Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Lessons - Navigating Gender Bias and Ageism | Bonnie Marcus - Author of Not Done Yet

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Lessons - Navigating Gender Bias and Ageism | Bonnie Marcus - Author of Not Done Yet · Success Story with Scott Clary

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  In this lessons episode, we dive into the challenges women face, particularly the double burden
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  of gender bias and ageism as they age. You'll learn how these issues impact career growth
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  and financial security and explore strategies for creating a more inclusive workplace.
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  Discover practical tips on addressing unconscious bias,
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  in hiring and fostering a supportive environment for women at all career stages.
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  Let's fast forward to what you're living and breathing every single day,
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  which is both helping women in promotion and achieving greater success in their career,
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  but also helping women over a certain age group. Let's talk about that a little bit,
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  because I think that's what you're coaching and you're consulting and you're mentoring really
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  revolves around. What are the issues that we see? Let's just describe the issues that we see,
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  so there's a lot of conversation about this, but I think that somebody who works in this
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  can really nail what issues our women are confronted with. What are some things that perhaps
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  men take for granted that don't come so easy to women? Let's talk through some of those,
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  and then we can speak about some of the fixes and the solutions that you probably highlight
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  in the book, obviously, but also some of the things that you teach over to people.
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  Okay, so first of all, women for decades have been dealing with gender bias in the workplace.
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  We don't have the same opportunities for advancement. We lack sponsorship. We are not paid equally,
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  and we also suffer the motherhood penalty. Now, of course, there's more flexibility,
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  there's parental leave in some cases, better maternity leave, but certainly when I was entering
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  the workplace and the women who were over 50 that didn't happen. So for decades, we've been
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  dealing with gender bias and trying our best to deal with that and still be successful
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  in the workplace. What happens when women start to show visible signs of aging?
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  They now suffer what I call the double whammy of both gender bias and ageism.
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  And what happens is that women are marginalized. Nobody seeks out their opinions anymore.
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  They're not invited to key meetings. Often they're portfolios. Their workload is redistributed.
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  And that's based on our society's emphasis on looks, it's called lookism, right?
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  Our looks, the pressure to be young and attractive.
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  And it's really based on whether or not our visible changes, which infuriates me, right?
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  What happens is men, of course, have ageist issues as well.
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  But research, especially from a catalyst, there's a trend brief that shows that
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  women face ages a much earlier than men. And it is based solely on appearance.
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  So we are much more vulnerable then to being not only marginalized but pushed out.
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  And then the issue becomes okay, now you're over 50, you're being pushed out, then it's so much more
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  difficult to get another job. So the women that I interviewed for this book, some of them were,
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  you know, had panic attacks that people are going to find out how old they are. And they have
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  Botox and fillers. And I live surgery in hopes that they can extend their career trajectory.
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  And survive for longer. I mean, this issue, I think, is beneath the radar. And I think a lot of
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  people don't understand how this affects women's financial security as well as their career trajectories.
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  And one reason why I wrote the book is I wanted to bring more awareness to this issue.
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  I wanted to give women a voice to deal with it and also the tools.
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  And my question to you is, why is this not more prevalent or why is this not more discussed?
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  Because if you look at the topical issues of the day, they sort of run in different trends,
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  like where, of course, you have to have unrepresented minorities to have more of a seat at the table
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  and fill more executive positions. And then now we're talking about women who we would have hoped
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  at this point in God forbid 2021, there wouldn't be as many issues. But I guess my point is like,
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  how do you get this message out there? How do you, how do you, I don't mean, it's not insensitive,
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  but prove that this is something that is still relevant because I think it slips people's minds.
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  I think that you see it, but it's not in your face all the time. I just, you know, I just,
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  I've had lots of conversations about a lot of underrepresented populations. And I think that,
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  yes, I've seen, especially in sales, I'm in sales, I'm in tech, in every job I've ever worked,
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  there's definitely an under-representation of women. But I don't know why that is. It just
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  seems like less apply, less look for the jobs, let, you know, and it doesn't seem like it's
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  something that me as an executive has the ability to fix. I know obviously I'm speaking,
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  I'm saying I do have the ability to fix it, but how do I actually fix it when I'm in that position?
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  And I don't see the women stepping forward to take those jobs that I would give them
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  if they applied, or am I just being completely ridiculous in saying that? I don't know. You're the
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  expert. Well, I'm not going to call you ridiculous. You're the host of this podcast. And you have,
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  you know, you have your own, you have your own experience in this area. I mean, you know, for,
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  for decades, women have suffered in tech. And for those who did go to grad school in STEM fields,
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  many of them drop out, you know, because they, they're suffering due to the gender bias. And I've
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  had clients in STEM fields where it is so male dominated, the gender bias is still so prevalent,
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  the unequal, the unfair playing field that they, you know, they'll go someplace else. They'll,
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  they'll change industries. But to your point about bringing more awareness to it,
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  I talk about this issue. And I draw some, some similarities to what it was like for women before
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  the Me Too movement, dealing with sexism in the, in the workplace. Women were silent.
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  They felt ashamed to come forward and talk about any kind of sexual harassment or abuse.
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  They didn't feel that there was a safe environment for them to have these kinds of discussions. And
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  they certainly didn't have any kind of legal backing to, to really do so. And it was off everybody's
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  radar because women were silent. I find the same things happening with gendered ageism.
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  Right now, women have been, especially the women I interviewed, who insisted they be anonymous,
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  by the way, in the book, for the most part, are ashamed to come forward and say, you know,
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  what I'm 62 years old and I'm, I'm being subjected to these demeaning remarks and that they don't
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  want to call attention to themselves for fear of backlash. They don't feel safe. There isn't a
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  safe environment to talk about it. And so it's, it's really off the radar. And I think that bringing
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  more awareness to it, having gendered ageism be included in unconscious bias training and
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  in corporate trainings to help people understand that this is a real issue for women is important.
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  As well as, you know, how do you deal with it on an individual basis? Because any of our bias
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  starts with us first. So that, you know, the point that I, I discussed before, I, I agree with
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  everything. I agree with absolutely everything you're saying. I was just thinking, I've been in the
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  position where I've been hiring. And I guess what I, what I'm trying to say is, how do, how do I
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  change so that I can find more candidates that I can bring in so I can even the playing field? And
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  if that's something or a tool or a strategy that a company can adopt, maybe it's bringing into
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  the unbi, like the, the bias training and the, well, the unconscious bias training. I mean, part
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  of that bias training, Scott, it's usually to do an assessment of all your policies and practices.
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  Some of that may be the way you word your, your job searches. And this can be really an eye
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  opener when somebody else objectively looks at it and says, well, you know, you're really the way
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  you're using that word that words, words are important and it's kind of subtle. But
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  so if you're not getting those applicants, I think that's the first place to look. And a lot of
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  corporations that go through bias training and unconscious bias training, those are some of the
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  things that they look at. And some of them are subtle, you know? No, I think that that's a great,
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  it's great advice. And that's something that, you know, I'm going to internalize as well and just
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  in the things that I do when I'm looking to hire for roles and whatnot because I've, I've just
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  noticed like without even paying attention to it, when I put out a role for a sales leader or
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  a sales individual, it's like 99% male. And I think most, I think most leaders would love,
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  would love more, would love more females brought into the workforce or so many benefits to
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  bringing people that don't have that traditional sales, bro culture, that's not a positive culture
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  for any organization. But how do you get rid of that if you find that 99% of the applicants
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  are all fitting that mold? And you're right, it's how do you word the job searches? How do you
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  represent yourself as a company? How do you conduct the interviews screening? Who's doing the
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  interviews in the screening? Are you bringing up the right point? But it's something that, you know,
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  people don't think they have a bias until someone else points it out, right? And so that's really
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  important. One of the things that I talk about a lot in the book is to do some self-reflection
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  and identify your own bias because that's the, I mean, for instance, gendered ageism, ageism in
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  general, so ingrained in our culture that we don't realize that we've internalized a lot of this
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  stuff. And I recognize, certainly, when I was writing this book and going through, you know,
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  how to coach women to do this, I realized, well, gee, I mean, you've got a whole list of
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  ages, things that you're dealing with as well. So I think it's important to really start there.
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  And from a company perspective, the leaders need to do that. They need to, you know, not just
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  gendered ageism, but gender bias and some of the things that you're talking about.
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  How do the leaders feel about these things? What are some of the biases that they hold? And how does
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  that affect their communication, their behavior, as well as policies and practices in the business?
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  Thanks for tuning in. If you found this valuable, don't forget to hit that subscribe button so
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  you never miss an episode. And if you want to dive deeper into this conversation, check out the
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  links in the description to watch the full episode. See you in the next one.