Play Like A Man, Win Like A Woman Part 9

I also advised Jennifer not to have regrets. She was making her own decision, and it was one she could be proud of. No one was forcing her to leave.

Now Jennifer told me that she had been working part-time for six years and was about to return full-time. The irony of the situation was that her new job was to replace the other woman, who had indeed been promoted, just as Jennifer had feared. But that woman was expecting a baby herself, and was taking a few years off to stay home.

I don't mean to suggest that every story has a happy ending. Of course it doesn't. My point is that there was a time when none of these tales of the business world ended well for women. This is a healthy indicator of change.

A sequential career means that when you're ready, you can return to work you love able to see new possibilities, open to new ideas. It had never entered my mind to enter television. But when I did, I saw that my experience in politics had prepared me well for my new job-it taught me to think like a politician. When I dealt with Capitol Hill, I was able to understand how the subtleties worked without having to ask.

A lot of young women feel that if they leave a full-time job, their former equals will end up far ahead of them when they return. This harkens back to the ten-year-plan issue (see Chapter 3: Set the Right Goal). If you think everything is part of a long-term strategy, and each move is an incremental step up the ladder, you miss the fact that almost anything in life can be a learning experience. A side road only becomes a dead end when you forget that side roads often lead to exciting new places.

There are times, however, when you want to leave your job, not because it's time to raise a family, or because you've fallen in love with someone who lives across the country, or because you must take care of your aging parents. Sometimes, you just want out. Other times, the powers-that-be make it clear they want you out. A recent study shows that the average American will hold eight different jobs over his or her lifetime.

The signs are everywhere: The good a.s.signments no longer come your way; you're left out of important meetings; the boss stops asking for your opinion; the smart women in the company no longer see you as their mentor but have found someone younger.

Or there are internal signs: You resent your boss, you can't stand your hours. Soon you're playing the same recording over and over in your head-the one that goes, "I hate what I do. I hate my job. I hate my career."

If these are your thoughts as you wake up in the morning, you need to take action.

Guys plan for these moments. In fact, just as they develop a strategy to make the team, they develop one to leave. They've played enough games to know that you have to be ready to make a proactive move whenever necessary. In the world of television, whenever a network is in trouble, it always seems to be the men who are quick to get out the resumes, to make the new contacts, to call up the headhunters. They're ready to sell themselves at a moment's notice.

Think of it this way: Men and women approach jobs the way they approach their relationships; men, who are polygamy-oriented, always look for multiple opportunities; women, who are monogamy-oriented, want their job to be long-lasting. We can become so attached to our company that sometimes we refuse to leave even when we're miserable. This may make us seem like wonderfully loyal employees, but it can also turn us into victims. We want to stay and prove ourselves, but in the meantime they push us too hard and pay us too little. We're miserable, we're indignant. But we often don't go anywhere.

Why? Probably because we find risk so frightening.

But leaving is often the only right thing.

And it often pays off. My friend Jo in telecommunications hated her job for years. Her particular tape-"I do all the work and my boss gets all the glory"-ran through her head every morning on the way to work and every evening on the way back. She was well paid, but mistreated, and embittered.

Jo braced herself, entered her boss's office, and told him she had found another job. She then joined a start-up company where she was extremely happy-for a year. The company went belly up, and she was jobless, back at square zero.

Or was she? Here was her (and our) worst fantasy come true; no different from the received wisdom that says if you leave your husband or partner you'll be alone in the world.

But the reality was, Jo had a new job in a month-and her new employer hired her exactly because of her entrepreneurial nature. After all, she'd left a major company to work with a start-up. And, she brought with her everything she'd learned in that tough start-up year.

She took a risk. The worst happened. She still won.

Leave when you know you must. But leave intelligently. Too often, when we do reach the breaking point, we take action impulsively. "I'll get back at them," we think. "I'll cook their goose. I'll just walk out right now and that will show them."

You can't storm off the field. A little boy who walks out on the team is so scorned by the other players that he learns his lesson: If you're on the team, you stay there until it makes sense to go. When you leave your company in the lurch, your a.s.sociates will consider you disloyal, untrustworthy, a quitter. That is not a reputation to cultivate.

Instead, come up with a sensible plan. Call up your contacts. Take tests. Send out your resume. See a headhunter. Read the employment section of the newspaper-but not wishfully. Read it purposefully. If you see something interesting, respond. When you line up the new position, tell your boss considerately and intelligently. Let him know how much you have learned from working with him-but that now, it's time for both of you to move on. If you were careful about picking the right boss (remember-a good boss is more important than a good job), he should understand the fait accompli without making you feel guilty.

Be advised that if you're unhappy, it's unlikely that your job performance is solid. Tell yourself you're doing the company a favor by gracefully orchestrating your exit and by giving your boss the chance to bring in someone who can do your job with fresh enthusiasm.

A good boss wants to know if you're miserable. Personally, I have a rule for all my staff: If I'm not the first one to know when people are unhappy, they're in trouble.

As risky and unpleasant as it may seem, if you plan your escape well, you may be making the least risky move of your career. Both you and your company will prosper from it.

GAME HINT: One way to leave well is to stop thinking of your current job as The Big Career-that can make you feel even more frustrated as your discontent grows. Tell yourself it is simply the means to an end. In other words, it is just The Paycheck.

Think: This isn't the right place for me, but I need to pay the rent (or save for graduate school or create a retirement fund) so I can't just walk out.

When you regard the job as a financial boon rather than a lifetime commitment, it becomes much less loaded with meaning. That makes it easier to come to work and eventually, to go.

Nineteen ninety-nine was a big year in professional sports. Or at least it was a big year for athletes to leave them. Michael Jordan, Wayne Gretzky, Cal Ripken, Jr., and John Elway all retired from their professions of basketball, ice hockey, baseball, and football respectively. Two of them may have been the best ever to play their games, but that's an argument for another book.

Apart from greatness, what all of these men definitely have in common was that they were not forced to retire. While none of them was at the top of his game, each could still play better than most of his peers, pull down a huge salary, and make his fans deliriously happy. Each also understood it was time to make an exit.

There is seldom a good reason to linger once you can no longer play your best game. That's true for football and hockey, and it's true for business.

Our careers progress in stages: first comes the heady entry-level job, when you're like a child in a candy shop and everything is exciting. Following that comes workplace adolescence, when you're on your way up, but you don't know how far you'll go. Eventually, as you reach adulthood, you're at the top of your game.

Then one day you notice that it's becoming more of an effort to come to the office, that you don't push to be included in exciting new projects, that you're not interested in proving yourself, that your attention is increasingly focused on interests outside the workplace. You're no longer a young lion going in for the kill. The only thing you're killing is time.

How many of us have the self-awareness to know the game is coming to an end? And how many of us are fully prepared to make that break when it appears inevitable? You know that Michael Jordan has spent the last decade making sure his financial house is in order (admittedly an easier thing to do when you make 50 million dollars a year). Is yours?

For most women, the answer is no. Planning our financial futures has meant having our husbands or partners take care of it, just as our fathers handled the money for our mothers. Even most of us who aren't in a relationship are still hoping that some White Knight will come charging along and save us from thinking about insurance, investments, retirement, and estate taxes.

Please! White Knights went out with girdles and bouffant hairdos. Unless you're very lucky, you alone are responsible for your financially secure old age. Even if you have a partner or husband, you can't be certain that he will be around to take care of you when your career is over. Why take the chance?

From the very beginning of the game, start planning to end it. You make sure your home is in order. Get your financial house together, too. The process takes many years, and the variables are constantly changing.

Maybe today you think you'll retire at 60, maybe tomorrow you'll make that 70, or 55, or 80. You can make continual adjustments, but you have to be absolutely sure you can afford to retire when the time comes to do it.

Buy one of the many books about financial planning. Talk to savvy friends and colleagues. Start collecting names of skilled advisors. The monetary aspect of the retirement game is something no women can afford to neglect.

If most of us have a difficult time dealing with the financial issues connected to our postcareer lives, we find it even more daunting to confront the issue of status. In other words, your job is not who you are. Your job is what you do.

Sound simple? It's not. Men have been in business for years, and few of them have learned this. I've seen hundreds of men face retirement, and even the smartest among them, my own father included, never truly mastered it.

Over the years I've learned that, to most of the world, I am not Gail Evans, but Gail-Evans-Executive-Vice-President-of-CNN. I don't exist without the rest of those words that follow my given name.

Sometimes I fall for this error myself. I've come to depend on that hyphenated phrase to land hard-to-get dinner reservations, to make a big impression at social events, to cultivate contacts and sources. It's an identification that works, it gets me into tough places, it makes people pay attention to me. I can't pretend I don't like it.

But do I truly know that those strung-together words are not who I am? I won't know that fully until I leave my job, and become just plain Gail Evans.

Resolving this issue should be a woman's gift to the workplace. We like to say that our ident.i.ty as a woman is defined by all of our various relationships: as a mother with our children, as a friend with our community, as a lover with our partner. I have noticed, however, that as women have become more powerful, we've begun to emulate men when it comes to wrapping our ident.i.ty around our job, giving up other means of valuing ourselves that have historically provided us with perspective.

But as we rise in the business world, along with the possibility that we will handle retirement the old-fashioned way, comes another prospect: that we will rewrite the rules of business, and particularly the rules for retirement. As long as we keep in mind our gift for valuing the totality of our lives, as long as we don't believe that we are only as good as our jobs, we can turn retirement, even retirement from highly successful careers, into a great adventure. Instead of feeling bereft, we can make it a time to investigate other parts of our personalities: Maybe we will go back to work part-time and mentor young women. Maybe we will return to our families. Maybe we will discover hidden talents and start new careers.

Let's take advantage of our discovery that careers can be sequential, and not only simultaneous, and make this sequence of our life the best it can be. Why shouldn't we use all our gifts as women to make retirement every bit as productive and empowering as our work years?

THE FINAL TWO RULES.

Because of their age-long training in human relations-for that is what feminine intuition really is-women have a special contribution to make to any group enterprise.

MARGARET MEAD, ANTHROPOLOGIST.

1 Be a Woman.

The other day I had lunch with one of the members of the Atlanta Braves (the team is owned by our company). We had a wonderful discussion covering a wide range of subjects-his family life, his background, his dreams, as well as mine.

A few nights later I attended a game with one of the CNN sports anchors. When the player ran out on the field, I said, "There's my new buddy!" and told the anchor about our lunch.

The sportscaster was startled. "Are you kidding?" he said. "We never talk about stuff like that." He then debriefed me on how the guys talk to each other and the press. It was all pure guy-to-guy conversation: just the facts, just the stats; no emotion, no connection.

Later I realized that my talk with the Brave had been so thoughtful because I had allowed myself to be a woman. I didn't pretend I was some kind of sports genius and I didn't try to talk like a man. I asked him how his family was dealing with his recent trade to Atlanta, how his wife was coping with the move, how his kids were adjusting to school. I tried to create a relationship with him.

So often I am struck by the personal nature of the discussions women can have with men while doing business, and I'm confident that these conversations enhance our working relationships. This doesn't mean the men leave thinking we're not savvy or astute. But it can leave them feeling safer around us. They understand that besides being business a.s.sociates, we're also real women who can take a genuine interest in their wives, their families, and the problems that they don't discuss with other men.

All the smart women I know in business agree: By allowing the natural, nurturing part of yourself to be available, you can build genuine relationships with the men you work with and for. This means that they will trust you and your opinions, which in turn can give you greater access to them.

I intensify that relationship by acting true to my instincts as a mother. Since I love kids, I always keep children's books on my shelves, which means that employees working on weekends or holidays often bring their kids to my office. This part of my personality helps soothe hurt feelings when I'm yelling at those children's parents a few days later. Like every boss, I have irrational moments. But how angry can you truly become when you can also picture your red-faced, screaming boss holding your daughter on her lap?

Use every one of your natural traits. Use your win/win att.i.tude about life to make everyone you work with feel like a valued member of the team. Use your social skills. The receptionist has a new hairstyle or the cleaning woman is back after having a baby-acknowledge these events. People remember, and reward, kindness, when it's genuine.

Most of all, use your intuition. Men don't learn about intuition-after all, there's no such phrase as "men's intuition." Women do; we're fundamentally more intuitive than men. I doubt this is an innate attribute, however. Most likely it derives from our orientation toward relationships, and the attention we pay to people's bodies, voices, minds. When the baby is crying at night, we need to know whether that cry indicates serious distress or basic fussing. When our ten-year-old says he hates school, we have to know whether he's having a bad day or he's having a bad life. If our teenager has had three minor fender benders in the last two months, we know he'll probably do it again. Saying, "Be careful," before he takes a step doesn't mean you're a genius. It means you've been carefully watching and have noticed patterns.

Intuition is the ability to be aware of what's happening around you at the moment. It means listening for the tiniest nuances of a particular situation, knowing how to read body and mind signals, and your own signals, too.

Surprising as it may seem, there aren't a lot of great mysteries in business. It's not difficult to get inside most people's heads. If you're truly listening and looking, most people are more revealing than they realize. Through body language, voice tone, words, and subtext, they'll tell you everything you need to know.

Intuition is one of the most powerful tools women have in the marketplace. To use it, all you have to do is listen-not just with your ears, but with your gut.

So employ your female instincts to your advantage-as long as you understand the effect these will have on the men in your office. It's one thing to be privately nurturing with a male peer whose work is faltering, but don't do it in a public forum or you'll embarra.s.s both of you.

Business relationships are first and foremost office alliances. This doesn't mean that they're not genuine, only that they exist to help all of you build a better, more profitable, more enjoyable workplace.

2 Be Yourself.

Whenever male writers want to create a female character of interest, they make her the most powerful, the most beautiful, or the most treacherous. She becomes a Lady Macbeth, a Helen of Troy, a Becky Sharp.

Female writers, however, paint such a heroine with integrity. Think of Jane Austen's Elizabeth Bennet, Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Ramsay, or Edith Wharton's Lily Bart: women whom other women admire because of their strong, ethical character.

I certainly wouldn't say that women have more integrity than men. That's a person-by-person judgment. But perhaps, from a sociobiological perspective, integrity is important to us because the man who has most integrity is most likely to be the one whose promises of fidelity are authentic, and therefore the best mate. Perhaps we care for integrity because we grow up believing that it is the foundation of any relationship, and relationships form the cornerstone of our existence. Or, perhaps the concept of valorizing integrity is truly hardwired into our genetic makeup.

One of the several dictionary definitions of integrity is: the quality or condition of being whole and undivided, completeness; the state of being unimpaired, soundness.

To me, this means being true to yourself, and being your true self everywhere you go, including the office.

The woman who tries to change her inner self to fit into her work environment will always be the proverbial square peg. There she is, pretending to be a tigress, but in reality she's a p.u.s.s.ycat wanting to be loved. She's a walking hypocrite, and she knows it. The lie makes her miserable, others pick up on that, and soon no one-neither her office mates nor the woman-know who she really is.

No amount of hiding or pretending will change a person's inner self. A woman who constantly recreates herself, who tries to be something other than who she is, will never be comfortable inside her own skin-or anywhere else.

Let's say a woman who's about to go out on a date with a new boyfriend spends hours beforehand trying to figure out how she should present herself. Flirt? Intellectual? Career woman? Homebody? By the time that evening is over, no matter what role she has a.s.sumed, it's unlikely that she or her date enjoyed themselves.

The same principle applies in the business world. If you funnel all your energy into propping up some counterfeit image, you'll have little left over for your job.

Still, many women create an alter ego because the "real me," they tell me, couldn't be successful. I say the "fake you" won't be successful either. Do you think you'll prosper every day you bring in some fantasy ident.i.ty? Perhaps that's why we read so many stories about female executives who drop out of corporate life because they don't feel fulfilled. Perhaps many of these women never revealed their true selves at work. How good could it feel to think you're an impersonator all day?

There is always a temptation to hide from ourselves, to have self-doubts, to tell ourselves, "I don't really know who I am, so I'll just be whatever seems most promotable."

But others can spot the ruse. We all have instincts that tell us who is genuine and who isn't, just as we sense this about ourselves. Sometimes, when I've said something clearly insincere, I catch myself and think, "I can't believe I just said that."

I remember the very first time I allowed myself to be completely, unadulteratedly me. It happened while a dozen male executives and I were watching a tape of a new CNN program designed to appeal to women. The show featured a well-known model and chronicled her day as an average woman, dropping off her child at day care, taking care of her ch.o.r.es, buying groceries, and so on.

After the tape aired, all the men in the room expressed their admiration for the show. Then they turned to me.

"What do you think?" they asked. Translation: "What does The Woman think?"

"I hate it," I said.

They a.s.sumed I was kidding. "Come on, what do you really think?" they insisted.

I reiterated my reaction. "Women aren't going to buy this," I said.

"What should we change?" they asked.

"I hate the whole thing," I said. "It isn't a matter of changing anything. It just doesn't work."

Normally I would have made suggestions on how to improve each segment, how to change the interst.i.tial portion, and a.n.a.lyzed the impact of the show from a business perspective. But this was one time I didn't feel like speaking male-talk. I knew the show wasn't going to work, because it wasn't credible. No woman in her right mind was going to believe that this stunning, privileged woman shared any of the daily problems the audience faced-much less even bought a bag of groceries.

So for the first time in my career I gave myself permission to be myself, to say what I truly believed, and deal with the consequences.

What I learned was that no one disliked me for it, or stopped asking for my opinion, or fired me. I didn't have to keep making myself up. I had enough credibility that I could express myself honestly, in my language.

Being yourself doesn't mean that you can't and won't succeed in a male world. It does mean you have to find a comfortable fit between who you are and the environment in which you work.

Nor does it mean you have to obey every one of the suggestions in this book. You don't have to toot your own horn, you don't have to speak up, you don't have to be a team player. It's fine to work anonymously in a corner or a back room, as long as you fully grasp the consequences of your actions. If you love your quiet job because you can come and go as you please, get your four percent raise every year, and have plenty of time for your life, that's fine. But if your ambition is to become CFO, CEO, or chairman of the board, you've got to make noise.

This book is about learning to make noise, and also, learning to make choices. Think of my advice as clothes you are trying on. Does the rule fit? Do you look good in it? Is it you?