Are male-dominated workspaces harmful to women?
updated the 20 May 2016 à 10:49Nobody can deny that sexism still exists and if you do, you are part of the problem. In this article, we explore the problems women face in male-dominated workplaces and how to gain the respect of your male peers and move forward.
Breaking glass ceilings is always hard.
And even in 2015, there is still blatant sexism in the workplace. Women in many first world countries still don’t earn as much as men at the same job, with the same qualifications and experience. Especially in male-dominated jobs where they are constantly spoken down to and underestimated.
The Problem
In a recent article by Elle, it has been proven by researchers at Indiana University that women working in male-dominated industries are stressed out. And there may be other reasons why.
Researcher Dale Spencer used audio and video tape recordings to independently evaluate who talked the most in mixed-gender university classroom discussions.
Regardless of the gender ratio of the students, whether the instructor was deliberately trying to encourage female participation or not, men always talked more — whether the metric was minutes of talking or number of words spoken.
Moreover, men literally have no clue how much they talk. When Spencer asked students to evaluate their perception of who talked more in a given discussion, women were pretty accurate; but men perceived the discussion as being “equal” when women talked only 15% of the time, and the discussion as being dominated by women if they talked only 30% of the time.
It is obvious why this can be problematic for women at work. We all want to strive to be better and have our voices heard, and appreciated and taken seriously but how will we solve this problem when men constantly over-talk us and to earn their respect to see us as equals?
What can you do about it?
In this article by Forbes, they state that the keys to earning respect in the workplace are to always have goals and aims, and work hard to get what you want, and be patient. Great things don’t happen overnight, and unlike children’s stories, we don’t have wish-granting fairy godmothers. Be mindful of the image you project to the world. Humans are superficial creatures, and if you show you have your life together in your manner of dressing, it makes you seem more credible.
Nobody wants to be constantly overshadowed, regardless of gender. Therefore the first step of change comes from us. Make the first move to break your glass ceiling.
Bernice Ng
Read More:
Sexism in Interviews: What NOT to ask
