Under Pressure: The Great American Work/Life Speed-Up for Men and Women

Successful business people standing together at officeBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“We have to redefine what it means to be a successful man and a good mother,” said Joan C. Williams, Distinguished Professor of Law and Director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings.

Williams, who has just published a new book on the subject of work/family conflict, Reshaping the Work-Family Debate: Why Men and Class Matter, believes that there are several gender and class related inconsistencies that are keeping both women and men from achieving their best at home and work. Williams explained, “While women are under pressure to be good mothers, always available to their children, men face gender pressures, too. Men are judged, to borrow a quote from feminism in the 70s, ‘by the size of their paycheck’ —which makes it very different to draw a line in the sand and say, ‘I need to go home to my family.’”

While the “good mother ideal” is problematic for women in the workforce, men now face similar inconsistencies. In the past, Williams said, men were culturally expected to work long hours to live up to the “provider” role – which fit right in with workplace expectations of what a good worker looked like. But now, men are faced with a new cultural ideal: that of the “nurturing father.”

Williams explained, “Men are now caught between two ideals.” The workplace ideal for men has not yet caught up with changing notions of masculinity at home. And women are unlikely to find male support in changing the structure of the workplace until that workplace supports the new needs of men too.

“Until gender pressures on men change, things aren’t going to change for much of women, either.”

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Voice of Experience: Cathinka Wahlstrom, Managing Partner, Financial Services, New York, Accenture

cathinkaBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“I think financial services is a very P&L based industry. It can scare women away, but it’s a great way of proving what you’ve contributed,” said Cathinka Wahlstrom, Managing Partner at Accenture‘s New York Office.

Wahlstrom, who is also a member of Accenture’s CEO Advisory Council continued, “We need more women in P&L. It’s one of the aspects of my job that I like most, and when your contributions are very clear, you can make changes and improvements a bit faster.”

“You really have a voice,” she added.

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In Case You Missed It: Business News Round-Up

Beth 005Contributed by Beth Collinge of CTG – a division of ILX Group plc.

This week’s news was dominated by the G20 meeting in Seoul, increasing concern over Irish debt, Europe’s inability to agree on its 2011 budget and an EU-wide patent, problems in both Boeing and Airbus aircraft engines, and the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese opposition leader.

Economic Backdrop

  • Global equities fell from recent highs, due to tensions in the eurozone and the increased possibility of further Chinese interest rate rises.
  • The euro dropped 2.4 per cent to $1.3691, the biggest weekly loss since August on concern that so-called peripheral European countries will struggle to repay their bondholders but made small gains at the end of the week on speculation the European Union will bail out Ireland. The yield difference, or spread, between Irish 10-year securities and comparable bunds reached 652 basis points, or 6.52 percentage points, the highest ever. The spread on 10-year Portuguese notes and bunds rose to a record 484 basis points.
  • US Treasuries rallied after the Federal Reserve Bank of New York said it would purchase $105bn of bonds by December 9, reversing an earlier sell-off. The purchase amount, the first of a massive monetary easing programme dubbed “QE2”, was in line with many analysts’ expectations but still provided a boost to US Treasuries. The $105bn includes both new purchases and reinvested cash.
  • Sugar fell 23.5 per cent at the end of the week as speculators pulled out of the market.
  • Copper prices hit an all-time high of nearly $9,000 a tonne, driven by Chinese buying.
  • Gold reached a new nominal high during the week, as Robert Zoellick, the president of the World Bank, suggested “employing gold as an international reference point of market expectations about inflation, deflation and future currency values.” and added that markets are “using gold as an alternative monetary asset today.”
  • The Bank of England increased its inflation forecast last week. In its quarterly inflation report the Bank said inflation, which hovers at 3.1 per cent as measured by the consumer price index (CPI), is expected to rise to about 3.5 per cent by the end of the year, before falling back towards the end of next year. It forecast that growth would reach about 2.2 per cent next year and then rise to three per cent by 2012. Yields on ten-year gilts jumped 14 basis points to 3.18 per cent from 3.04 per cent before the report was released and sterling rallied to over $1.60 against the dollar and to over €1.17 against the euro, as the markets priced in lower expectations of further quantitative easing (QE).

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Brace Yourself: It’s Almost Holiday Season

iStock_000011802750XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

I know, I know.

It seems a little too early to start thinking about turkeys, or sugar plums for that matter.

But being caught off guard during the holiday season is the best way to get stressed or sick. Whether or not you yourself celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas, Hanukkah, etc., the end of the year usually means parties, networking drinks, and family gatherings. And if you have children, you’ll be doubly busy.

Think ahead now and stay above the fray! Here’s our professional woman’s guide to a relatively frazzle-free November and December.

  1. Start Planning Your Calendar Now

    True story: For a few summers in college, I worked at a large craft supply store – working the register, designing store displays, and stocking merchandise. Mid-July every year, as soon as we packed up our Independence Day craft supplies, up went the DIY Christmas ornaments and decorations.

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The Future of Women in Financial Services at the NCRW’s Women and Money Luncheon

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iStock_000001124874XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Earlier this week, the National Council for Research on Women hosted a discussion on women and money at JP Morgan Private Bank. The event featured four notable panelists as well as a conclusion by Jacki Zehner, Vice Chair of the Women’s Funding Network.

The panel discussed the next steps in getting more women into the financial services sector, keeping them there, and getting to them to the top. Zehner explained, “We are moving from a place of less power to more power, and shifting from a moral argument… to an economic one.”

She added, “There is a tremendous amount of research that fuels our activism.”

The panel included Rosie Rios, Treasurer of the United States; Michelle Clayman, Founder, Managing Partner & Chief Investment Officer, New Amsterdam Partners LLC; Joe Keefe, President & CEO, Pax World Management LLC; and Rebecca Patterson, Managing Director and Global Head of Foreign Exchange and Commodities, J.P. Morgan Private Bank. The panel was moderated by Deirdre Bolton, Anchor, Bloomberg Television, and Co-host of “Inside Track.”

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Men Who Get It: Joe Keefe, President and CEO, Pax World

Joe_KeefeBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“Pax World is very focused on the notion of gender equality as an investment concept,” said Joe Keefe, President and CEO of Pax World, the first US mutual fund to focus on environmental, social and governance factors (ESG) in investment analysis and decision making.

“Our women’s empowerment platform includes applying a gender lens to all of our funds, while our Global Women’s Equality Fund is the only mutual fund in America focused on investing in companies that are global leaders in advancing gender equality and women’s empowerment. Additionally, our proxy voting policy is straightforward: if the slate of directors is all male, we withhold support and send a letter to the company explaining why and encouraging them to embrace gender diversity.”

He continued, “And it goes beyond putting more women in the boardroom or senior management. Investing in women and girls is a critical strategy for promoting sustainable development and alleviating global poverty.”

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Ask-a-Career-Coach: How to Choreograph Your Career

AnnDalyHighRes-2Contributed by executive coach Ann Daly, Ph.D.

A young client’s mother recently asked her what she had learned in our first few coaching sessions. “Always be looking for a job!” was my client’s instant response. This was a hard-won lesson for Mary (not her real name), who had been laid off unexpectedly after a few years at her first job. She had spent those years so focused on the work at hand that she hadn’t yet begun to consider her next job, let alone her long-term career trajectory.

Mary is hardly alone. We tend to get so concentrated on the daily grind of our immediate responsibilities—especially in this job market—that it’s a challenge to visualize, let alone steer, the full arc of our career.

“Always be looking for a job!” was Mary’s enthusiastic reduction of our first few conversations. She and I continue to explore the distinction between a job and a career. It’s like the distinction between an enduring mission and a current tactic. Mary’s mission is to improve the health of her community. Her current job in event fundraising is just her current tactic. It is a means, not an end. Tactics are necessarily provisional; in order to remain effective, they must continually adapt to changing conditions. No job lasts forever, nor should it.

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Building Our Girls’ Club

iStock_000014130901XSmallBy Danielle Sonnenberg (New York City)

Everyone knows that men get a lot of their business through the “boys’ club.” Now women are getting in on the action. Yes, women are forming their own version – a girls’ club.

Building Women’s Networks

The numbers show that women have a lot of catching up to do. Only 3% of all women-owned firms have revenues of $1 million or more compared with 6% of men-owned firms according to the Center for Women’s Business Research.

Organizations like the Women Presidents’ Organization and Women’s Leadership Exchange are giving women lots of opportunities to meet women in similar positions of power to share resources, connections and advice.

At the Women Presidents’ Organization (WPO), women attend monthly chapter meetings with about 20 other women in non-competing industries to discuss business alongside personal issues, such as how having children affects the growth of a company. There are 90 chapters around the world. In order to be a member, product based companies must earn at least $2 million in gross annual sales or a $1 million for service based businesses and women must either be an owner or a senior manager.

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Coalition of Investors Calls for Gender Diverse Leadership

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iStock_000012154683XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Despite a global movement to increase the number of women in leadership, a new report shows that, in the past year, women in the boardroom have only increased by .2%. This is not nearly enough for the improvement in governance diversity that many investors are calling for.

“Women on Boards,” a statistical review performed by Governance Results International, counted female representation on boards of directors, and showed little change in the number of women in leadership roles across the globe.

Julie Gorte, Pax World’s Senior VP for Sustainable Investing said, “Women are under represented on boards. They are better represented now than they have been previously, but the needle hasn’t moved far.”

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Voice of Experience: Brenda T. Dieck, Partner, White & Case

Dieck_BrendaBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“I love the thrill of negotiating and the satisfaction of closing the deal,” said Brenda T. Dieck, Partner in the New York and Los Angeles Bank Finance Practice Group at the law firm of White & Case LLP. “There are so many interesting puzzles to solve,” she explained.

Currently charged with building the firm’s LA bank finance practice, Dieck said, “It’s a unique opportunity to be part of a well-established practice group in New York, and at the same time, have the opportunity to be somewhat of an entrepreneur in LA, building a complementary team on the West Coast.”

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