Breaking Away from the Good Ol’ Boys

In chapter two of Reinventing Womanhood, Heilburn discusses a study conducted by Margaret Hennig:

Hennig set out to study women in high managerial positions in the business world (an emphatically male domain) who had a continuous work history and held, at the time of investigation, a current position at a high level, without kinship ties to the ownership of the firm.

Heilbrun goes on to discuss the background of these corporate success stories, noting that all were first born (or virtually so) and members of all girl families. All of these women also had very close relationships with their father and enjoyed “excursions into ‘male’ worlds” and were continually involved in “activities conventionally described as ‘masculine.’”

Hennig published part of her findings (along with co-author Anne Jardim) in the book Managerial Woman (Garden City: Anchor Press, 1977), which influenced an entirely new generation of female corporate climbers. But that was thirty years ago? Does it have any relevance now? I did a little research and found three news articles that tracked the Hennig managerial mindset.

“Let’s Huddle, Women” Time Magazine: May 2, 1977

This article echoes the book, women must learn to be like men to succeed:

Women who grow up in sex-stereotyped America playing tennis or figure-skating do not know how to plan ahead, take risks, deal easily with victory and defeat, [or] play on a team.

The article continues that without knowing the subliminal rules of a male dominated environment, women are at a disadvantage. It also suggests that women focus too much on self-improvement instead of action.

Of course, a few women at that time did manage to forge ahead. Armed with the hidden knowledge imparted to them by their fathers, they had gained a strong sense of self-esteem and “a familiarity with the unwritten rules.” However, after landing jobs in middle management, the article points out, these same women faced an identity crisis:

they had shelved their femininity for a decade in order to concentrate on their work, and they felt both a sense of personal loss and a desire to continue their careers. All eventually resolved this conflict by relaxing, taking a broader perspective of their lives and their responsibilities—and often by marrying older men who already had families.

The article concludes with a little advice on how you, too, can man up and get ahead.

“Women Beat The Corporate Game” Money Magazine: September 12, 1988

A decade later, and Money magazine touts that managerial women now succeed “by being themselves–not men in dresses.” Yet the rhetoric sounds the same to me:

Successful female managers have taken on many of the values and life patterns of careerist men, who long have fixed an unblinking eye on the prize. They are gutsy and gritty women in a man’s world who refuse to let the feeling of being out of place become an obstacle.

The article even seems to celebrate the fact that woman manage to “compete while maintaining their femininity”, which echoes Heilbrun’s assertion that women get ahead by “preserving the socially required ‘femininity’.”

After covering a few relevant statistics about women in the workforce the article then falls back on the “unique obstacles” of Managerial Women:

• biology-women are still the ones having babies and therefore not as single minded as men
• cultural-the corporate world thrives on competition and men are naturally more competitive.

Examples are given of women who choose to postpone families only to be faced with infertility and finally the author acknowledges the double standard of competition:

Still, many men who might admire or at least tolerate a harsh style in other men prefer that women tread the tightrope between toughness and femininity.

And of course it ends with advice:

That fact of corporate life may seem unfair, but to paraphrase Anne Jardim, that is the way the world works. Success is a hungry god that demands constant sacrifice. Ambitious women who understand this are already on their way to the senior executive ranks in America’s corporations, and are already reaping the rewards and satisfactions long enjoyed by their male counterparts. They are also making similar sacrifices. That is the price of success, and the price of equality.

Again, buck up and be a man, ladies.

“Ann Fudge on Making Choices” Businessweek: March 29, 2004

Finally, in this article, there seems to be a glimmer of hope. Ann Fudge is the CEO of Young and Rubicam, and in her interview with Businessweek she talks about women having choices. Although she admits that “We can still do a better job of making Corporate America open to women,” she acknowledges that as women “we have the choice to decide when and how we play.”

Of course, her response was prompted by this comment:

One thing that has grabbed a lot of attention recently is the number of female Harvard MBAs and other professional women who are simply dropping out of work to stay home. Some people think that’s a waste of great talent.

This comment illustrates how ‘feminine values’ are still undervalued in our culture. Removing oneself from the corporate world is still considered a step back. In her interview, however, Fudge notes:

It was definitely not dissatisfaction. It was stepping back and saying, “What are you really here for? What do you really want to accomplish?”

Her two year sabbatical lead her to a more communal business model:

I thought about how people saw one another differently and couldn’t communicate. That’s when I started to think about media — and children’s media, in particular. Maybe if we saw each other differently, we could make different judgments about people different than ourselves. It’s just lack of knowledge. When people really spend time with one another, they discover we’re really not that different.

Another noticeable difference lies in her role models: her mom, and a former professor–Margaret Hennig. With female role models of her own, she does not “shy away” from the responsibility herself:

I have had lots of people who called me and I’ve guided through the process. Saying, “You’ll be O.K.” In that respect, it’s exciting — to help people develop a new model.

It appears women like Ann Fudge are starting to break down the old Hennig model of the managerial woman.