Corrections or additions?
This article by Kathleen McGinn Spring was prepared for the November 13, 2002 edition of U.S. 1 Newspaper. All rights reserved.
Working Women Through the Ages
Mountains of books have been written about the external
forces that shape our lives: marriage, child rearing, health problems,
death of a loved one, unemployment, etc. But social scientists Marian
N. Ruderman and Patricia J. Ohlott have taken a look at a
universal force that also shapes our lives — the simple act of
aging and maturing.
Their new book, “Standing at the Crossroads: Next Steps for High-Achieving
Women” (Jossey-Bass), explores the virgin territory into which
female executives have trooped in the past several decades. After
speaking with women at all stages of their careers, the authors find
patterns, ways in which successful women refine the way they relate
to work at different stages of their lives.
Ohlott, a research associate with the Center for Creative Leadership
in Greensboro, North Carolina, speaks at a half-day workshop on women’s
leadership issues on Monday, November 18, at 7:45 a.m. at the Holiday
Inn Select in Clinton. The workshop is sponsored by the Hunterdon
Chamber and costs $65. Call 908-735-5955.
This excerpt from the book talks about how successful women shift
focus as they advance in their careers:
Women Aged 29-33: Married to My Job. This is a very busyand exciting time of life for managerial women. Agency — takingcontrol of your own destiny — was the dominant theme in the livesof these women. Virtually all were very intense in the pursuit oftheir careers. Women in this group are establishing the groundworkfor an executive life, teaming to take risks and have an impact onan organization. The majority of time in all three interviews wasspent talking about their current major projects — their struggles,their accomplishments, and the visibility resulting from leading ahigh-profile initiative.They work extremely hard — long hours and weekends. They see theircurrent assignment as a stepping-stone to an executive career. Theyscan the environment for future tasks, projects, and assignments thatcould help them achieve their goals. They have a life plan that revolvesaround their career. Women aged 29-33 seek out developmental opportunitiesto enhance their capabilities.These women are working to show they can succeed in a career so thatif they later decide to have children no one can say they are notcareer-oriented. Even those who already have children are workingendless hours because they want to prove themselves relatively earlyin their career.Wholeness manifests itself in terms of concerns about spending toomuch time at work and not having enough time for themselves or familymembers and friends. However, they don’t seem as distressed by theissue as some of the older women are because they don’t focus on whatthey are missing. Even when they say they want to be more balanced,they tend to avoid making the changes that would let them work lessand attend to other things. They have a lot of self-discipline andare willing to sacrifice life outside work to create the foundationfor a high-level career. They seem to trust that there will be a timewhen they will get around to other things.Women Aged 34-40: Branching Out. Women in this age groupare often in transition, and many face the first significant encounterwith a career obstacle. Life has a lot of uncertainty for this groupof women.They keep working on career goals and contemplate what it will taketo reach them, seeking to move from junior positions to more seniorones. Some see that their career isn’t blooming as they dreamed. Reorganizationsmay have removed a target position, disagreements with senior managersmay have slowed progress, or they may simply have come close enoughto the glass ceiling to feel its effects personally. In response,many add to their career goals by taking on a new role or a new job.However, in the process they adjust their lives so as to be both moreauthentic and realistic. They focus on how they fit with the job notjust in terms of skills but also in terms of personality and lifestyle.Connection is more important to these women than to the younger ones.Life has expanded beyond career and their involvements focus on otherpeople as well as on work. They tend to set goals that include friendsand family, and they vow to spend more time with their loved onesand friends. Single women are intent on adding intimacy to their lives.One manager said, “I have become totally rootless, in other words,I have no roots anywhere.” She had moved so many times for hercareer that she felt all alone, and her new goal was to be more settled.The focus on connection carries over at work as well. These womentry to be more personable with their staffs and work on networkingspecifically with women in their own and other organizations. Someof them have reached levels with few female peers and they seek todevelop supportive relationships with managers facing similar issues.Wholeness is the dominant developmental theme for thisage cohort, and usually involves substantial pain. As their familylife becomes more demanding, these women often describe themselvesas “fragmented.” They try to reevaluate their priorities soas to feel more whole. They’ve begun to see that having it all hasa price tag, and they long to feel better integrated. But if theydo cut back at work, they feel insecure. Meanwhile, single women questionwhat else there is besides work. One said, “I have a great careerbut nothing else going on in my life.”Self-clarity still seems secondary. However, women in this age groupare starting to talk about the different ways men and women are treatedin their organizations. They start to consider this context in relationto their own experience. They also begin to see their lives in totalityand develop long-term visions as to how they would like to grow. Self-descriptionsdemonstrate a relatively longterm perspective: “Maybe I can’thave it all at the same time but I can have it all at different times.”Women Aged 41-45: Getting Comfortable in My Own Skin.Agency is still a developmental theme, but the focus is less on careerand more on other life goals. These women restructure their livesto focus on what is most important. They exert control over theirlives and start shaping their environments so they can have as greata sense of well-being as possible. Instead of leaving difficult situations,they are more inclined to fight back and set boundaries and conditionsthat are more satisfying. One said, “Even if I lost my job andincome, it’s okay …. I am being a proactive advocate for myselfversus being a victim or reactor to circumstance.”Authenticity is the dominant theme for this cohort, which is partof the reason their agency is active in multiple life domains. Thesewomen work actively to ensure that their lives and their values arealigned as closely as possible. They rarely sit back and accept thestatus quo. They make career decisions without seriously compromisingpersonal goals. In contrast to the younger women, they place greatervalue on internal measures of success than on the organization’s yardstick.When dual-career issues come up, these women can create solutionsthat help both spouses achieve their goals — sometimes with somefriction — but they know how to work things through with theirhusbands. Women in this group also excel at using boundaries to ensurethat they live life according to their priorities. They keep the promisesthey make to themselves.They want to become mentors, making it a goal to give back to thecommunity of women some of the lessons they have learned. They findthemselves attracting others to them and derive great pleasure fromthe mentoring experience. Furthermore, by coaching others these womenreinforce their own strengths and their philosophy of life. They takeresponsibility for socializing other women to the organization.In their own work, they are good at seeking out others to act as soundingboards and help them deal with difficult issues. They have peers theycan share concerns and hopes with. They rely on others in a sophisticatedway.This is the first cohort with a relatively high level of self-clarity.The other groups were aware of their own strengths and weaknesses,but rarely saw themselves in the context of life experiences and thelarger world. This group seemed to have teamed what worked for themand what didn’t. They saw things more clearly than the younger womendid. They also valued personal growth and development. They were opento teaming more about themselves through therapy, self-help books,and other methods. They had the confidence to review their lives andtry to improve them. They clearly identified and surfaced gender differencesin the ways their organizations treated people.Wholeness begins to move to the front seat. One said, “This jobis very important, but I’m not going to sacrifice everything elsefor it.” She followed through on this and kept her job from crowdingout other activities and roles. Primarily she strengthened her boundariesand actively said no to many tasks she thought would unnecessarilyexpand her time at work. Another told us how she’d refused to flyacross country for a meeting that would cut into a planned vacation,offering to join via videoconference instead.The women in this cohort have become better problem solvers. Theycan see different paths to a goal and pick the one that allows forthe greatest feelings of wholeness. Those in the next younger grouphad the same desire for wholeness but were not so effective in takingaction to limit the encroachment of work on personal time-perhapsbecause they didn’t see alternatives, perhaps because they didn’tfeel they had enough organizational capital to suggest alternativeapproaches. Women in their early 40s have realized that you can’thave it all at the same time and also have developed the initiativeto carry out alternative strategies.Women Aged 46-50: Growing in Wisdom. These womenhave achieved a significant management level and seek to make theirmark on their organizations. They also want to exercise influencein a way that is truly beneficial to others, and to act as a modelof leadership. They are focused on fine tuning their lives to builda structure that will allow them to have a major impact before theyretire.Agency and authenticity seem to interact for women in this cohort.They fine-tune their lives to make life on and off the job more authentic.They actively work to obtain and preserve authenticity by either leavingunauthentic situations or trying to change their situations so theycan act authentically within them.Connection goals matter to this cohort but seem less intense thanfor some of the younger groups. These women tend to take a very matter-of-factapproach to connection, as if the possibility of not valuing it highlydoesn’t exist. Several mentioned expanding their circle of intimaterelationships. They have strong connections with a handful of peopleand they want to expand their personal networks by renewing old relationshipsor creating new ones. Those with elderly parents strive to spend moretime with them.This group also values self-clarity and focuses on learning more andgrowing. They are attuned to gender dynamics and struggle to understandhow gender issues play out in their work environments. Some of themopenly discussed their experiences of sexism and discrimination. Theyhave seen people enter, advance, and leave executive careers and havenoticed women facing greater obstacles than men do.Women Aged 51-55: Making My Mark. At this age some ofthe chief concerns of connection are how to develop younger womenand how to use a sense of connection to be supportive of others. Thesewomen see themselves as senior in their organizations and they feelresponsible for nurturing the next generation of women managers. Moregenerally, connections in their personal life are a great source ofjoy.Authenticity is a major issue, with many talking of honoring themselves.They decide to start or resume hobbies and actually carry throughon these goals. They are very clear on their priorities and structuretheir lives in accordance with them, with no waffling. They seem comfortablewith their own definitions of success and no longer care about thedifferences between traditionally male external measures of successand their own yardsticks.As they approach retirement, they seek a deeper meaning in life apartfrom work. One said, “As I grow older and I reflect on what isreally success, it seems to me that what’s really success is to beable to raise a child that will contribute to society in a meaningfulway and that should really be my goal. And yes, I can have professionalsuccess based on how much I get paid and how much recognition, butwhat I really contribute to a greater scheme of civilization or whateveryou want to call it — is what values I leave with this child.”Previous StoryNext StoryCorrections or additions?This page is published by PrincetonInfo.com— the web site for U.S. 1 Newspaper in Princeton, New Jersey.
