Women at Work

In this special live episode, we share stories, research, and practical advice for strategic self-disclosure, and then take questions from the audience. Guest: Katherine Phillips. Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

It takes time and care to develop trusting relationships with the women we work with, particularly women who are different from us in some way. But the effort of understanding each other’s experiences is worth it, personally and professionally: We’ll feel less alone in our individual struggles and better able to push for equity. We talk with professors Tina Opie and Verónica Rabelo about the power of workplace sisterhood. We discuss steps, as well as common snags, to forming deep and lasting connections with our female colleagues. Our HBR reading list: “Survey: Tell Us About Your Workplace Relationships,” by Tina R. Opie and Beth A. Livingston “Women: Let’s Stop Allowing Race and Age to Divide Us,” by Ancella Livers and Trudy Bourgeois “How Managers Can Promote Healthy Discussions About Race,” by Kira Hudson Banks “How Managers Can Make Casual Networking Events More Inclusive,” by Ruchika Tulshyan Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Sign up for the Women at Work newsletter: hbr.org/email-newsletters Fill out our survey about workplace experiences. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

We bring you three stories about parental leave, from listeners whose experiences with it changed them, for better or for worse. They talk about having to fight for more time off, go back to work before they were ready, care for sick babies, and try to hide their exhaustion and stress. Ultimately, they’re stories about how inadequate leave policies hurt families and companies.

The glass ceiling is the classic symbol of the barrier women bump into as we go through our careers. But for women of color, that barrier is more like a concrete wall. If we’re going to reduce workplace sexism and racism, women of all ethnicities need to work together. And it will be tough to do that unless we feel more connected to each other. We talk with professors Ella Bell Smith and Stella Nkomo about how race, gender, and class play into the different experiences and relationships white women and women of color have at work. They explain how those differences can drive women apart, drawing from stories and research insights in their book, Our Separate Ways. Our HBR reading list: Our Separate Ways: Black and White Women and the Struggle for Professional Identity, by Ella L.J. Bell Smith and Stella M. Nkomo “How Black Women Describe Navigating Race and Gender in the Workplace,” by Maura Cheeks “Why Aren’t There More Asian Americans in Leadership Positions?” by Stefanie K. Johnson and Thomas Sy “Asian Americans Are the Least Likely Group in the U.S. to Be Promoted to Management,” by Buck Gee and Denise Peck Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Sign up for the Women at Work newsletter: hbr.org/email-newsletters Fill out our survey about workplace experiences. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

Women are increasingly supporting our families financially. It can feel empowering to be the sole or primary earner, but many of us feel pressure to be both an ideal worker and an ideal mother. We hear from a woman who supports a stay-at-home husband and three sons. Then, Alyson Byrne, an expert on status and gender, fills us in about the research on women as financial providers — for example, the more we financially contribute, the better our psychological well-being. (Yay.) She has tips on managing the professional side and the personal side of being the chief breadwinner. And Maureen Hoch, Women at Work’s supervising editor, shares her experience of being her family’s primary earner. Our HBR reading list: “Does a Woman’s High-Status Career Hurt Her Marriage? Not If Her Husband Does the Laundry,” by Alyson Byrne and Julian Barling “Whether a Husband Identifies as a Breadwinner Depends on Whether He Respects His Wife’s Career — Not on How Much She Earns,” by Erin Reid Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Fill out our survey about workplace experiences. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

Have you ever offered up an idea in a meeting and been ignored — but then, 10 minutes later, a man repeated the idea and everyone called it brilliant? Or have you ever worked hard on a team project and been left off the thank-you email? If we aren’t thoughtful about how we present our ideas at work, we risk not being heard or, worse, missing out on the credit we’re due. Research shows that women get less credit when we work in groups with men. So, it’s important for us to be strategic with our suggestions and insights. We talk with two experts on workplace dynamics and difficult conversations. First, Amy Jen Su covers how to artfully share your contributions. Next, Amy Gallo tells us how to call out credit stealers. Our HBR reading list: “Research: Men Get Credit for Voicing Ideas, but Not Problems. Women Don’t Get Credit for Either,” by Sean Martin “Proof That Women Get Less Credit for Teamwork,” by Nicole Torres “Research: Junior Female Scientists Aren’t Getting the Credit They Deserve,” by Marc J. Lerchenmueller and Olav Sorenson “How to Respond When Someone Takes Credit for Your Work,” by Amy Gallo Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Fill out our survey about workplace experiences. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

If you’ve worked your way up in a competitive field — or are anxious by nature — you may have perfectionist tendencies. Maybe you’re a hard-driving, obsessive worker who thinks a task is never quite done. Or maybe you’re avoidant, struggling to start a project because you want it to be done just right. We all know society holds women to a higher standard than men and rewards us for not making mistakes. But internalizing other people’s expectations — or what we think they expect — will only burn us out. To keep rising in our careers, we need to get in tune with our own standards for what’s a good, or good enough, job. It is possible to keep our perfectionist tendencies under control. We talk through tactics with Alice Boyes, a former clinical psychologist turned writer and author. Our HBR reading list: “How Perfectionists Can Get Out of Their Own Way,” by Alice Boyes “How to Focus on What’s Important, Not Just What’s Urgent,” by Alice Boyes “How to Collaborate with a Perfectionist,” by Alice Boyes “Perfectionism Is Increasing, and That’s Not Good News,” by Thomas Curran and Andrew P. Hill Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Fill out our survey about workplace experiences. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

Hearing your manager say you’re doing a great job is, of course, lovely. But without examples of your greatness in action, or suggestions for how to be even better, you don’t have the information you need to keep improving. Studies have found that women tend to get feedback that’s vague or tied to their personalities, which doesn’t boost our performance ratings. Meanwhile, men get feedback that’s specific and tied to business outcomes, which sets them up to develop and be promoted. First, we talk with Harvard Business School professor Robin Ely about the research on women and feedback. Next, we talk with Tuck School of Business professor Ella Bell Smith about how to draw out actionable, useful feedback from our managers, and how to respond when we’re not getting what we need to succeed. Our HBR reading list: “What Most People Get Wrong About Men and Women,” by Catherine H. Tinsley and Robin J. Ely “The Gender Gap in Feedback and Self-Perception,” by Margarita Mayo “How Gender Bias Corrupts Performance Reviews, and What to Do About It,” by Paola Cecchi-Dimeglio “Research: Vague Feedback Is Holding Women Back,” by Shelley Correll and Caroline Simard Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

There’s a lot that goes into making a good decision at work: figuring out priorities, coming up with options, analyzing those — and several steps later, planning for what to do if you’re wrong. If you’re a woman, you are also factoring in how your colleagues expect you to ask for their opinions so you can create consensus. And if you do, they’re still likely to see you as indecisive and lacking vision. We talk with Therese Huston, author of the book How Women Decide, about our strengths as decision makers and how to work around double standards when we’re making decisions and communicating them to our team. Our HBR reading list: “Research: We Are Way Harder on Female Leaders Who Make Bad Calls,” by Therese Huston “Women and the Vision Thing,” by Herminia Ibarra and Otilia Obodaru “Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?” by Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic “Get Excited: Reappraising Pre-Performance Anxiety as Excitement,” by Alison Wood Brooks Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.

Having a baby is exciting — and exhausting. Figuring out how to take parental leave, or manage someone who’s doing it, can add an extra wrinkle. No matter how long you’ll be away from work, there’s preparation to be done: talking to your boss, making sure colleagues can cover your projects, handling unexpected needs and feelings. With the help of our guest expert, Daisy Wademan Dowling, we talk about how to effectively plan for your parental leave or the leave of someone you manage. And through the story of a lucky woman whose organization offers 12 months of paid leave, we explore what our lives might be like if we had access to more generous leaves. Our HBR reading list: “The Best Ways Your Organization Can Support Working Parents,” by Daisy Wademan Dowling “Need a Good Parental Leave Policy? Here It Is.” by Joan C. Williams and Kate Massinger “How Companies Can Ensure Maternity Leave Doesn’t Hurt Women’s Careers,” by David Collings, Yseult Freeney, and Lisa van der Werff “Denmark Has Great Maternity Leave and Child Care Policies. So Why Aren’t More Women Advancing?” by Bodil Nordestgaard Ismiris “Why Walmart Expanded Parental Leave — and How to Convince Your Company to Do the Same,” by Sarah Green Carmichael Get the discussion guide for this episode on our website: hbr.org/podcasts/women-at-work. Email us: womenatwork@hbr.org Our theme music is Matt Hill’s “City In Motion,” provided by Audio Network.