Play Like A Man, Win Like A Woman Part 5

A recent international poll conducted by the Roper Organization shows that not only are female executives more likely to say they are "super-stressed" than men, but that white-collar and blue-collar women are equally likely to feel this way.

THE PROBLEM: You feel so overwhelmed by the amount of work on your desk that you can't concentrate.

WHAT TO DO: I remember the exact anecdote that helped me figure out how to cope when I felt overwhelmed. It concerns the 1950s English track star Sir Roger Bannister, who, along with his compet.i.tors, was trying to run the first four-minute mile.

Bannister's coach knew Bannister could run a quarter mile in one minute, sometimes even a little less. So he devised a clever psychological trick: He taught Bannister to stop focusing on the event as one mile long and instead to think of it as four quarter-mile sprints, and to run each one in a minute or less.

Bannister was able to reframe the picture and he broke the record-and was knighted for it two decades later.

By making the ultimate goal seem impossible to attain, we can become immobilized, unable to understand how to get from here to there. But there are few projects that can't be broken into smaller, more manageable pieces, making the distance between here and there seem a great deal closer.

The guy down the hall is clear about this. He knows the drill. He takes the first thing he has to do, concentrates on it, finishes it, then moves on to the second thing, concentrates on it, gets it done, and so on down the line.

Men can work like this because the larger picture doesn't distract them. As we have seen, men compartmentalize. Their lives have parameters; they walk into the office, and they're clear-this is my office, this is what I get paid to do. Like racehorses, men don't mind wearing blinders to help them focus on what needs to be done.

We would have a fit if anyone put blinders on us, because blinders would mean that we couldn't communicate with the other horses, or see which horse is walking down the lane, or who's being fed what. But blinders can be useful. They lead you where you want to go-the finish line.

A woman's work is never done, goes the old saying. Don't you believe it. You can always get your work done, when you focus on the pieces one by one.

10 Don't Anguish.

SITUATION: Two days are left before the big presentation and the work isn't finished.

HIS MOVE: He doesn't let on that he's worried.

HER MOVE: She tells her friends that she knows she won't be ready.

I once knew an exceptionally talented woman who worked for a large company, where she was known as the local Ally McBeal. She told her troubles to everyone who would listen. Every mistake, real or imagined, became the subject of a long conversation. Every self-destructive thought was verbalized. Every dreary moment was grist for the rumor mill.

The woman saw nothing wrong with her behavior. She even volunteered that her therapist (whom everyone heard plenty about) recommended that she share her feelings as often as possible.

As was frequently pointed out, her therapist didn't have to share an office with her. Those who did found themselves so burdened by her inappropriate disclosures that they turned her into a pariah. No one would volunteer to start a project with her. No one would want to take a trip with her. Her career slumped, which made her worry more, which made her talk more.

Remember this: Guys wear their game face. Even when the odds are against them, they still try to look as if they're going to win. And who knows, maybe they will.

Girls are brought up to be nice. In turn, we want everybody and everything else to be nice too. When they aren't, we anguish openly about anything and everything-what's the best restaurant for a client luncheon? Are these the right clothes for the meeting? Is promotion really a possibility? Are the budget projections accurate? Is the weather good?

I'm not saying that guys don't worry. Of course they do. But they know that when the compet.i.tion is intense, you don't let your anxiety show-unless you have a compelling reason to do so. Say the subst.i.tute comes into the game to help charge everyone up. He doesn't tell his teammates that he should be looking after his grandmother, and his foot hurts, and he doesn't want to have to compete against his cousin on the other team.

Women are more apt to show vulnerability than guys in all areas of life; we were encouraged as young girls to tell Mommy what's wrong. We got attention for sharing our problems. "Does it hurt? Mommy will make it better," were among the kindest words we heard.

Today you're not worrying about your skinned knee but about tomorrow's presentation, and you're tempted to share your fears with your colleagues. What you want is the same kind of rea.s.surance you got when you were young. "You'll be fine, you'll do great."

But the guy in the cubicle next door isn't Daddy. He has no interest in your inner turmoil. And you don't want him to know. Because if he does, someday he could use it against you. That may be unfair, but that's business.

THE PROBLEM: Nervous and stressed out, you want to discuss your problems with others.

WHAT TO DO: Don't. Anguish in private.

But if you absolutely feel you have to confide in a co-worker, pick someone you can trust, someone who won't use your anxiety against you, someone who can help you focus on what needs to be done, rather than on what went wrong.

Bear in mind: If you're anguis.h.i.+ng all the time, you must ask yourself if your work is really the source of your difficulties-or could the real problem be a personal issue that you're reluctant to discuss with your family or close friends?

HINT: If you're a boss, part of your job is to maintain control. That doesn't mean that you can't show you have questions or problems. If your department isn't going to meet its numbers, for instance, it's your responsibility to put your group on notice. But if you start telling everyone that the project is doomed to fail, either you will undermine everyone's self-confidence and the project truly will collapse, or your employees will think of you as a worrywart and they'll stop listening to you.

11 Follow the Team Leader.

SITUATION: Eight people are working on one project under one team leader.

HIS MOVE: He contributes as best he can and reports regularly to the leader.

HER MOVE: She voices her doubts about the project long after it's begun and subtly tries to do things her own way.

Jill, after starting as an a.s.sistant, worked her tail off at her company until she was made a vice president. Last fall she was one of many people attending an industry convention. There, on the morning of her company's gala affair, her boss sought her out to say that he'd just reviewed the details of the party with the new public relations coordinator, and didn't like what he was seeing.

"You know how to give a good party," he said. "You know what I like too. Do it."

Jill could barely respond. She was a vice president, not someone's a.s.sistant. Her calendar was filled with important meetings, and she was well aware the boss would never have similarly commandeered a male employee. Additionally, she liked the new public relations person and knew that taking over her job would damage their relations.h.i.+p.

What did Jill do? She canceled the appointments she could, asked her peers to keep the ones that couldn't be postponed, and threw herself into planning the best party in the convention's history, all in ten hours. The reason: She knew that the boss was the team leader and that the party mattered to him. Even though planning the affair didn't fit her job description, she was aware that by doing it, and by doing it right, she was making herself an indispensable member of the team. She was also showing that the team was more important than her own ego.

The event was fabulous, and her boss, as well as the rest of her team, knew why.

Unfortunately, this story is the exception to the rule. Too many women I know worry so much about protecting their hard-won professional position-or their friends' territory-that they can forget about teamwork.

Boys learn that being part of a team means doing what the leader tells you to do, and shutting up about it. You can argue with the coach when he calls the play. You can point out mistakes. But once the play is in operation, you perform your a.s.signed part to the best of your ability.

Women have little practice following a team leader because of the group orientation of our games. Our social circles, being democratic, made us think everyone was equal.

Consider the following: I recently phoned a department in my office to relay some sensitive information on a breaking story. The boss was on vacation, and the person who took the call was a new employee with little experience handling the kind of story I was reporting, and even less seasoning as a leader. When I asked to speak to the person in charge, she told me, "No one's in charge. We're doing this as a team effort."

I didn't have the time to talk to a group, and hung up. I wanted to talk to a leader. Finally I decided not to pa.s.s the tip along. Suppose my information was wrong? Who would check it? Who would give a final go-ahead? And who would be the spokesperson if we needed to do a postmortem? A team isn't a team without a leader.

THE PROBLEM: You're having trouble fitting in because business is a team sport.

WHAT TO DO: Remember that your job is not about you. It's about the team. You have to follow team rules: Play with the big picture in mind: It isn't your job to feel insulted if a particular task seems beneath you. If the situation warrants immediate attention, no one wants to hear about your personal doubts. Your individual concerns, no matter how important to you, are the small picture. The big picture is the team's ability to score a goal. You've been hired because you can contribute to the team. That means you can't get caught up in minutiae or waste energy disliking people or worrying about your own problems.

You don't have to like your teammates, but you do have to stay loyal to them: Regard the least-capable member of your team as a problem to solve, and not a personal affront. A team is only as good as its weakest link. Strengthen that link and you strengthen yourself.

You don't have to think of yourself as an automaton: Unique, interesting, unusual, different-these words describe a woman's charm. They make us attractive to our partners and to the world. So it's easy to think that if you become a team player, you'll become invisible. You won't. In fact, you'll become a better version of you. A good center can help make a good quarterback look great; a good catcher improves a pitcher; all good doubles partners help each other. Each member of your team brings his or her own unique talents to the playing field; you can improve yours by taking advantage of all the talents around you.

Don't second guess the team: As we saw in Chapter 3: Learn the Playing Field, once a team decision has been made, it's time to move on. There is no move called Pause, or Stop and Think About It, or, worse, Second Guess. I've often made this mistake, and have often been reprimanded. The most common situation: The boss and I are going out to lunch, and after we make a decision where to go, I bring up all the other alternatives-whereas all my boss wants to do is eat.

If you want your team to score a goal, it's not helpful to keep proposing alternative ideas. When everyone on the team is running to the left, this isn't the moment to ask if it wouldn't be better to run to the right.

Examine your internal conversation: Write down your complaints about work and read them aloud. Are they all I-and me-oriented? Many of you will think, "Not me." But we can be very egotistical, in ways that we don't always recognize.

Say, for example, you have an incompetent co-worker, so you wrote, "I think he's a jerk." "He never listens to anything I say." "He's not as smart as I am." Do you see the egotism in that impulse? We become so wrapped up in our negative energy, so convinced that if someone would just listen to us everything would improve, that we can end up obsessed with a team member who's not sharp.

Rather than sound off, pitch in and help. Find a way to make positive suggestions. Devote your critical talents to making the team work better instead of just criticizing. Never approach the team leader with only a complaint. Have a solution handy as well.

Let the team help you: When we get frustrated with our teammates and say, "I can do it better and quicker myself," we usually make a strategic mistake-as well as take on too much work.

As tempting as it may seem to transgress boundaries, don't. A center fielder doesn't try to pitch, a goalie doesn't try to score. If you really think you could do someone else's job better than he or she can, go to the team leader and discuss it confidentially.

It's a very female tendency to undertake more than our share, and one that I believe evolves from being a mother. You can put the dishes away twice as fast as your child, so you don't ask her to do it. But if you never give her the opportunity to try, even if it takes her extra time, how will she learn?

Fact: Many women fail because they can't accept help. You see them in their offices at 7:30 P.M., doing the work of five other people-people who have long since gone home. When questioned, they explain that instructing the people under them seemed too laborious and, furthermore, by the time they were done teaching, they could have done the actual job better and quicker.

But the result of your doing too much is that you become angry, and your employees don't learn anything. Worse: In the end, because you can't do it all yourself, you eventually fail. That's the reason you have a team in the first place.

Don't torpedo the team: Perhaps the worst play we make as a team player is to forget we're on the team. Yes, there are many other items on your agenda every day-the house, the relations.h.i.+p, the kids, the parents, and so on. But while you're at work, except in time of real personal crisis, your prime objective is the team's success. I'm not saying the rest of your life isn't important, but if you want to be successful, focus on your work while you're at work.

When you need time off to take care of a serious personal problem, ask for it. If your company is so rigid that it can't accommodate an urgent personal need, you're probably in the wrong place.

12 Don't a.s.sume Responsibility Without Authority.

SITUATION: The boss is upset because a key department is underperforming.

HIS MOVE: If persuaded to help out, he makes sure that the boss gives him the authority to tackle the problem.

HER MOVE: She immediately volunteers to help, and her offer is accepted. Happy that her boss has such confidence in her, she never asks for the appropriate authority.

Consider Jill, who threw that big party even though it wasn't in her bailiwick as a vice president. Before Jill canceled her scheduled appointments, before she asked her a.s.sociates to see the clients she couldn't postpone, before she threw herself into planning the best party in the convention's history, she told her boss that she needed the authority to run the event as she saw fit: to spend what had to be spent, to hire the people who needed to be hired. She couldn't keep coming back to the boss every time she ran into an obstacle. The people who had been working on the party needed to know she was in charge.

Her boss agreed. And he made it clear that by accepting this condition, she was prepared to take the heat if the party were a flop. Jill was smart enough to accept this as good news, knowing that if the party was a success, she'd get the credit.

Having responsibility without the necessary authority is one of the prime issues women face in business.

Say the boss is in a quandary-there's a problem in the creative end, and he knows that the guy in charge, Jack, isn't getting things done. He calls a meeting of his trusted inner circle to discuss the situation. By the time the meeting is over, you've volunteered to help Jack out. You haven't been offered a new job or been given new responsibility or received more money. You're just "helping."

Most guys know that each position comes with a specific responsibility. A goalie protects the goal, a quarterback throws the ball. The object is to win, and everyone plays his specific role to move the team to victory.

Because so many of us feel, correctly, that it's hard to get noticed on our merits, women break this rule over and over. We take on responsibility after responsibility because we want to show that we have a variety of talents, because we believe that we should always be congenial and willing to do anything.

But taking on any job without obtaining the proper authority wastes time as well as emotional and intellectual energy. You're trying to finish off a task in an area where the key people don't report to you. Instead of looking like a problem solver, you look like an interloper. The boss is standing above the fray, clean and distant, while you're in there, sleeves rolled up, taking charge of a group of people who resent your presence, who don't know if you're a permanent threat, and who are unclear about the status of their old boss.

It's a potential mora.s.s. You remember the boss's last words to you: "I want you to know that whenever you open your mouth, you are speaking for me." Do these words help now?

No. Because unless the top person gives you authority officially and publicly, you don't really have it. And responsibility without authority creates confusion, unhappiness, and trouble.

THE PROBLEM: You've volunteered to help the boss so often you're overextended and the lines of authority at your company have become unclear.

WHAT TO DO: Don't volunteer next time. Stifle your impulses. You're not there to make everything okay and your boss knows it.

The truth is that a woman is more likely to initiate the dreaded responsibility-without-authority problem than her boss is. He doesn't really expect us to solve his problem-not unless we've volunteered so often he takes our partic.i.p.ation for granted.

Believe me, I know how hard it is not to offer help. I still have to restrain myself. But what I finally understood was that when a male boss complains about a bad situation, he usually just wants to vent.

Say he tells you that old Jim is doing a bad job in the accounting department, that he can't get along with his employees, that there's constant turnover. We are so trained to be caretakers that instead of saying, "Yes, I understand, that sounds difficult," we offer, "Jim and I have a great relations.h.i.+p. Do you want me to talk to him?"

No, no, no. The boss didn't expect you to take action. He probably won't turn down the offer-why should he? It won't cost him. But he wasn't asking. He was whining.

Offer your services only when are you certain that the task is a career opportunity. But be clear that you're making a trade-off. I never knew a volunteer in this kind of circ.u.mstance who didn't end up feeling exploited. Her boss started taking her goodwill for granted, and by the time she either became furious with him, or realized how overextended she was, it was too late. So instead of becoming the boss's favored pet and improving her prospects, the relations.h.i.+p soured.

GAME HINT: At different times, nearly all men will treat almost all women as though we're subordinate. Be wary. If someone giving a presentation needs a drink of water, you can fetch it for him, but don't leave the impression that you're always the one responsible for water.

I know one female executive who says she loves to get the water or coffee for clients because it shows that she's not as self-important as her male colleagues, and the speakers always remember her fondly. But if you're worried about looking subordinate, whisper or hand a note to the person closest to the water pitcher that the speaker needs a drink.

Likewise, you needn't volunteer to take notes at every meeting. No law says that a woman has to be the secretary. If you do it once, suggest that, in the future, the task should rotate around the table, and note in your minutes who's next in line to take over. But don't become so dogmatic that you seem uncooperative or defensive. Find a way to make these tasks everyone's responsibility.

13 Sit at the Table.

SITUATION: The boss has called a big meeting in the conference room. There are ten chairs at the table, and another two dozen by the wall.

HIS MOVE: He sits at the table.

HER MOVE: She sits by the wall.

Imagine this scenario: The team is on the field at practice, and suddenly there's an open position. Four players are sitting on the bench. One of them is sticking his hands in the coach's face, begging to get in. The other three are ducking behind each other.

It's a scenario you'll never see, because a major part of playing the game is being ready to run out on the field. When the coach wants you, you're available. You're always fully present and accounted for.

The cla.s.sic office equivalent is the meeting in the conference room, where there always seem to be fewer chairs around the table than people to sit in them. The rest of the chairs are by the wall, or at one end of the room, or directly behind the boss's throne.