Nasty Women, and Why We Need Them

This week's newsletter comes on the heels of presumptive Democratic Presidential Candidate Joe Biden's recent announcement that Senator Kamala Harris will be his running mate. Depending on your news source, there is genuine excitement about this choice, and not just because Harris is 22 years younger than Biden, from the most populous state on the West Coast, a woman of color—basically the Yin to Biden’s Yang.

But more because Biden’s pick does not feel like tokenism so much as a strong leader’s recognition that the moment for a new brand of leadership has come. While this may become the first time a woman is Vice President, this is hardly the first time a woman will be tapped to help “fix” a bad situation. Yes, of course Biden would be the inheriting President, but why do you think everyone brings up Harris’s relative youth and “energy?” Because “Flattening the Curve,” and repairing the social and economic damage sustained in the U.S. is going to take grit and a practical, collaborative energy that women naturally bring to the table; and men will be forced to adopt, or hire, this patient-but-persistent approach to getting things done. 

My hope for this partnership—and for the well-being of the United States—is that this potential new leadership (trying not to jinx it, here) practices what it preaches, that the strengths Harris brings to the table are truly utilized, and that Biden continues to lead with maturity and humility. This means knowing when to defer and let her lead.

There are precedents for this model in business (Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg), but sadly not many. All too often women get the nod for a top, or close-to-top spot, to round out a leadership team and are stripped of their potency, not recognized for the strengths that got them to the table, marginalized and holding a title in name only to appease customers. It’s demoralizing for women, and a tragic waste of potential. 

I was disappointed (actually, pissed) when I read Francoise Brougher’s account of her mistreatment and the misogyny she encountered as COO of Pinterest, a company I have long admired for it’s reputation as appreciative of the inputs of women (who comprise 70% of its user base). According to Brougher, 

“In less than two years, I grew Pinterest’s revenue from $500 million to $1.1 billion, increased the advertiser base from 10,000 to 80,000, and expanded operations to 20 countries. Half the company’s 1,500 employees reported to me.

But despite her performance, and despite being hired for her operational experience leading teams at Google and Square and her relationships with investors, she was excluded from critical product meetings and the company's pre-IPO investor tour, penalized for offering her opinions, eventually fired, and then asked to sign an NDA corroborating a story that she left by choice, which she refused.

Brougher also learned that she was compensated differently than her male peers and had been misled to believe she was being compensated equally. Pair this example with that of Emily Kramer, Carta’s former marketing head, who resigned and sued her former employer when she learned that she was being compensated less than her male peers and told, similarly to Brougher, that despite unmitigated success growing the company, she exhibited interpersonal issues. In Kramer's case, she was cited for being in violation of the “no asshole” policy.

An ironic twist: I had met Emily a few months before her departure at an event my company co-sponsored with Carta for female startup founders, where she'd presented a compelling case detailing how women are often screwed out of recognizing the value they are entitled to as startup equity holders because of implicit bias in cap tables. This presentation, part of the Table Stakes project that was to generate outstanding press for both Carta and the cause of equity equality, blew me away. Her passion and command of the topic made her the ideal evangelist for her company; her ability to connect with and provide value to founders (Carta's customers), I thought, made her a powerful asset. 

I’m grateful to Kramer and Brougher, who could have slinked away, licked their wounds and pretended none of this ever happened. They could have defaulted to shame and declined to defend themselves or become complicit in their victimhood by assuming they didn’t measure up to the systems that discriminated against them. They didn’t make the bargain many senior women negotiate with themselves of keeping their mouths shut and agreeing to friendly departures to avoid public scrutiny. 

I can’t imagine that Pinterest or Carta will not change as a result of these revelations. But the change that must come can’t be in a blanket statement about the importance of diversity. Female executives at these companies can’t be put on display like signs put out on the lawn that say, “Women Executives Matter". Investments must be made to ensure equity.

Channeling Joe Biden: Women who are tasked to lead must lead. 

Some more great discussion on this topic can be heard on this podcast by my BlogHer Co-Founder and person who irritatingly has never needed a teleprompter, Elisa Camahort Page. I miss getting riled up with her… Call me...

And this piece on insanely hypocritical performance reviews by another woman who understands intimately the "damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t 'double bind' that women and BIPOC people (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) can face in the workplace," Ellevest CEO Sallie Krawcheck, Wall St. Rabble Rouser and Original Gangsta of the Women who Talk about It set. Thanks for keeping us brave, Sallie.

If GenXers are now “Perennials,” does that mean we’re immortal?

No, it doesn’t. But this white paper by Julie Des Jardins of management consultancy CREDAS does point out some other superpowers that GenX women have that the world desperately needs right now—resilience, adaptability, immediate recall of every Schoolhouse Rock song ever created...

Let’s address the elephant in the room: Yeah, Julie and I are related. We’re identical twins. And I am exactly like her, minus the blue hair, advanced degrees and patience to research things that depress me. I managed to get through Ada Calhoun’s thought-provoking, occasionally terrifying book, Why We Can’t Sleep: Women’s New Midlife Crisis, and will just share the Cliff’s Notes. 

Gen X women: We’re screwed. 

We’re the first generation that will NOT be more prosperous than our parents, dinged like helpless pinballs between economic downturns that have permanently limited our long-term career opportunities. And we're also to blame as we were told we could have it all—careers, babies, libidos—and now we feel as though we’ve failed to meet our full potential.

Fortunately Julie and the CREDAS team see our status of being wedged between bigger, bolder generational cohorts as key to getting us unstuck from the geopolitical, economic, cultural mess we’re currently in at work (again, I defer to why Kamala Harris has been tapped to lead.) The term Generation X, coined from Douglas Coupland’s iconoclastic novel about people that I could have dated in college makes us sound way more cool and mysterious than we actually are. But that’s OK. I accept that I haven’t been cool for at least 25 years. 

According to Des Jardins:

Whereas the “Greatest Generation” came of age in the Great Depression and then rose to defeat fascism in World War II, the greatness of GenXers has been until now less conspicuous, harder to pinpoint. And yet in their weathering of smaller wars and recessions, Xers have taken their hits, hunkered down, and slowly rebuilt for the long term. It has taken some decades of hindsight to see that what makes them exceptional is a quality rarely cast in heroic light: their long and steady resilience.

...In the workplace, (Perennials’) brand of heightened resilience translates to an uncommon ability to adapt to conditions, smooth friction, calm fears, build consensus, embrace difference, communicate ideas, consider multiple points of view, and reinvent—to endure.

"Actually, Perennials have done more than endure. They have become unfailing and quietly irrepressible."

Unfailing and quietly irrepressible. Alas I’ve found my new LinkedIn tagline.

And now for Gen Y and Z

Fifteen years ago marketers broke social media early adopters into two categories: Digerati, and Old People. Over time, and many social platforms later, there is much more nuance to the behaviors and preferences of the social media user. This infographic by Ignite Social Media provides a look at the differences between Millennials (who used to be the youngsters) and Gen Z’s. (Full infographic can be found here for download).

Not surprisingly, nearly twice the percentage of Gen Z’s (now ages 8-23) use TikTok (35%) than Millennials (ages 24-39; 19%). And more than twice the number of Millennials (82%) are on Facebook, than Gen Z’s (40%). Surprisingly, nearly 40% more Gen Z’s use Snap and only 3% more Millennials are on YouTube. And Twitter, for its age and media influence, has relatively few users compared to other platforms over 10 years old (27% and 22.9%, respectively).

All this to say: We and our kids are still spending waaaay too much time on social apps.

Quote of the Week:

From Senator and Vice Presidential Candidate Kamla Harris, at the Black Girls Lead 2020 virtual conference. Surfaced by the Ellevest Editorial Team:

“There will be a resistance to your ambition. There will be people who say to you, ‘you are out of your lane,’ because they are burdened by only having the capacity to see what has always been instead of what can be. But don’t you let that burden you.” 

Happy Weekend, stay unburdened.