Prejudices at Work - Part 3

(I am changing the title of these posts, as the original one seemed to convey something else than what I wanted to express, though I am not sure if this one is much better).

I think discrimination is nothing but bias exaggerated, and it may be difficult to define a boundary between the two. At times, the discrimination can be stark and direct, and there are laws to deal with it, though the effectiveness of these laws has always been a question. But most often, it is subtler - indirect hints that keep affirming that despite your competence, you will never be considered at par with your male colleagues, that you will never be one of the team. Let me share two incidents, which are work-related, but not entirely professional, which go on to show the inherent behavioral insensitivity towards women.

The global head of the group my friend K works for, came to her site for a visit, and the site manager invited all his managers for dinner with him. That is, all the managers except K, who, being the only woman in the group, was conveniently forgotten. Only when they reached the restaurant, the site manager was reminded of his omission. He called up K (even apologized!), but by then it was too late for her to make suitable arrangements for her family and reach there.

Another time, my group planned a day outing to celebrate a major release. The fun activities planned for the group consisted of rather physical games of football and cricket – which the few ladies in the team just watched on, feeling left-out, and somehow, betrayed.

Most of the corporates today deny having a glass ceiling for women, but practically, is it difficult to detect its existence? Though this was not the idea behind this set of posts, it was perhaps inevitable that we touch upon this point as well (Perhaps because the initial title was not very apt). Anyway, I had a long discussion on this with N, but he does not agree with me here. But in my view, though the gender ratio at the entry level is same as that in engineering colleges, it gets more and more skewed as the levels increase.

In my decade long stint in my previous company, in the India office I saw only one woman who was a Director (though in a non-product group), and none who was an Architect. [Just to explain the terminology used there, a Director is the owner of a product or an area from management perspective, while Architect is the owner from technical perspective]. I am citing here the experience from my previous company, as I am rather new in the new one to comment, but I strongly suspect that the things are more or less the same.

So, almost all the senior executives in the company were male. And rare few of them had working wives. Most of the wives quit working after marriage/kids, to take care of the household, since the high-flying executives were often busy and/or away on business, gearing up the power ladder, and could not be depended on to consistently attend to domestic responsibilities. I’m sure all these ladies are happy and proud of their spouses’ success, and only sometimes do they wistfully mention their own abandoned dreams. But how many of them have their contribution to this success acknowledged? Mostly, it is just shrugged as a matter-of-fact – “Oh. She quit after we got married”. A gallant way indeed to thank the ladies for their support, sacrifice and hard work.

Here are:

Part 1

Part 2