Season 3; Episode 9: You Should Smile More with The Band of Sisters

The Band of Sisters is a tribe of six women: Dawn Hudson, Angelique Bellmer Krembs, Katie Lacey, Lori Tauber Marcus, Cie Nicholson and Mitzi Short - who all met when they worked at PepsiCo. Each of these women are impressively accomplished executives in their own right with a deep bench of experience working in competitive and traditionally male dominated industries. 

They have a lot to teach us. And in fact so much so they recently published a book this fall called You Should Smile More: How to Dismantle Gender Bias in the Workplace. 

What I love about their new book is how you get a variety of different perspectives and approaches on the same issues many, many women have faced over the course of their careers. Yet they don’t just rely on their own experience, they interviewed women and men to hear about their experiences and perspectives – and included these in the book as well.

In this final episode of Season 3, three of the six sisters: Lori, Dawn and Cie generously offer us a taster of their new book. They bring a fresh perspective on improving the lives of women in the workplace in the face of offenses at work that gradually have an outsized impact on women. You’ll hear some super practical ways women can respond to gender bias in the workplace and how women and men together can build intentionally inclusive and productive cultures at work.

Key Takeaways from this Episode:

Culture is Critical 

·     Despite leaders’ best intentions, gender bias continues in the workplace.

·     Leaders need to create an environment where people can speak truth to power and speak openly about the things that get in the way of having a great culture. This can include women giving direct feedback to other leaders about how they experience gender bias in the workplace. 

·     No matter how hard you try, you lose touch when you have a more senior position – men and women. And if you don't put mechanisms in place where people feel comfortable coming to you, you've become part of the problem.

·     During COVID, people realized they have more choices for how and where they work. However, microaggressions in work culture were just as common in virtual spaces (think Zoom) as they were in physical spaces (the office). 

·     Men and women come out of college and business school today used to dealing with each other pretty equally. Yet in corporate culture which has been passed down through decades this is not the case. Often, the leader will have a vision for a gender-neutral company that attracts and retains talent. But things that happened in the past get passed down inadvertently. Younger people today are almost less equipped to deal with it.

Include Men

·     Women alone can’t solve gender bias; it’s critical for men to be part of the conversation and solution.

·     Women are saying ‘this still happens all the time’ while men honestly say, ‘I didn't know that was a thing’. 

·     Men and women together need to create an inclusive culture that expects and reinforces inclusive behaviors from everyone in the company.

Make an Impact

·     Fixing micro events are usually small things, so they're easy to change or adapt. But those small changes can have a big impact.

·     Just being in the room, gives you the power to make a difference.

·     This stuff shows up every day in every way. When you're in the room where it happens, it’s an opportunity to say something. You have to go from being a bystander to being an ally. 

·     Women tend to think they’re the only one that experiencing gender bias or at first they tend to chalk it up to being the most junior person in the room. Until another women opens up. 

More in the Book

·     We didn't want to write another book where we put the burden on women to solve all the issues. We also speak to bystanders in the room, men, or women, to help them become allies. If you don't bring men, and specifically white men, who are in charge, into the conversation you won’t create change.

·     While women have similar experiences of dealing with bias in the workplace, each of us have very different ways to approach this bias. The book is organized to help women to navigate these situations: in one situation you might identify with Mitzi and in another one with Cie. That's the power in having six voices.

·     Many of the situations we dealt with in our careers still exist today except they are more subtle and therefore harder to deal with. 

To learn more about my work in executive coaching, leadership development and team effectiveness check out my website, connect with me on LinkedIn or email me at winnie@winnifred.org.  

Reach out and tell me what was helpful about today’s episode or any suggestions you have for my show.

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I look forward to sharing another transformative conversation with you next week!

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