Tips for women leading change

I'm in the process of writing an article on women leading change. The way we lead change is different - where we focus our energy, pitfalls to avoid, and taking advantage of what we already do well. 

These are the top 10 I have come up with so far. I would love your thoughts on these or others.

Slaying the dragons

1. Build a team you trust and enjoy working with
2. Clarify what you expect – both the roles and the relationship
3. Take credit for your work – and recognize your team’s effort
4. Work with your team to create the change story – use them to engage the organization
5. Create your own infrastructure to keep a pulse of the organization
6. Build your internal and external support/advisory group – ask for help
7. Be authentic – share your story and why this is important to you
8. Ask for other’s stories – find out what is important to them
9. Support others (especially women) and help them grow
10. Stop waiting to become the expert – step into it with confidence

Why are female managers earning less than their male counterparts?

Female managers earned 81 cents for every $1 earned by male managers in 2007, up 2 cents from 79 cents in 2000, according to theGovernment Accountability Office report released last Tuesday.

http://www.inc.com/news/articles/2010/09/GAO-reports-gender-pay-gap-persists.html

Last week I was talking with a group of women about pricing our services and the difficulties we have when having these conversations. It seems that, as women, we don't have enough confidence asking for what we want financially. All the women agreed that talking about numbers is really hard.

• Pricing our services or ourselves
• Negotiating the price and standing our ground
• Knowing how to navigate the process 
• Making appropriate compromises so everyone wins
• Staying in the game and not giving up too easily

Anyone want to go car shopping? Bring a man.

What was even more discouraging to me was that women with children had lower salaries than those without: Mothers earned 79 cents for every buck a man took home in 2007, but childfree women earned 83 cents for every dollar a man earned.

I can think of some personal reasons that could account for this difference. 

• I leave work every day to pick my girls up at day care. I see the looks when I head out the door - no one cares if I come in early or work from home at night to get my work done. I've heard the comments about my "priorities."
• When the girls are sick, I usually stay home with them. My schedule is more flexible so somehow this has become the default. I usually tell people that I am working from home, I have off-site meetings/training, or that I am sick rather than say it is my kids.
• I am not excited about having company activities on the weekend. I'm also not excited about team dinners at night. It is true - I would rather spend time with my family. Somehow this means I'm not committed enough.

I think that the assumptions people make about working moms impacts our compensation. And year after year that adds up. A lot.

Is LinkedIn different for women?

Several weeks ago I delivered LinkedIn Basics to the executives at an incentives company. I've been thinking about some of the similarities and differences in how the men and women were responding and the questions they were asking.

Both groups were very interested in using this tool in a more compelling way--

• Lots of questions and discussion on the best headlines and summaries
• How to conduct searches and research people
• Concerns about the etiquette and "rules"

It seemed that the women were much more interested in the connection aspects and the way this can be used to develop relationships and support each other. They seemed much more willing to open up their connections.

• Searching for commonalities in connections
• Sending personal messages
• Joining groups and participating
• Giving and receiving recommendations

The men seemed more interested in using it to create a personal advantage. They were reluctant to give up any information that might be used to take their business.

• Hiding their connections
• Hiding their identity when looking at people
• Finding other people's connections for a competitive edge

There was quite a bit of debate on how they would use LinkedIn moving forward. They are still in discussions even as they update their profiles. I am very much interested in where they end up.

I wonder if some of this might also be a generational issue as well. The most adamantly opposed to opening up and sharing were also the men who had been in business the longest. The younger crowd seemed more willing to open up. Maybe this is what experience will do to us - I hope not.

The old boys club

This morning over breakfast my dear friend shared a story of recent events that was so astounding it left me speechless (which is saying a lot).

They had finally found a highly qualified, proven, and experienced sales executive to join their team. The executive team convened to discuss the candidate. Oh BTW she happened to be a woman.

one guy's heated argument: we can't hire her! what will we do when we want to go play golf? this will totally mess up the team dynamics! 

CEO: do you hear what you are saying?

guy: but really, I am serious, this would really mess up the team and how we sell and what about when we want to go out drinking?

CEO: we are NOT having this conversation.

And this guy is in his early 40's.

I don't know if he ever did hear what he was saying. Or understood what it implied.

Makes me scared. and mad.

Do women take it too personally?

The last few weeks have been an emotional roller coaster. Moments of wild anticipation balanced by moments of utter dejection.

• My client doesn't call me; I think I must have done something wrong.
• I have a good meeting but then don't hear anything back; I am certain I must have said something disastrous.
• Everything is moving along brilliantly in a sales pursuit and then it goes silent; I agonize about everything I said and did that could have messed it up.

I have a tendency to assume that when things go wrong it must be something I did. I relive what happened and consider all sides of the situations... again and again... Is this a gender issue? If so, how much energy do we waste worrying about  and rehashing what is out of our control?

I want to continue learning and improving. But I wonder if we take it too far and we try to learn from experiences that are not learning grounds.

When it might be better to let it go and let things progress without the emotional energy tied to them.

I'm trying to relax and let things happen as they are supposed to happen. Everything always works out.

Competition and Collaboration

This weekend I saw "Easy A." I really enjoyed it - great lines, good acting, and just fun to watch. Made me wince as I remembered high school and the way we treated each other. When does this competition start among girls and why are we still dealing with it as adults? Or do we just move from the overt viciousness of high school to more sophisticated, covert competition as professionals?

I have wonderful relationships with my women colleagues. They are smart, talented, and great to work with. I enjoy working with them and we like to spend time together outside work too. But I have the luxury of picking my team and the people I work with. And I have often thought that having an exclusively female team might also have something to do with the dynamics.

Last weekend I listened to a group of women discuss how poorly their women leaders were dressed at a big-wig presentation and how distressed they were with the way they represented the company. I wondered if any of them had provided feedback with the women in question. It is disheartening to hear professional adult women speaking about their leaders in such a negative way.

Recently, we spent quite a bit of time coaching one of my recent women clients to have direct conversations and provide feedback when she repeatedly moved into speaking negatively about her women peers/leaders. It was a recurring pattern in this organization - quite a few women were in direct competition and were completely unsupportive of each other. The result was a lack of trust, cliques, and people "in" and people "out". A lot like high school.

I'm always surprised at the stories I hear about women who are reluctant to support other women, who are not pulling women along with them, or who are afraid of how it might look if they support women too much. And I love the stories of where it is working.

I have a friend who has repeatedly built strong and successful teams by promoting and coaching women. By putting them into stretch roles, giving them opportunities to fail, and consistently speaking positively about them. This happens to be a man. How can he be so good at this while so many women are lousy at it?

Networking tips

This morning's conversation with my daughter:

Amelia: Where are you going?

Me: Networking meeting

Amelia: What is neck working?

Me: It's a place to meet new people and make new friends.

Amelia: Why?

Me: It's important to have a lot of friends.

Amelia: Why?

Me: So that if you need help they can help you... and if they need help, you can help them.

Amelia: Ok. (whew)

So I reminded myself about why I was heading out the door at 7am (again, what is with these early meetings?). This is about building relationships so that I can help others and they can help me. A refreshing re-grounding.

Networking can feel intimidating and overwhelming so these are my tips to make it easier and usually more fun.

• Go with a friend if at all possible - strategize up front, separate to meet new people but stay in eye contact and rescue each other if needed. Don't linger with your friend - you still have to get out and meet people.
• Enter with purpose and head straight for the coffee - you can meet people while in line and commiserate about how early the meeting is. Use this to introduce yourself and get acquainted. And you have a reason to move on to meet someone else once you get your coffee.
• Leave everything except your business cards in your car trunk - you don't need to be carrying a purse or notebook (if you must take notes, put a tiny notebook in your pocket). You don't need your cell phone - it will only distract you.
• Don't claim your seat until most people are already moving toward their tables - this way you can get the lay of the land and find the right people to sit near. And don't sit down until the last minute - keep mingling.
• Only hand out your business card when there has been a solid connection and you want to follow up with the person. I see people handing out cards like crazy and I just think it is a bit cheesy. I like to think that it is more classy to have a reason to exchange cards.
• Eat before you go. There is no graceful way to mingle and talk while balancing your plate and cup and trying to eat and chew. And you can't sit down too early because then.. well really what is the point of coming?
• Keep moving. Don't get caught with one person too long. This is where your friend can come in handy - if you see her spending too long with one person, wave her over and introduce her to the person you are talking to. They you can move on.
• Go in with a positive attitude. On the way to the event, I like to think about possible best case scenarios - sometimes I meet a woman executive with a big budget who is about to launch a really big change and needs what I offer, and she is really funny and happens to have a couple of kids the same age as mine, and live in the same neighborhood, and it turns out that we know the same people. We really hit it off and immediately schedule a coffee date to talk about ways we can work together. - Wouldn't that be great? No reason it couldn't happen...

The goal is to mingle, meet people, and hopefully find a few people who you connect with - either they can help you or you can help them. Get these people's contact info and follow up. I think it is so nice to get a follow up email referencing something I said. Try to remember some personal story or something they told you so you can differentiate yourself.