When the World is Cruel to Women, Stand for One Another
Knowing very well the challenges faced by women leaders, here’s what Sylvia got to say about how to tackle it.
When love of learning brought her places
Sylvia was no beginner in the field of research. After getting her master degree in the University of Hertfordshire, she started her career as a researcher in Singapore.
Her love for research sprung from her strong willingness of learning. In life, continuous learning was something she really valued. “Why do I like research? It’s because I can learn so many things. When I do a research about certain topic I have never known before, I need to learn about it. It expands my knowledge even more,” she said.
After spending about 10 years in several different research agencies, Sylvia encountered Aldi Haryopratomo, founder of Mapan, who told her the stories about what Mapan had been doing and the vision that guided Mapan in doing what they did. Sylvia was hooked right away. It was a hard decision for her though, as when she was approached by Aldi, she also had a job offer from another well-known, established company. “I never heard anything about Mapan. But when Aldi, founder of Mapan, told me those stories, I knew I would take the risk of joining this company. Besides, joining a startup means that I have plenty of room to grow. It’s never like that in an established company where everything has been set and what you do is to only follow those set rules, so I took the risk.”
And that was how Sylvia started her journey at Mapan, leading a team of researchers and analyst in the Insight & Analytics team of Mapan.
Standing for one another: what needs to be done to tackle challenges as woman leader
Woman leaders had always been stigmatized, being labeled as moody or too emotional, to name a few. Being a woman leader herself, Sylvia knew very well that being a woman leader was really challenging. It was not only because women had different biological functions that might affect their performance they took place, but also because lack of support among women themselves.
However, those labels need not to be seen as always negative. Let’s take the label emotional for example. Sylvia herself believed that being emotional was not something negative per se. When people were being emotional, it only meant that they had feelings. That was what made people humane.
“What is wrong is when those feelings turn you into someone who is highly sensitive. Being emotional is not wrong, what you need to do is to use those feelings you have to cultivate empathy,” she argued.
As Sylvia believed that being emotional was nothing wrong, she did just that with her team. As a leader, she always taught her team members not to be highly sensitive, especially when they received feedbacks from other business users. “When other business users who use our analysis give us feedback as professionals, it is a good chance to grow. If we are being highly sensitive about it, then we might take it as something personal. However, that would not be the case if we can use our feelings to grow empathy. It means that we can empathize more so we know what can be improved, because we have put ourselves in their shoes.”
Sylvia did not only feel that those negative labels could be turned into something positive. She actually believed that having women leaders could actually be an advantage. As more and more women joining the workforce, having more women leaders mattered even more. “Men will never understand the feeling of being pregnant, having back pain or cramp every month. Only women leaders can understand this because they themselves experience this, they understand the struggle of being women,” she said.
Sylvia realized that for women out there, striving for a leadership role would be a winding road full of challenges. The women did not only compete with men, but also other women who sometimes were not supportive to one another. The competition was doubled.
However, it did not mean that it was impossible for more women to be leaders. What should be done then?
“I was really fortunate that in 10 years of my career, I always had female bosses. My father passed away when I was 16 so I didn’t really have anyone as a role model in my personal life. However, these female leaders somehow had been a good role models for me in my work.”
“Instead of competing with one another, women out there should be kind, be more supportive of one another’s growth. They should be because the world has been cruel to women, so women need to stand for each other, starting from now.”
After all, being a woman leader sure was not something easy, given the stigma and labels put on them. By competing with one another, Sylvia believed that we would not go far in women leadership. The key, according to her, was about standing for one another, being kind and supportive, regardless what the society said about women in leadership.
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