That's What She Said: What Men Need to Know (and Women Need to Tell Them) About Working Together

by Joanne Lipman

If women only talk among ourselves, we can only solve 50 percent of the problem. We need men to join the conversation, to be our partners. And as for the men, most of them aren’t anywhere near villains. They don’t need beating up with a two-by-four. They’d

like to see an equitable workplace, they just can’t figure out what they’re supposed to do about it.

Misogynistic corporate cultures have flourished at companies including Fox News, Uber, venture capital firms, film studios, media companies, and more, though when exposed the result has been the ouster of top executives.

In one survey, 79 percent of male supervisors reported worrying about giving women candid feedback, and said they felt they had to provide guidance carefully and indirectly. The irony is that by self-censoring, the men don’t give women the feedback necessary for the women to advance.

A 2014 survey of minority female scientists found that an astonishing 100 percent reported experiencing bias. What’s more, while women in the U.S. earn only 80 percent as much as men, the discrepancy for minority women is far steeper: just 63 cents on the dollar for black women and 54 cents for Latinas.

Even though women earn almost 60 percent of college degrees and more than half of graduate-school degrees,

they represent just 5.6 percent of S&P 500 chief executives and 18 percent of board members of Fortune 1000 firms. They are only 19 percent of law partners. A Rockefeller Foundation survey found that 1 in 4 Americans believes we will literally invent time travel before women run half of the Fortune 500 companies.

Prime Minister Shinzō Abe calls women “Japan’s most underutilized resource.”

Yep, they’re blond too. Researchers theorize that lighter hair color is associated with youth, beauty, and warmth, which helps counteract the harsh trait of aggressiveness that goes against female stereotypes.

When men succeed, they attribute it to their own grit and intelligence. Women attribute it to luck.