Up-beat, pragmatic, and chock full of advice, What Works for Women at Work is an indispensable guide for working women.
An essential resource for any working woman, What Works for Women at Work is a comprehensive and insightful guide for mastering office politics as a woman. Authored by Joan C. Williams, one of the nation's most-cited experts on women and work, and her daughter, writer Rachel Dempsey, this unique book offers a multi-generational perspective into the realities of today's workplace. Often women receive messages that they have only themselves to blame for failing to get ahead-Negotiate more! Stop being such a wimp! Stop being such a witch! What Works for Women at Work tells women it's not their fault. The simple fact is that office politics often benefits men over women. Based on interviews with 127 successful working women, over half of them women of color, What Works for Women at Work presents a toolkit for getting ahead in today's workplace. Distilling over 35 years of research, Williams and Dempsey offer four crisp patterns that affect working women: Prove-It-Again!, the Tightrope, the Maternal Wall, and the Tug of War. Each represents different challenges and requires different strategies-which is why women need to be savvier than men to survive and thrive in high-powered careers. Williams and Dempsey's analysis of working women is nuanced and in-depth, going far beyond the traditional cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all approaches of most career guides for women. Throughout the book, they weave real-life anecdotes from the women they interviewed, along with quick kernels of advice like a "New Girl Action Plan," ways to "Take Care of Yourself", and even "Comeback Lines" for dealing with sexual harassment and other difficult situations.
Show moreUp-beat, pragmatic, and chock full of advice, What Works for Women at Work is an indispensable guide for working women.
An essential resource for any working woman, What Works for Women at Work is a comprehensive and insightful guide for mastering office politics as a woman. Authored by Joan C. Williams, one of the nation's most-cited experts on women and work, and her daughter, writer Rachel Dempsey, this unique book offers a multi-generational perspective into the realities of today's workplace. Often women receive messages that they have only themselves to blame for failing to get ahead-Negotiate more! Stop being such a wimp! Stop being such a witch! What Works for Women at Work tells women it's not their fault. The simple fact is that office politics often benefits men over women. Based on interviews with 127 successful working women, over half of them women of color, What Works for Women at Work presents a toolkit for getting ahead in today's workplace. Distilling over 35 years of research, Williams and Dempsey offer four crisp patterns that affect working women: Prove-It-Again!, the Tightrope, the Maternal Wall, and the Tug of War. Each represents different challenges and requires different strategies-which is why women need to be savvier than men to survive and thrive in high-powered careers. Williams and Dempsey's analysis of working women is nuanced and in-depth, going far beyond the traditional cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all approaches of most career guides for women. Throughout the book, they weave real-life anecdotes from the women they interviewed, along with quick kernels of advice like a "New Girl Action Plan," ways to "Take Care of Yourself", and even "Comeback Lines" for dealing with sexual harassment and other difficult situations.
Show moreForeword by Anne-Marie Slaughter Preface 1. Introduction: It's Not (Always) Your Fault Part I: Prove-It-Again! 2. Spotting Prove-It-Again! Patterns 3. Prove-It-Again! Action Plan Part II: The Tightrope 4. Spotting Tightrope Patterns 5. Tightrope Action Plan: Neither a Bitch 6. Tightrope Action Plan: ... Nor a BimboPart III: The Maternal Wall 7. Spotting Maternal Wall Patterns 8. Maternal Wall Action Plan Part IV: The Tug of War 9. Spotting Tug of War Patterns 10. Tug of War Action Plan Part V: Double Jeopardy? 11. The Experience of Gender Bias Differs by Race Part VI: Leave or Stay? 12. Leave or Stay? Reading the Tea Leaves 13. Leave or Stay? Don't Dismay Part VII: 20 Lessons 14. The Science of Savvy in 20 Lessons 15. Conclusion: Jump-Starting the Stalled Gender RevolutionAcknowledgments Notes Selected Bibliography Index About the Authors
Joan C. Williams is Distinguished Professor of Law and Founding Director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She has authored eleven books, including White Working Class: Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America and Unbending Gender: Why Work and Family Conflict and What to Do About It. Rachel Dempsey is a writer and attorney. Her writing has appeared in publications including the Huffington Post and Psychology Today. Anne-Marie Slaughter is the Bert G. Kerstetter '66 University Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University. From 2009–2011 she served as Director of Policy Planning for the United States Department of State, the first woman to hold that position.
"[The book] identifies four overall patterns of gender bias that
high-achieving career women face."
*Black Voice News*
"Deftly combining sociological research with a more casual
narrative style, What Works for Women at Workoffers unabashedly
straightforward advice in a how-to primer for ambitious
women....The authors plow nimbly through decades of research,
transforming what could have been dry and impenetrable statistics
into attention-grabbing revelations."
*The New York Times Book Review*
"Forty years later, gender bias shouldnt exist in the workplace,
but it does, in large part because many of us dont recognize its
most common forms. Thats a pitfalland for me, at least, a pratfall.
ReadingWhat Works for Women at Work would be a good first step in
avoiding both."
*Strategy and Business*
"If youre a working woman searching for the best pocket guide to
success at work, here it is. Prove-It-Again, the Tightrope, The
Maternal Wall, the Tug of War, Double Jeopardythe distinguished
scholar Joan Williams and her daughter guide women through each of
these sticky wickets. Their invaluable advice is no substitute for
broader changes in the workplace, they note, but it can help
position more women to accomplish that change."
*Arlie Hochschild,author of The Outsourced Self*
"In their compelling new book, Williams (Distinguished Professor
and Director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of
California, Hastings College of Law) and Dempsey (a student at Yale
Law School who blogs for Huffington Poston women's issues) spell
out the two sets of rules, higher standards and closed doors that
many women encounter on the job these days."
*Forbes*
"Joan Williams and Rachel Dempsey clearly and vividly detail the
double standards and the dead ends that so many women face in the
workplace. Fortunately, the authors also provide easy-to-follow
strategies to counter these scenarios. This book can help women
claim their seat at the table and lean in to their careers."
*Sheryl Sandberg,author of Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to
Lead*
"Much of its advice is solid career counsel for anyone looking to
move up...ultimately the tone of this book is quite
hopeful...[T]his book's message: If we make ourselves and the men
in our lives aware of the roadblocks women still face, and we use
some of the many tools the authors offer in this volume, we are
likely to see women move ahead more quickly. In fact I wish there
were a way to interest men in reading this book. They would get the
most out of it."
*Forbes.com*
"The book offers women advice for asking for promotions or pay
raises, while acknowledging that women who ask for these things can
be considered masculine in ways that might undermine their success.
I particularly appreciated reading about the toxic competition
between women at work that can also hinder the success of women
collectively."
*Salon.com*
"The book's plentiful examples and suggestions provide smart
strategies for federal workers to find work/life balance without
calling their commitment to career into question."
*The Business of Federal Technology*
"Williams and Dempsey provide the essential bridge between research
findings on prejudice and discrimination and the problems that
women experience at work. Solutions exist, and these authors
present them. What Works for Women at Work is a must-read book for
everyone committed to creating gender-fair workplaces."
*Alice H. Eagly,author of Through the Labyrinth*
"Written by a mother-daughter duo, this decidedly unwonky
examination of gender bias doubles as a playbook on how to
transcend and triumph."
*O, The Oprah Magazine*
"Having sifted through many of the debates about how much women can
and should succeed, Williams and Dempsey finally offer a template
on how women can do that and how the workforce can support this
integration; whether these women are homemakers or management, this
book is a confidence booster. A much needed look at what women
might want, but what society needs."
*Amy Richards,author of Opting In*
"This title is many steps beyondLean In(2013), Sheryl Sandbergs
prescription for getting ahead in business.What Works for Women at
Workis filled with street-smart advice and plain old savvy about
the way life works in corporate America."
*STARRED Booklist*
"Its great to have a smart compilation of helpful suggestions put
together not by two self-help gurus but by two women who understand
that all their advice might still not be enough. Besides, make no
mistake: the guidance they offer is often quite good, and I suspect
few women will not find either a strategy theyve successfully used
in the past or one they can utilize in the future within its pages.
[] It pretty much sums up what happens to all too many women
today."
*Women's Review of Books*
"The insights from cognitive psychology and social psychology, and
the tips gleaned from experience, that this book brings to bear on
experiences of gender in the workplace are worth learning."
*Feminist Economics*
"The book offers an accessible and sound model of problems faced by
women climbing the corporate ladder, and presents clear strategies
to take while waiting for business to catch up."
*Publishers Weekly*
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