A common financial derailer for women executives is not having a strategy around your career. What you want from your career and how it integrates with your life seems to be changing, especially due to the pandemic. We are looking at our lives and our work differently now, and it has become more important than ever to find ways to make your career work for your life.
In what seems to be a tremendous period of career transition, we decided to reach out to stellar business coach Colleen Jordan Hallinan of Qii Consulting for tips that can help you manage your career so that it allows for the compensation and quality of life you want, however you define those.
Common Career Pitfalls Women Experience
Gender Bias
Gender bias often holds women back, especially in law, finance and tech. We may have reached parity with men in earning college degrees, but only 29 women hold the CEO or top leadership position at S&P 500 firms, and only 70 have had the position in ALL TIME. Yes, we have come a long way, but we have very far to go. Women are still fighting the proverbial glass ceiling in many industries, but this goes beyond career advancement – it’s also about the quality of your work-life.
A woman successful in a male-dominated field, especially one on a leadership track, has unfortunately had to learn to ride the fine line between being herself and managing around others’ perceptions. For example, in this article from The Atlantic, the author describes a report on sexism in the courtroom finding “that women in the courtroom face what she described as a ‘double standard and a double bind.’” “Women, she wrote, must avoid being seen as too ‘soft’ or too ‘strident,’ too ‘aggressive’ or ‘not aggressive enough.’ ”
We’ve all heard this before. It’s not limited to trial lawyers, nor are double standards limited to our demeanor or who is judging us. How high stakes professional women are perceived, by both men and women, forces us to walk on eggshells. In heels.
“Heels and skirts were preferred at trial—but not too high and definitely not too short.”
Losing Yourself, In Two Ways
In any business, especially those dominated by men, you can find yourself stuck in a role that doesn’t provide you the advancement potential you deserve. It can take years to finally realize this, and by then you’ve experienced a serious loss of momentum in your career development.
Second, a role that doesn’t allow you to use your natural strengths, or that doesn’t feed your personal mission or reflect your values, will chink away at your confidence, fulfillment and happiness, resulting in a personal loss of a sense of self over time.
Going It Alone
Trying to do it all: working, household chores, caring for children, and inevitably at some point, aging parents. According to Gallup’s latest report on the distribution of household chores, whether single or dual-income households, women are more likely to do the laundry, clean the house, shop for groceries and pay the bills. Even when the woman is the primary breadwinner.
Planning Around the Pitfalls and Taking Charge
Career planning must include assessing your willingness to cope with the most formidable barriers. In the article quoted earlier, from how you engage with the jury to whether or not you wear heels and a skirt, “body and demeanor will be under relentless scrutiny from every corner of the courtroom.”
These barriers shouldn’t stop you from becoming a trial attorney if that’s the trajectory you want, but be prepared to accept the baggage that comes along with it. This unfair scrutiny is NOT exclusive to the field of law.
Path to Partnership or Leadership
In a firm you want to grow with, ask for and discuss what it will take to become a partner or take a leadership position. If you are met with vague responses or a blank look, either become the person that makes career path transparency a reality at this firm, or polish up your resume. The best companies to work for are the ones focused on developing the next generation of leadership, regardless of gender.
Compensation
The above applies here too. You need to know what the compensation formulas are for the roles in your firm, especially your current role and any you aspire to. Ask where your compensation lands in the range of pay for your position. If met with blank stares, do the research. Professional associations in your field are likely the best source of compensation benchmarks. Once you have the data, ask for a conversation about what you need to do move the needle.
Growth Mindset
From Carole Dweck’s book: “People with a fixed mindset—those who believe that abilities are fixed—are less likely to flourish than those with a growth mindset—those who believe that abilities can be developed.” Whether you are a leader now or aspire to be one, even if you lead only yourself in a solo firm, there are five essentials to keep you in the growth mindset: Qii Time, True to Self, Self-awareness, Humility, and Vulnerability.
Qii Time
You may have heard the four quadrants of the matrix of urgency and importance. Our biggest daily obstacle is quadrant “i,” the important and urgent demands in our life: last minute requests, emergencies, unexpected mishaps, the unprioritized to-do list and most work-life conflicts. Quadrant “ii” is the setting for the important, not urgent things. Delightfully, the more time we spend in quadrant ii, which is about planning, developing relationships, and cleaning up messes, the less time we spend in quadrant i.
How to Make Your Career Work for Your Life
If you’re ready to take ownership of your career path and quality of life, here are a couple worksheets to get you started.
In your life’s vision, be sure to describe what your “quality of work-life” looks like. Simply answering the following question is a great start:
“If you were looking back 10 years from now, thrilled with your progress toward your personal vision, how did your career contribute to that?”
When defining your values, think of all the hats you wear: spouse, mother, sister, daughter, board member… and my favorite, “steward of my mind, body and soul.” If you’re ambitious about your career, these other hats are going to need a lot of protection, so play the defensive and create those personal boundaries now.
Your life is an iterative process, where all your plans, priorities, and relationships meet with reality and need modification. And nobody has time for quadrant ii, so you have to squeeze it in: annually, quarterly, monthly, weekly and a little bit daily.
Your career needs to feed your life’s goals. The most important Qii time you spend should be on strategic planning for your life. Start with determining your life’s vision, passions and pursuits, and get clear on the values that make up your personal boundaries. Once you’ve knocked out these two imperatives to a personal strategic plan, you have a compass to help you identify goals and actions necessary for the life you want, and the motivation to stick to the plan.
True to Self
When you know what you want, you are motivated to be persistent. You need to know what and who is important to you, what you want your life to look like, and who you want to be. And then you need to keep your eye on those balls throughout your career.
Be your best advocate. Be clear and persistent about your vision for your future with your employer, whether you are an employee, partner, or entrepreneur reporting to yourself. I don’t have empirical data, but I’m willing to bet most female business owners rarely do enough to impress their “boss.” The motivation of your personal vision will help you tip the scales in your favor.
In networking, be real, connect with people you like, not just potential business. Look out for potential mentors and advocates. And find those you may be able to mentor or advocate for in turn. These are the people that will support you the rest of your career, or whom you will support for their career, either with moral support or by being the catalyst for a significant future career opportunity.
Self-Awareness
Know your strengths. There is no way you can advocate for the kind of future you want if you don’t know where you deliver the most impact. It’s like paddling down a river and either being thrown against the rocks, or navigating your way to where you want to be. Your strengths are your greatest leverage.
Understand how you impact others. Ask for feedback. I’ve heard that when somebody is asked for feedback, they get a little shot of dopamine. Give the people you trust and respect regular doses of dopamine, and avoid getting blinders.
Get coaching or therapy. There is nothing like an objective, supportive voice to counteract any voices you have that are holding you back, whether your own inner voice or the voices of others.
Vulnerability
Remember that we all started out in life standing up and falling down, over and over again, just to learn how to walk. Getting back up again is a lifetime practice. Push your boundaries and stretch for the next capability, the next role or the next opportunity, as long as it aligns with your vision and values.
Be open to opportunities. You will transition through different chapters throughout your working life. Sometimes the best opportunities to move into the next chapter find you.
Learn to let go. Delegate. We know it won’t be just the way you want it; accept that possibility. This applies to an assistant at work, a housekeeper, parent’s helper, and especially your spouse.
Humility
Ask for help. There are people out there that have been down the path you’re on and they really do want to share what they’ve learned. Be a sponge. Everyone has something unique to share.
And stop saying no when someone offers to do something for you. Doing it all is not what makes you successful.
It’s ok to be wrong. Like falling down while learning to walk, every mistake is an opportunity to do it better next time. Even when you’re right, every disagreement has a learning moment.
Moving Forward with Confidence
Here at WealthChoice, we understand fully the career and financial challenges executive and professional women face. If you feel you would benefit from having a financial partner in your corner who truly gets it, please do get in touch. We’ll be only too happy to help.
