CuppaGemma

I prefer the company of men at work.

It is with regret and pragmatism I make the observation that the company of women in the workforce can in many cases be reduced to archetypal Grimm characters who have lost their edge but crack the whip. Many, not all.

There is something among women that cannot be shared.  Not the gallant prince, but power. No one will deny that women have to work hard, often harder than their male counterparts and still will receive less compensation, smaller titles and ultimately less respect. The dragon breath of reality sighs upon us. Okay, so be it, we will manage.

Many of us are driven to work hard, be agile and smash ceilings. We buy aspirin and mints. There is a fatal flaw I have noticed showing itself in more than one job and in more than one instance.

The way up, and remaining up will always be a marathon not a relay race. Only one woman can get crowned.

That’s the crux of it. We don’t look to other women as people we will help to also step up. We don’t build a network of friendships and support.  We forget the value of collaboration. We use other women to get us where we need to be, or to reemphasize why one and only one of us may be on top.

On order of a mortal sin, someone who is younger, simpler and less jaded may not replace one in a position of respect and power. Power, like a man, cannot be shared.

Cindys the world over must find a way to deal with this.

In many instances we can do a great number of things but are intentionally marginalized with tasks of sorting lentils from ashes. So over and again the work is done with a smile, and the whip is cracked. The relationship did not start out that way of course. In the company of women, a younger one is taken in by an older one to help set things straight, make things better.

And all is well and good inside the moated universe of the office until the handmaiden is perceived to be outshining the mentor in one way or another. This will simply not do. It can not be allowed. She will be picked apart to the bone, or laden with too many tasks to ever accomplish them all, or each task will be microscopically dissected and sent back for revision.

Could Grimm write us a tale set in the modern office?

Women have subtle ways of denying one another. The New York Times did a piece on this, Backlash: Women Bullying Women at Work on May 9th. The quotes in it are telling. No one wants to mention it. Women have quit over it. We are all holding ourselves back because of it.

It’s there as a wholly different problem then a nice set a gams being remembered more than a pitch for a change in strategy. This problem with men is known and tractable.  But women sharing power- that’s a game of musical chairs. There is only one throne to be had.

We forget Emily Post and play passive aggressive chess matches of belittlement where the pawn can’t specifically call out the queen unless she is speaking with a rook or knight who happens to be in the right time and space to understand.

The problem with the company of women is that we are expected to serve as a shadow, not as a team.

One woman serves as the other’s step.

For whatever bundle of cultural mores we cannot be the group that rows in sync and that hand over hand helps to bring others all up. We do not want to add more girls to the board room. It seems, in the company of women that more than one in the position of power is intrinsically threatening. Darn, I thought we had already graduated high school.

In the original Grimm’s story it is the little pigeons who cry, “Turn and peep, turn and peep”.

They get the attention of the king’s son and he passes on the false bride (who actually hacks off her own toe to make the shoe fit) for Cinderella instead. In the workforce of women the goal is not to be the bride (there are indeed those of us who have been there, done that).

The goal is to level the field.

A chance to work hard and to be respected for what you can do. The ability to serve and build a team. To make things happen. And were we to help one another out, a level field would mean more women overall. That’s not a moral I have found. Yet. Because it is in many, not all places that we find this dynamic.

So we reach out beyond the confines of one little moat and look elsewhere. We work with men, we work with women who are compassionate over competitive or we go off and do our own thing. Create our own set of rules. We don’t play games.