Coming up in the system
When I started working in the early 1990s, at the height of the Bush-Clinton transition period, the economic scene was full of yuppies, materialism and “trickle down economics”: the theory that if you made a lot of money then hire a gardener, everybody wins. Rich money “trickles down” to the lower classes!
I was bright-eyed and optimistic, expecting that the work world would embrace intellect and energy just as the academic world had. I took a job at a global consulting firm, where I thought my work would have meaning. Needless to say, my introduction into the system of global commerce was surprising.
After the novelty wore off, I was surprised to see how much of people’s time was invested in superficial activities and tasks that had little substance or significance. By how much insider language and posturing there was. The leather binder FiloFax, the Covey seminars, the earnest exploration of financial engineering techniques, the games, the socializing, the private clubs, the client rules, the time sheets. The lessons in running a professional services firm, where you push the tasks down to the lowest level resource that can accomplish them. The cubicles! PowerPoint! The boredom! How could any of that be meaningful? We worked long hours, which is fine with me — but 50% of our work was either filling out paperwork or looking busy to show that we were working. There was little innovation, little creation.
Moreover, when I looked around, nobody around me seemed happy.
The culture was harmful for every employee, but it was particularly toxic for the few women in the company. There was only one female partner in our location. She was smart, kind, wealthy, masculine in carriage, unmarried and childless. All the other women there were also childless. At the time, my husband and I had three little ones, all under five years old. The corporate work world at that time didn’t allow a comfortable reconciliation these two aspects of life. It had to be one thing or another.
Though that was 20 years ago, in most big companies, little has changed (aside from the FiloFax). Literally the same discussions of motherhood or not, of executive access, of equal pay — are still happening almost verbatim.
The designs and structures of the dominant way of working are not designed to fit the oscillations of a real and complete life — which is to say a woman’s life, where so many of the core responsibilities for raising a family, caring for relatives, caring for the community still fall. While there are organizations that have attempted to overhaul or at least shift the patriarchal structures of the working world, we still adhere mainly to a structure designed by and for men. As in so many other cases, the context around this system has changed drastically — while the system itself has remained largely static. The embedded misogyny of the system, including pay gaps, sexualized environments, glass ceilings and all of the other syndromes we read about are real. And at the lower levels of an organization, they are difficult if not impossible to overcome.
Taken in this context, becoming an entrepreneur is almost a compulsory gender choice. As a woman, I decided there was only one place to be: at the top, where I could control my own rhythm and schedule, set my own pay, and attempt to define the culture in a way that fit my values. The choice was a natural fit for my temperament and upbringing, too: My dad didn’t raise me to be subservient. He raised me to think and lead. I was starting little businesses as a teenager, and in college, and I knew how to hustle.
I worked for a total of six years in large company environments before striking out on my own.
Being an entrepreneur, owner and founder is still stressful. The success or failure of your venture rests squarely on your back, and there’s rarely a time when you can say “Well, that’s not my problem.” You spend your days adjusting all the dials and levers of an enterprise in order to make the pieces fit, trying like hell not to run out of cash before you get revenue, making sure your profit is up and your messaging is right. But with the right people and the right culture, it’s a lot of fun.
In my work life, I also saw that the toxicity of the corporate culture wasn’t only about gender. The reason those companies couldn’t make the most of my gifts wasn’t unique to me as a woman — it was because their design didn’t allow for customization. The disconnection I was encountering was because I wasn’t able to bring joy and creativity to my work. My concerns weren’t only woman’s issues or even era issues. They were and are human issues, and they are pervasive.
I’m writing and thinking a lot about redesigning work. This is part of that series.
