Women Have Issues in the Corporate World Because Their Voices Are Ignored
A viral social media post showed me that the workplace is still more attuned to male voices
If you work in tech like me, you often hear women complain that their male colleagues or bosses ignore their input in meetings and projects, which makes building careers difficult.
It’s so common that a post I made about it on Threads went viral, and even Bonnie Garmus, the author of “Lessons in Chemistry,” chimed in to say the same thing happened to her and that it was the reason she started writing the book!
I shared a story about how this week, in a management meeting, I saw this dynamic play out in the most stereotypical fashion.
My colleague (a woman) suggested how we should deal with a problem that is causing friction in our support process. All the men started to push back on her idea, saying that her suggestion wouldn’t work.
After a heated debate, our boss said, “It’s very simple. This is what we’re going to do.” Then he repeated exactly what she had said earlier. And all the men nodded in agreement.
So far, so infuriating. But I wasn’t even surprised; this is so common. I’ve seen it happen countless times.
Many men have issues hearing women speak. Or they won’t accept that a woman knows what she’s talking about. Worst case, some men end up stealing a woman’s ideas and passing them off as their own.
“Can you please explain the difference between what I said and what you said?”
As mentioned, it’s really common, but this incident stuck with me. This time, she didn’t just let it happen. Instead, she very calmly asked, “Can you please explain the difference between what I said and what you said?”
I’ll never forget the look of utter confusion on his face.
He had no clue what had happened. He even asked what she meant. So she repeated that she had said the same thing earlier and would like to know why all of a sudden, everyone agreed with the idea.
I‘m sure he didn’t fully believe us when I confirmed that he had said the exact same thing.
I’m proud of her for standing up for herself this way. It’s hard to stay calm in these situations when you really want to hurl some expletives at them.
But we both remained professional and saved our rant for after the meeting ended.
It’s difficult to find the right way to respond in this situation. But the way she phrased the question as a request for clarification was really impressive. It’s polite, but it pulls no punches.
I shared the story on Threads because I thought it might be a good strategy for other women to know.
It must have struck a nerve. It has become my most viral Thread to date. The two-part post got 30,000 likes and almost 1000 comments. Hundreds of women shared the wildest stories about similar situations that happened to them in their workplace.
It wasn’t just women who noticed this trend. Men chimed in with their observations as well, nickthequizzer wrote:
We had a management meeting recently where we reviewed progress on something. The MD said “I think this was originally Steve’s idea” and when nobody said anything I said “No, it was Allison’s idea, Steve just said it again which is when the room started listening”. Cue slightly awkward looks.
It was crazy to read how common the disregard for women’s voices is. Even if you’ve seen it play out as well. I even learned a new word for this behavior: men repeating a woman’s words without acknowledging that she had said anything is called “hepeating.”
Apart from the stories about the blatant stealing of projects and ideas and intentional disregard by male peers and bosses, there appears to be an underlying biological reason as well. Some of this probably isn’t deliberate.
Men seem to have a harder time hearing female voices.
There’s research from the University of Sheffield on auditory illusions in schizophrenic patients that shows that male and female voices activate different regions of men’s brains.
Women’s voices are processed in the same area as music. That sounds really cute. But it also means that men in a meeting might not actively hear what you say.
It registers somewhere, obviously, or they couldn’t repeat it later. But not in the same place as men’s contributions to the conversation.
If you aren’t heard and your ideas are repeated by other people — men — and they are praised for your ideas, it becomes really difficult to advance. To them, it looks like you’re not contributing anything.
I’m lucky my voice is naturally deeper and calm, but I still deliberately raise it and speak a little more deeply so that what I say has a greater chance of being heard.
I’ve done this automatically for years.
Some women have resigned themselves to the situation. They’ll just let it happen to get things done more quickly — like darth_darnerys friend:
My best friend is in a position at work that no other Woman has ever achieved within her company. When she is on a conference call, they all wait for her to come up with a solution, then put her words into their own and dub it their idea. When I ask her why she doesn’t rage over it she replies “it gets them off the phone faster” 😂
I get that; I’ve used this tactic, too. Sometimes, when I need things to get done or want to move forward, I let a man repeat something I’ve already said. I know it’ll cut the discussion short.
I’ve even asked male colleagues to call customers and repeat what I had said to them. Because it was obvious they needed to hear it in a male voice to believe it.
Maybe I sound resigned too, but this tactic appears to be common. One woman shared that she even had to call her boss into a meeting once to do this.
I once walked out of a meeting and into my boss’s office and said “I need your penis to go explain to Mr. X that this is what we are going to do because he can’t understand when I say it.” So he went into the meeting and read the guy the riot act. I had had it that day
Often, when I was in meetings with a male sales colleague, a similar dynamic played out. I was the technical specialist. He was the sales guy with limited knowledge of how things worked. Whenever I answered a technical question, all the men around the table would turn to him and wait for him to repeat what I had said.
I resented this, but I also knew that there was no point in pushing back or trying to assert myself aggressively. The result we wanted to achieve was to sell them a piece of technology. That wasn’t going to happen if I made waves. So I learned to ignore it.
After more than 25 years in tech, I view every interaction as an ROI (return on investment) calculation. If I don’t see any immediate financial benefit from everyone knowing something was my idea, or that I came up with a solution, I just move on.
I don’t want to expend time and energy when there’s nothing to gain from an ownership discussion.
But this isn’t a strategy that women starting out can use. They still have to prove themselves. Letting men take credit for their thoughts and ideas will keep them stuck at the bottom of the career ladder.
They need strategies for their voices to be heard.
Some women on my thread just wanted to vent, but many shared great suggestions on how they dealt with these situations.
Their ideas ranged from amplifying each other’s voices and ideas by repeating them and crediting them to the woman who said them, like it was done by the women in the White House under Obama to keeping meticulous notes of everything you’ve done. And sharing them with everyone involved.
What stood out to me was that many suggested that you find another woman to gang up with and make sure you support each other’s voices.
Gaslighting by men in meetings was a common theme, too. Many women said that they had spoken up, but the men denied this happened. If women support and amplify each other, it’s harder for the men present to pretend they’re making it up.
For me empowering women in the workplace means having the back of the women I work with and support them whenever possible. And you can too. Repeat what other women have said and credit their ownership. If you notice someone steeling a woman’s idea politely remind everyone that what is being discussed was shared by another woman before.
Help each other to be heard.
Ronke Babajide is a feminist, socialist writer. She is based in Vienna with her husband. She works in Tech and mentors women who work in the field.