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Summary
Summary
In the vein of #Girlboss and Nice Girls Don't Get the Corner Office , discover how to thrive at work from the head of the Global Innovation Coalition for Change at UN Women with this "passionate, practical roadmap for addressing inequality and finally making our workplaces work for women" (Arianna Huffington).
For years, we've been telling women that in order to succeed at work, they have to change themselves first-- lean in , negotiate like a man, don't act too nice or you'll never get the corner office . But after sixteen years working with major Fortune 500 companies as a gender equality expert, Michelle King has realized one simple truth--the tired advice of fixing women doesn't fix anything.
The truth is that workplaces are gendered; they were designed by men for men. Because of this, most organizations unconsciously carry the idea of an "ideal worker," typically a straight, white man who doesn't have to juggle work and family commitments. Based on King's research and exclusive interviews with major companies and thought leaders, The Fix reveals why denying the fact that women are held back just because they are women--what she calls gender denial --is the biggest obstacle holding women back at work and outlines the hidden sexism and invisible barriers women encounter at work every day. Women who speak up are seen as pushy. Women who ask for a raise are seen as difficult. Women who spend hours networking don't get the same career benefits as men do. Because women don't look like the ideal worker and can't behave like the ideal worker, they are passed over for promotions, paid less, and pushed out of the workforce, not because they aren't good enough, but because they aren't men.
In this fascinating and empowering book, King outlines the invisible barriers that hold women back at all stages of their careers, and provides readers with a clear set of takeaways to thrive despite the sexist workplace, as they fight for change from within. Gender equality is not about women, and it is not about men--it is about making workplaces work for everyone. Together, we can fix work, not women.
Author Notes
Michelle P. King is the Director of Inclusion at Netflix. A leading global expert in gender and organizations, she was most recently head of the UN Women Global Innovation Coalition for Change. King is an advisory board member for Girl Up, the United Nations Foundation's adolescent girl campaign. King writes for Forbes , Thrive , and Harvard Business Review , and is also the host of the weekly podcast The Fix , which shares practical ways men and women can advance equality at work. She lives in Los Angeles, California, with her husband and two children. For more information, visit MichellePKing.com.
Gillian Anderson is an award-winning film, television, and theater actor and producer, writer, and activist. She currently lives in London with her daughter and two sons.
Jennifer Nadel is an award-winning broadcast journalist, qualified attorney, writer, and activist. American-born, she lives in London with her three sons.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
King, head of the UN Women's Global Innovation Coalition for Change, debuts with a welcome addition to the growing chorus of voices calling out the system rather than individual women for workplace gender inequity. She asks why people are obsessed with the idea that women need to be fixed, despite being more likely to have the characteristics commonly associated with good leaders--being collaborative, communicative, and well-educated. To her, the answer lies in an outdated expectation of what constitutes the "ideal worker": a stereotypically masculine, aggressive, and family-deprioritizing man, an ideal she associates with Mad Men's Don Draper character. King writes about how privilege and denial keep inequality going, how men are also harmed by gender assumptions, how feminism hasn't gone far enough, and how working mothers and female leaders still struggle with stereotypes and institutional barriers. The challenge, she shows, is in getting people to understand there's a problem at all, but King is there with strategies for taking action--she calls "for breaking up with Don" and critically reexamining how ideas about masculinity play out in the workplace. This thoughtful, thorough, often enraging look at a broken system delivers a resounding and memorable message: "Women are not the problem." (Mar.)
Kirkus Review
A global expert on organizational diversity and inclusion explains how to create an equitable workplace.King is head of the U.N. Women's Global Innovation Coalition for Change and an advisory board member for Girl Up, a campaign by the United Nations Foundation that helps fund and support programs that focus on adolescent girls. She is also a keynote speaker, researcher, and writer as well as the host of a weekly podcast, The Fix, in which she shares ways men and women "can advance equality at work." In her debut book, King challenges the notion of the ideal worker and condemns the success prototype common in traditional workplace environments. While the author acknowledges that strides have been made, she contends that organizations, often unknowingly, "operate in a way that marginalizes, excludes, or devalues women." She also contends that many organizations do not value differences and that their "diversity and inclusion efforts" are often "aimed at fixing women" rather than creating a workplace that truly supports men and women equally. Backed by extensive research data and interviews with company and thought leaders, the book is divided into three primary sections. In Part I, King explores the history of the workplace and the challenges faced by both women and men in this conventional environment. In Part II, she identifies three career phases common for women and the "invisible barriers" that women typically face at each stage. In Part III, the author provides a call to action for employees and leaders to begin discussing these hidden barriers and implementing changes that create environments and cultures that support everyone in an organization. Throughout the book, King also calls out problems and identifies specific ways employees and leaders can begin fixing them. Although the text is particularly geared toward issues faced by women, the author rightly asserts that equality in the workplace will benefit everyone.A common-sense guidebook for creating a workplace that values men and women equally. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
It is exhausting to hear researchers and authors dump issues about gender equality in the workplace at the feet of women themselves. Failure is due to, they claim, any number of individual issues, from nonconformity to lack of awareness about corporate dos and don'ts. Nonsense. It is the fault of the workplace, an environment designed by men, for men. Consultant King more than proves her point with case histories and statistics documenting the invisible barriers women face: the confidence-versus-competence catch-22. The penalties ladled out to moms who adopt part-time work. Even the so-called standard of success (which she calls "the Don Draper syndrome"). Though King touts "the fix" throughout, there is no one panacea, nor any one way to ensure equality. And unfortunately, the last section, on how to act to change the workplace, falls flat when she simply looks at awareness and understanding of barriers, with action afterwards, as the fix. Detailed roadmaps, please; otherwise, it will take at least another century to realize a 50-50 balance in the C-suite.
Table of Contents
| Foreword | p. ix |
| Introduction: It's Not a Woman Problem, It's a Work Problem | p. 1 |
| Part I Awareness | |
| 1 Who Broke The Workplace? A Brief History | p. 17 |
| 2 Gender Denial | p. 45 |
| 3 Privilege At Work: How Denial Feeds and Breeds Inequality | p. 69 |
| 4 It's A Path, Not A Ladder: Becoming Aware of Your Workplace | p. 85 |
| Part II Understanding | |
| 5 The Achievement Phase: Six Invisible Barriers from Graduate to Manager | p. 105 |
| 6 The Endurance Phase: Balancing Management and Motherhood | p. 147 |
| 7 The Contribution Phase: Six Invisible Barriers Women Leaders Face | p. 187 |
| Part III Action | |
| 8 Breaking Up With Don Why Men Need Gender Equality Just as Much as Women | p. 223 |
| 9 Equality A Call to Lead | p. 247 |
| 10 It's Our Workplace So, Let's Fix It Like Our Futures Depend on It | p. 279 |
| Acknowledgments | p. 289 |
| Notes | p. 291 |
| Index | p. 309 |
