The Work It, Mom! Blog
with Nataly
Hi, I am Nataly and I am the co-founder of Work It, Mom!
I write the daily Work It, Mom! Blog where I talk about issues affecting working moms, goings on in our Work It, Mom! community, new site features, updates,and contests. I also share my own juggle between work and family and love to see members jump in with comments. Come and visit often!
Nataly's profile on Work It, Mom!
My first job out of college was for McKinsey & Company, a super-competitive consulting firm in New York. I worked with really really sharp people and it was a huge learning curve. Many times, I felt like I was hardly keeping my head above water and not doing such a stellar job. Reviews were a big part of the process there and I was genuinely stressed out when my first one rolled around, thinking that my manager would deliver some bad news.
Then I had the review. It was glowing. There were absolutely some areas I needed to work on and improve, but overall, my performance was rated very highly by my manager and my colleagues and I got a nice $5,000 raise, a BIG deal for a 22 year-old just out of college, living in New York City.
This wasn’t the only instance in my career when my perception of how my work would be rated by my boss was worse than what my boss actually thought. Once I talked about this persistent (and annoying) feeling with another woman colleague and she confessed about feeling the same way. It was part of a larger conversation we had about the female impostor complex – feeling like someone would soon figure out that we’re not as great at our jobs as it might seem.
Unfortunately, it turns out that this is fairly common. A new study has shown that women managers are three times as likely as men to underrate their bosses’ opinions about their job performance. The men in the study were more likely to overrate how they thought their bosses would rank their job performance and women underestimated their bosses’ level of satisfaction with their work by 11 percent.
What’s wrong with us, women? Why do we continue to be so super-hyper-critical of ourselves that we end up undermining ourselves at work? And I do believe that underrating your own performance at work is more than just an annoying feeling but a way to limit how far you go and succeed. If I don’t feel like I am doing a great job then I feel less empowered to take on greater challenges, speak up and generally behave in a way that shows my bosses that I’m confident in my abilities. And no one wants to promote someone who is not showing confidence in their own abilities.
Do you feel that you tend to underrate your bosses’ opinions of your work? Do you think as women, we do this because we are so super-critical of ourselves and hold ourselves to a tremendously high standard?
Subscribe to blog via RSS
Yes, probably most women do this. I cannot say why. I believe it’s something I was born with. After a certain age, of course, the mind clears and the individual realizes that all the bigmouths have been riding on BS all these years. Then we can have a review conversation without fighting the urge to lower our eyes.
This could be instinct based on the fact that in most things historically, it did a woman no good to compete with a man. Maybe an awareness of this tendency would help young women work around it. On the other hand, maybe it is there for a good reason, e.g., to help working moms keep it real. There is no question in my mind that the average woman is capable of more than the average man. But at the same time, working moms have far more responsibility than the average man. Maybe the fact that we’re trying to be great at 3x as many things reduces our focus on / expectation of being #1 at our career - and maybe that’s not a bad thing.
One thing I have always asked myelf - right after “could I do that” - is “would I WANT to be that person at the top?” In most cases, I realized that I’d have to compromise important principles to be that person. My principles are too important to me, hence I do not desire to work on those personality traits that “keep me down.” I did go back and forth for many years on whether or not I did want the promotion enough to fight for it. I never got to the point where I wanted it passionately enough to wow others. I did receive many kudos and raises for my high-quality, high-volume work; but there was pretty much no way I was going to be placed in charge of the focused, aggressive (and chauvenist) males who knew for sure what they wanted. And in retrospect, I am much happier. Rising to “the top” isn’t the end-all and be-all for most of us.
SKL | August 18th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
Perhaps some women infer from a boss’s lack of feedback that they aren’t up to par when that message is not what’s intended. My last project manager was ENTJ, He didn’t ever say you did a good job. If you never heard from him you were great. Some - not all - of my male and female peers were disturbed by this attitude - they wanted him to say “thanks, good job,” sometimes. If I ever wonder what my boss thinks about my performance or presentation or the information packages I give him, I just ask.
My current project manager is exactly the opposite. He (to my way of thinking) over-compliments people. I do a lot, and I’m good at my work; you don’t have to compliment me 10 times a day to try to motivate me to do even more!
Grace | August 18th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
I hate to generalize men and women in discussions such as these, but here goes.
The difference (in broad terms) is that women hang closer to their mothers in their younger years then men do. As boys, we are NOT encouranged (IN GENERAL) to stay in the kitchen and help mom cook dinner. At a certain point in time, girls are encouraged to do just this as well as help with the laundry, help with the cleaning, etc. Many chores that girls are assigned are chores that they do WITH mom so they are talking with mom more than their brother might. Boys have traditional chores (taking out the garbage, mowing the lawn, cleaning the garage) that are done in solitude, not with mom or even with dad. All that communication going on between moms and daughters creates a mentality of living up to expectations set BY EXAMPLE by mom. BOYS on the other hand, think in terms of WHAT IS THE PENALTY for not doing something and actions are more driven by ego. What will happen to me if I don’t clean up my room and play video games instead? Girls are driven by guilt, boys are thinking in terms of penalties imposed and servicing their own ego. These are VERY DIFFERENT WAYS OF THINKING.
It relates to this article because women are trying to live up to a certain standard at work, which in most cases at work are undefined unless the boss is an extraordinary communicator. At home, standards were defined by mom’s praise or complaints at work done and the evaluation was IMMEDIATE whereas at work, managers don’t often give such immediate feedback. Women will naturally undervalue their work when living up to a standard that’s undefined. Men on the otherhand define their own standards at work by looking at others around them and decide what the work standard must be by observation (and their own ego). It follows that men will think their work is at or more likely above the work standard in the office because their egos will tell them they are doing superior work compared to the office standard (which their defined themselves) and expect a good evaluation.
Glenn | August 18th, 2009 at 3:44 pm
I’m a single mom and I went back to work when my son was 8 weeks old. I use to do PR and worked long hours. Once I came back, my managers and bosses demaned alot more of me making me prove to them that I was commited to my job. And I was, but my son came first. I quit. I missed the challenges and creativity. I went to work for a university in a much more mommy friendly job, with a woman boss who does yell at me if I call in sick because my son was almost hostipitalized with asthma.
Would I like to stay home every now and then? Yes, but I don’t have a choice. I wake up every morning confident looking for ways to get a better earning job that utilizes my skills. I guess I don’t have that syndrome. I have to believe that I’m worth what I ask for people to believe. Yes, all the things working mom’s do is overwhelming. We want to be great at everything and we want to be everything to everyone. We just need to chill.
Anna Garcia | August 20th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
This is SO true. I’m not sure where I fall into this characterization - I also have the Type-A and first child complex working against me! I have always been my worst critic. I remember conducting a self appraisal in an employee evaluation and I seriously struggled over that thing for a least a week. I broke down all of my successes and “areas of improvements” and neatly outlined my next year’s goals. I also went through each area and scored myself - I even went beyong the 1-5 scoring system and implemented the .5 option AND I never gave myself a 5 (the best score) because you know, there is ALWAYS room for improvement. After my agnoizing self appraisal, I was called in to review my evaluation with my supervisor. At this time, I came to learn that she didn’t even bother to fill out the supervisor’s form and used my form as her own (and didn’t add a thing!). I know this wasn’t a typical situation, but in hindsight, I should have given myself 5’s.
Liz McLachlan | August 26th, 2009 at 6:51 pm