Managing Women

If we are not aware of how our attitude toward women is failing to serve us, many of us may inadvertently treat the women who report to us at work (or those to whom we report) in a less than healthy way. If we fail to show proper respect for them and value their input in teams or other collaborative efforts, we send the message that we are clinging to old views of women--and that will come back to haunt us. I have talked to a number of men who report to female managers on the job and they have issues arising from their own prejudices or their boss perceiving that they have prejudices. Further, the more we see women mainly as sex objects, the more likely we are to engage in inappropriate relationships in the workplace with women (e.g. affairs). This can result in us losing a job or damaging key relationships at a minimum. (In some cases there are actual punitive consequences for such behavior. We have certainly seen a large number of prominent men torpedo their careers with just this sort of behavior.)