world of work. And that's why I say,
(09:20):
men need this more than we do. And I just
want to say one more thing on this idea that
the prototype works. What we need to own as the
prototype doesn't actually work for organizations. It actually works for
those men who are in those positions of power. And
that's what they're actually saying. They're questioning, Hey, this work
for me, so surely that makes it okay. And I'm saying, no,
it worked for you at the expense of the well
(09:41):
being of the people you work with at the expense
of your organization's productivity, organizations, innovation organizations, ability to problem
solve and engage in sort of diversity of thought and
all the things needed to innovate. And you know, we
see this play out in cultures of equality. If you
have them, employees are six times more likely to innovate,
which is something that is critical and going to be
a cool differentiator for the corporate success. So my argument is,
(10:05):
I think there's an opportunity here to actually redefine that,
to lean into that into question did we get here
in a way that's truly successful and what is our
definition of success? Because you can be a lot more
financially successful with more diverse teams. So you're saying it's
almost a fiduciary responsibility that you have and to your
shareholders returns in the future to evolve even if your impulses, Hey,
(10:26):
the status quo has has has me, you know, has
me sitting pretty yeah. And I think it's just challenging
for people, right because you know, if you're a leader
and you managed to get there by adhering to don
drepe of HAGD, then someone comes along and says, hey,
you know what that's not only created huge cultures of
inequality and you know, discrimination, marginalization of minority groups at work,
(10:47):
but actually it's not that effective. And here's all the
reasons why. You know that actually acquires individuals whom position
of power and privilege to question that and to really
do the work to become aware of how their privilege
is actually created in And that's why I say, you know,
this is actually a leadership issue. I mean I have
a whole chapter just the leaders on the work that
they need to do, because here's the truth. Right then,
(11:09):
equality employees experience in workplaces is a direct result of
the leadership because leaders get to decide every day what
behaviors get endorsed, rewarded, supported, ignored. They get to decide,
you know, how women are going to be treated, if
women are going to be valued in the same way
as men when they get to leadership positions, how men
are going to interact with women. And to me, that's
really the ultimate form of privilege. You know, to be
(11:31):
able to tackle inequality that yourself never have to experience
is really what privilege is. And so I think every leader,
what we're asking them to do, is ready to lead
to manage those day to day experiences of an equality.
That's where culture happens, that's how it gets created. And
so that's really what we need all leaders to do,
even those who might have lived up to DOT in
(11:51):
the past. You know what I'm asking them to do
is they don't live up to your privilege anymore. Spend
it by managing these moments and by taking action to
be an ally so and back, I wanna unpack what
success will look like in the future. Before the break,
(12:15):
you had mentioned, um, the five qualities that define success
in the future and leadership in the future, and I
want to just unpack who the future leader is and
what they look like, and how if you're not in
a leadership position now you can get there. So, UM,
(12:36):
I think I'll start answering this question at sort of
an organizational level and bring it back to leaders. So
when we think about what cultures, because leaders drive culture
right through their behaviors, they set the standard for it
and everybody follows that. They determine what culture looks like.
And in organizations where there's cultures of equality, what we
find is the value based cultures. So what this means
(12:59):
is we have to break up with Don Draper, and
we need to shift away from organizations where there these embedded,
outdated ideals of what good looks like. Um, you know,
where we don't really value difference, we just value one
type of ideal, to organizations that are built based on values.
So what we're seeing is increasingly and there's examples of
this like um just in the art and who's in
(13:19):
my book is the Prime Minister of New Zealand who's
building an entire government focused on one thing, one value,
which is kindness UM And that might seem too soft
for people. But we're also seeing this play out in
organizations where you know, increasingly they it's not the corporate
sort of lip service values, but values where they're very
clear on what good looks like based on what is
(13:40):
important to that organization. So for some it might be
what we call radical candor you're saying that is a value.
HBO has got some articles on it recently, where it's
very important in organizations that employees give feedback in real time,
that they're able to speak up and call things out.
And so what I'm saying is in a culture of equality,
you're very clear on what the value is. But importantly
given people a number of ways to demonstrate the value
(14:03):
rather than asking them to conform to sort of masculine
or feminine ideals. And this is important in global economies.
You know, we've got cultural differences embedded in that as well.
So for example, if radical candor is like a value
that your organization has, don't ask everybody to be done
and in the meeting assert themselves and talk over people. Right,
give people different ways to demonstrate that by maybe feedback
(14:24):
and one on one situations or providing an email or so.
Organizations need to build in the flex and how we
demonstrate the values. But right now, most people aren't clear
on any of this value based culture. So if you
ask employees, um, you know what good looks like in
the organization, and I've done this, they're going to describe
the Don Dreper prototype and that's that for them, is
(14:45):
what good looks like, rather than being very clear on
what gets valued in the organization. And so culture is
where they're clear on that. You know, they're really support
employees to kind of live up to that. And and
that's really what a leader's job is is to really
define what good looks like within their team means and
then give people the opportunity to display that using a
wide range of behaviors. So then help me out for
(15:07):
a second, because if my if I'm not in a
situation where my leadership is demonstrating values that resonate with me,
if I'm working at a company that is not purpose
driven and does not have much of a purpose filter,
let's say it's dog eat dog. Forget radical candor it's
(15:28):
just dog eat dog, it's and it's all about the
don draper. If I'm not in a position to make
changes in how my organization functions and what's modeled at
the top, what can I do from my mid, mid tier,
low tier, wherever tier I'm at. Yeah, so there's quite
a few things all of us can do, and this
is my message to both men and women. So I
(15:49):
just want to make that clear right off the bat.
I think there's three things all of us can do,
and it's really important that all of us do do this.
So the first is to um become away. One of
the things my research found is that we're actually all
in denial to some extent when it comes to gender
and equality. We either deny the experiences of it or
we deny the impact that it has or we deny differences,
(16:09):
and interestingly, research shows it's also extents to race, right,
so we sort of raise people's experiences of inequality and workplaces.
So the first thing is to become aware of your
different identities and how For example, I'm a white woman
and I have my whiteness and common with Don so
that makes it that much easier for me to advance
and organizations than it does black women and organizations, just
as an example. And so I think it's really important
(16:31):
to understand how your identity and living up to that
identity by engaging in Dundrey for behaviors, creates cultures of
an equality and experiences of an equality for others. That's
the first important point. And I think an easy way
to do that is to think about your whole career
and map up moments where you've witnessed or experienced inequality
and start to really understand how this has shown up
in your career. And then you can use resources like
(16:53):
my book to look at you know what is likely
to come down the pipeline, right, so what are some
of the barriers you like you don't encounter in a
few shire and you can navigate these challenges and cultures
of an equality by being an ally. But in order
to be an ally, and I will explain to what
that looks like, we really need to understand what the
barriers are. So one of the challenges today with sort
(17:14):
of current diversity and inclusion initiatives is they make people
aware of biases, but they don't tell you how to
take action, and they don't hold you accountable for making
it a practice. And so for me, the one way
we can support each other is to understand what the
barriers look like and how they're different for all women. Right.
And so I always say, you know what white women
want from men and organizations, they have to be prepared
(17:34):
to give to woman of color, which is understanding the
challenges and speaking up and being an ally and ally
ship is important because it's how we take that awareness
and understanding and make it a practice and navigated in
our workplace. And you know, I've got some examples as
to how this play is out for me, right, So
a powerful example I can share is I've worked in
an organization where I had the don drapers, and I
(17:56):
had a black woman who was reporting to me and
the drapers where we were looking to run this big
workshop and with all their leaders, and they questioned having
this black woman facilitate the session, and the question went
by this, Michelle, you know, we're just not sure she's
senior enough to facilitate the session. And so for me
(18:17):
in that moment, I know the barriers the black woman's face.
I know that they on average have their legitimacy and
capability question much more than white woman. I know they
have to outperform to be seen as just as competent
as you know, the white counterparts. And I know that
it's my job to really support and advocate legitimacy right
and push back on this inequality moment. And so in
that moment, I did something that I think everybody can do,
(18:38):
which is I asked why and why is such a
powerful thing because when you do that, you're putting the
owners on the individual who's engaging in the marginalization behavior
to explain it. So with this group of white men,
I say, look, why can you help me understand on
what basis you formed that opinion. Turns out they've never
spoken to her that had no background. They've just made
her a couple of times and had made that assumption
on the basis of how she looked, and by asking why,
(19:01):
you know, I had to get them to a point
where they admitted they actually had no basis for this.
And it was at that point that I said, well, great,
if we don't actually know that she can do it,
I know she can do because I know her background
and experience. Let's give her a shot. And she facilitated
the workshop and it was highly effective. But that's just
one example of encountering you know, the day to day discrimination.
But because you know the barriers, you know how to
(19:21):
be an ally in the moment, because you recognize the
challenges that minority space of work. So my message here,
everybody is alone. It's very hard to navigate these barriers.
I share some strategies for each barrier in my book,
but ultimately the aim is to be allies because together
we can push back on these barriers. And I hate
putting all the emphasis on women because I think it's
something importantly that men can do, and I talk a
(19:42):
lot about this in the book with reference to my
husband and how to reingly important that men, for example, share,
you know, when they're taking their son to the doctor,
and speak up and share you know, the challenges of
integrating work and home life. Just those simple actions of
not hiding their identities outside of work can really help
us when we con back. I want to talk a
little bit more specifically about the barriers that you mentioned.
(20:14):
So before the break, we mentioned, um, what Michelle had mentioned,
the barriers for women, and in your book you specifically
describe three times in a woman's career that they barriers
are specific to that to that time, Um, because they're
different barriers. They're different barriers for a woman who's just
(20:34):
entering the workforce than they are for like middle aged
people like me who have a whole different By the way,
we didn't touch on age discrimination, but that is very
very prominent, I think in the workplace as well. So
can you just walk us through those barriers that exist
for those three different phases of a woman's career? Sure? Um,
(20:56):
And you know, I just want to sort of stop
by saying that, you know, men and women's career is
unfolded in very different ways, right, and so for listeners
you might not know this, but women do have three
distinct phasors in their careers. And in my book, I
mapped the barriers to each phase. Um, and the reasons
of that is women have to integrate sort of work
and home life, whereas for men it's just sort of
this more linear path where some of those barriers I
(21:17):
mentioned earlier sort of show up along the way. Whereas
for women, they're really these three core phases. And the
first phase is what we call the idealistic achievement phase.
And so one of the barriers, just to give you
an example of how plays out in the sphase, is,
you know, when women start working life, what we find
is they're pretty idealistic about their ability to achieve right
in advance and organizations, and they believe that actually working
(21:39):
life is going to marry sort of school life, you know,
and that working hard will enable them to advance. It's
pretty much this idea that workplaces the meritocracy is right,
it's the smith and workplaces on because success discriminates, and
it discriminates based on who most closely for its prototype.
But not knowing this when that's down racing right and
but not no knowing this, women have what we call
(22:01):
conditioned expectations. So this is this first barrier, and so
they believe that like if if you know, it's unlikely
they're going to experience inequality and If they do that,
they alone can overcome it. But what we see is
that as women join organizations and they're faced with the
Don drip for prototype, they encounter something else called the
conformity bind where to be seen as competent, they have
to live up to Don. But when women stray from
(22:23):
the standards as society holes for how women are meant
to behave, which is the opposite of Don, it's meek, mild, unassuming,
you know, very maternal, very feminine. When women stray from
those norms to live up to Don, they saw differently. Yes,
so women face this trade off between being seen is common,
that's right, and likability is super important for promotions, and
(22:46):
so there's really this trade off and there's just no
right way to be a woman at work. And so
when women encounter this conformity binding organizations, what we find is,
you know, that's just one barrier. Because they've got these
conditioned expectations, they're start to internalize these challenges. And that's
why within the first three years of working life, women's
confidence in their ability to advance the senior leadership positions
(23:09):
drops by more than that's an amazing statistic, right, That
is because we don't arm young women with the awareness
that they need of how inequality plays out. And so
that's why I say, you know, for every parent everywhere,
you know, give your young graduate a copy of this
book and arm them with the awareness so that when
they encounter the barriers, they don't internalize them. And that's
(23:30):
just the first phase, which is which is really a
different message to parents because a lot of parents, I think,
I feel that the way to raise girls in particular
is to tell them you can be anything you want,
the world is your oyster, and that somehow that will
fuel them for what we do know is going to
be an uphill and difficult journey at times. But what
(23:53):
you're saying is just tell it like it is, tell
it like it is, because otherwise what you're doing is
you're actually gas lighting them. Right, Like, you can do
everything just right, you can get all the grades, you
can get all the performed scores, you can have everything
just right, can still not succeed. But there are ways
to get through these barriers. I mean there are. So
(24:13):
what do you do as a young woman starting out
now who's aware of these barriers is not they're not
blind to them, How do they get through them because
they some people do. I think the number one thing
in all honesty is not internalizing them. So it took
me a long time to do that. Right to have you,
in order to develop confidence in your own capabilities and
to truly see yourself and develop yourself from a place
(24:34):
of strength, you have to not internalize the barriers. Because
what happens is when we internalize the barriers, we engage
in a lot of what are called women fixing, you know,
where we go on the latest mentoring program, with the
latest negotiating program, on networking program. I mean more research
finds on average, women are really good negotiators, in fact
better than men men and women rate women better. And
so I'm trying to say, hey, don't invest your time
(24:56):
and fixing something that's not broken. Don't internalize these messages
that are going to bring you down. Recognize that it's
not you, it is your workplace, and see things for
what they are and realize just how truly capable you are.
And also pick organizations that are most likely going to
value you. You know, when you're having that first job interview,
one most important questions you can ask leaders is, hey,
how do you practice inclusive leadership? Or do you even
(25:18):
understand and equality works and work places, And I like,
I I do this, I've just done this. Like for me,
that's a really important question because you know, leaders might
not have the perfect answer, but if they have no
one swer, if they don't understand the challenges women face
the work, they're hardly going to be able to support
you in your career. So for me, it's up front,
it's pick organizations that can evalue us and then don't
(25:39):
internalize these barriers and learn to recognize them when they
pop up, so you know the different strategies for navigating
each of them, and every barriers different, so it has
different strategies. But it's really important that women know this's
early on. And I think the other thing to recognize is,
you know, these barriers never go away, like in the
second and third phase, which is the second is called
the endurance phase because it's when you have management and motherhood,
(25:59):
and the third it is when women lead. Because it's
the idea that there's one glass ceiling and that's just
simply not true. The barrier show throughout women's careers and
particularly when their leaders. You know, these challenges get harder
and harder and That's why when we look at women
in leadership positions. You know, my message to organizations is
they their exception, not the norm. You know, they represent
almost the hardiest of survivors of women who've managed to
(26:21):
endure workplaces in daw motherhood, enjaw, marginalization, and sexism. And
what we need is your great environments where we're not
just asking exceptional women to advance, but where we open
it up and give all women an opportunity to advance.
So I squorely place the activity with leaders in terms
of the actions they need to take to create these
right environments. Just just just when you say all people,
(26:42):
all women to advance, leadership is is a pyramid. There
are fewer leaders than you can only have like a
few people at the top. You can't when you say everybody,
we're not all going to be CEOs. And I don't
disagree with that. What I think is unfair though, is
only advancing a certain number of people based on characteristics
(27:06):
focused on their identity, whether that be why, able body,
middle class. You know, for me, this is about actually
advancing people based on their talent and capabilities. And quite frankly,
if we look at the research in terms of who
are the most capable people in organizations today. You look
at the fact that women are transformational leaders that men
and women or women is higher in terms of their
leadership capability. You know, if it was purely based on
(27:27):
merit and who's the most capable, women were ruled. And
so for me, this is really about understanding that right
now we're not actually judging this pure now on capability.
We're judging it based on who most closely fits the prototype.
That doesn't really work for workplaces. And so if we
bring it all back to capability, our workplaces would look
very different to how they look today, and our boards
would look different, The c suite would look different. It
(27:50):
might not be full of women, but it would be
fifty full of women at least at least. Yeah, I agree,
And look, I don't believe this is about men or women,
right I'm not. I'm not an anno. Its sounds like that,
but I'm not advocating men something have to behave like
women and women something if we are like man, That's
not what I'm saying. I'm saying let's give people the
freedom to demonstrate their capabilities, to bring their strengths to work,
to bring their different identities, because that's where we get
(28:12):
the cognitive diversity we need. And then let's advance people
who are the most capable leaders, and let's see where
that lands, because based on research, that should be woman.
So you know, it'll be really interesting when you create
these environments. And I think that's why that study shows
writing culture of equality, women is six times more likely
to advance. And it makes sense because in those environments
women have an opportunity to engage their skills to to lead.
(28:36):
We're talking about a very rarefied space. You you mentioned
privilege to see sweet and even top level corporate America
is a tiny percentage of the planet, but also of America.
How do you translate your message, which seems to make
sense in a corporate structure, how do you translate that
(28:58):
for someone who maybe isn't working, you know, as an executive,
who is working at McDonald's, or working, you know, as
a janitor, has a regular a regular job, a blue
collar job. How do they take the message of of
feminism and an empowerment into a non corporate environment. So
(29:20):
I love, I love this question because today UM actually
spoke at the U. S. Treasury Department and UM actually
had the reverse question, you know, how do you translate
this into corporate For me, UM, I think the reality
is is the inequality that exists in society, which is
the fact that we value men in masculinity more than
women in femininity. UM exists in workplaces, irrespective of your workplace.
(29:43):
The studies find, and it's been replicated over thirty years
across geographies, that when we think of managers or mail
you know, when we think of managers or leaders, literally
those two words, we think of males. There's the thing
manager think male phenomenant. It's very well established. And so
for me, this is actually about you know, serspective of
what role you're working in. It's likely that what good
(30:03):
looks like in that setting is a masculine ideal and
to engage in behaviors that are masculine in order to
fit that ideal. And you know, that's why I have
my weekly podcast where I interview people from a range
of backgrounds, from music, from surfing, from you know, blue
collar workers, you name it to really understand how inequality
is everywhere. And it's everywhere because patriarchy is everywhere. And
(30:26):
patriarchy is simply that belief that men and masculinity are
more valuable than women and femininity. And so my message
to everybody is, hey, we need to reset what we value,
you know, in our homes. We need to think about
do we value women's careers as much as men's. And
this is something you know, I have to work on
with my husband and already work through here. I need
you to value my ambitions and my career interests and
(30:46):
my value in contribution to society as much as you
value your own. And to do that we have to
share the load of work. And so this really plays out,
you know, in society, this idea that when we walk
into workplaces and we leave our biases and prejudice at
a harm. It's crazy. It doesn't matter what workplace you
work and you're likely to encounter an equality in it
because we have an equality in society. And that's why
(31:07):
for me, I almost feel like as an advocate, I'm
reversed to engineering a problem because I'm like, if we
can tackle in workplaces, you know, at least where boards
are holding these businesses accountable for you know, ensuring that
they are competitive and diversity the path of doing this,
maybe we can rewind back into our horns. Great conversation.
Thank you so much for being with us today, No problem,
Thank you so much. You can find Michelle King's podcast
(31:32):
at The Fix Stories of challenges and triumphs women across innovation,
technology and entrepreneurship. Her book again is The Fix, Overcome
the Invisible Barriers that are holding women back at work
and also connect with her on Instagram at Michelle Penelope King,
on Twitter at Michelle Peeking, or go to our website
(31:53):
Michelle Peeking dot com. The Road to Somewhere is recorded
in New York City. Make sure you share, subscribe, rate,
and review us and let us hear from you. Where
are you on your journey? Connect with us on Instagram
and Twitter at pod to Somewhere. Email us at road
to Somewhere at iHeartMedia dot com. Special thanks to our producer,
(32:14):
Alicia Haywood. Thanks for joining us on the Road to Somewhere.
Available on the i Heart Radio app, on Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.
Road to Somewhere News
Hosts And Creators
Lisa Oz
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