No more "Ladies First" E-Book

Dorothee Ebert

• Herausgeber: Regina Ebert Verlag
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

For anyone who has never heard the sentence "Ladies First" in their lives, they can now put this book back down. For everyone else: no, this is not the ultimate expression of politeness. Supposedly well-intentioned gestures tend to reinforce the traditional power structure and subconsciously stand in the way of equality. The book is a humorous plea to all genders to question their own unconscious bias and to take the issue of equality into their own hands.

Leseprobe

Imprint

Original edition 2022

1st English edition 2024

Regina Ebert publishing house

Hebbelstr. 19, 14469 Potsdam

ISBN: 978-3-930685-34-9

Editorial office: TheAuthorEdit - Tiziana Olbrich

Cover: King Triumph - Renz Eli Cacnio

Content: Dorothee Ebert, FrankfurtThis work and all the contributions and illustrations contained therein are protected by copyright. Any use that is not expressly permitted by copyright law requires the prior written consent of the publisher. This applies in particular to reproductions, adaptations, translations, microfilms, and the storage and processing in electronic systems, as well as the right of public access. The text of this work has been partially translated with the help of AI-based translation tools (deepl.com).

For Julius

Table of Contents

Not Another Book of This KindGetting to Know the SubconsciousLadies FirstWho Has the Nicest Handwriting?Do You Have Kids?Going to the Bathroom TogetherAt the BarNice HandbagSomething in BetweenLiving in the Glass HouseThe Little Bit of HouseworkShe Is Not a Real WomanBetter no Responsibility at allThe Hymn of DiversityThe Discriminated ManWhat Are the Key Takeaways?To Our SonsTo Our DaughtersAcknowledgmentsSourcesAbout the Author

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Albert Einstein

Prologue

Not Another Book of This Kind

Do we really need another book about the poor oppressed women in the workplace? We live in the 21st century and by now everyone surely understands that diverse teams are more successful, that no company can afford to miss out on the valuable potential of 50% of the working population and that fathers are just as capable of changing diapers and doing the grocery shopping as mothers are. In most companies it feels like there is not a day that goes by without praising diversity and proclaiming equality of men and women. And board meetings where men proudly announced a zero percent women quota belong to history nowadays. We have come so far: flexible working models, shared parental leave, mentoring programs for (female) high potentials, a variety of great role models and more and more men attending parent-teacher conferences. Many companies have initiated special programs to promote women and in leadership development great care is taken to ensure that women are not discriminated in the workplace. And every company that is worth its salt proudly presents on its website the variety of childcare options available.

For many years gender equality was not a relevant topic for me personally. "We live in the 21st century! There are more urgent issues to address such as climate change for example - honestly, who wants to discuss discrimination in the workplace?"

According to Marion Knaths women mostly don't feel the impact of this issue, especially at the start of their careers.1 One definitely does not want to be labeled as a "feminist" or "man-hater". Just the sound of it is off-putting. And what will men think? Feminists are probably the women who don't perform well and hide their weaknesses behind pseudo equality debates. One definitely doesn't want to be associated with them. It's not that bad anyway, right?

Yet, from a female perspective a look at the executive management is still disillusioning. In Germany for example, the proportion of women in top positions in companies is less than 15%, and the German Bundestag has just under 35% female members.2 Is it just a matter of time? Do we simply need to be patient and wait for the "female shift" to happen on its own?

I don't think so! Because if it was just a demographic issue, we would have made more progress by now. We all know the statistics that show us every year that more than 50% of university graduates are female. Female students on average have better grades and possess all the important skills to master our transformative times.3 And yet, so little changes in the top management levels. Why is that?

The power of habit!

The mentioned measures - from childcare to mentoring programs and role models - are important and correct. But they don't go deep enough. We need to go deeper - much deeper. To where logic and reason no longer suffice. If we really want to bring change about, we must confront ourselves to the greatest power of human beings. Unfortunately, this power is not visible. It cannot be captured in a glossy campaign for International Women's Day nor can it be interviewed on any prestigious podcast. Its existence is completely unconscious to most people. And yet it determines the majority of our actions. The power of our habits - the power of our subconscious mind.

We will find the causes (and solutions) in our subconscious mind!

Many studies have concluded that we mainly act based on innate, inherited, or learned patterns. For efficiency reasons our brain switches to autopilot mode for the majority of the day guiding us relatively safely through turbulent times. This is very beneficial for many actions and energy-saving as well. Unfortunately, it also leads to quick decision-making based on learned stereotypes which can often result in biased choices. This applies to our everyday life and our professional life as well. However, most companies prefer to focus on concrete measures and visible quick wins. They rarely delve into the underlying unconscious factors when seeking solutions.

This book aims to dig deeper. We bring subconscious patterns to the surface and make them visible and addressable for discussion. After all, it's difficult to fight an unknown enemy.

Deficient women

One reason why "women's empowerment programs" often do not produce the expected results is due to their structure. The xxx assumption is that women not only need to be "supported" but also "shaped". They are supposed to fit perfectly into male leadership positions and to be able to stand confidently in hierarchical power structures. This is based on the assumption that women are deficient and that they need to be given the necessary tools to compete with men. This may have worked for many decades because the business world grew remarkably without much diversity and female workers. But in times when well-educated women can hardly escape calls from headhunters the supposedly "weaker sex" is no longer willing to bend to men's demands. They vote with their feet when they feel that the mentoring program serves more to adapt to the company culture than to actually strengthen their own competence and skills.

The HR department needs to do something!

This highlights another reason why we haven't made significant progress in achieving gender equality in the workplace for decades. Diversity is not just an issue for the HR department. It is a top management issue that must be desired and supported by all employees of a company, especially male employees. If you want to have more women in your company and in leadership positions you cannot just talk to the women. You need to talk to the men as well. You cannot delegate the issue to the HR department and simply showcase a few female role models on your company intranet. Instead you need to change the subconscious stereotypes of your (top) management team. This book provides several examples of how to do that.

A fight against windmills?

Oh, my dear friends of logical thinking, I can already hear you saying:

"If almost all of our actions are subconscious, then nothing can be changed here anyway!"

I have to admit that unfortunately you might be right. Just knowing about subconscious patterns alone will not make the world a better place. What we have trained and preserved over decades will not be easily shaken off after having read a book. However, uncovering subconscious patterns and showing a direct connection to our actions can greatly help to change them. To improve our behavior we must be confronted with them. Only then we will have a chance to self-reflect and thus change.

If you know better, you do better

This book is an attempt to make at least a part of these patterns and their effects on everyday business visible. Nothing more and nothing less! I don't presume to be able to change men's and women's behavior. Each person can only ever change themselves. But if every reader feels "caught" in some way in at least one chapter and spends a few minutes reflecting on their own (previously unconscious) patterns, then this collection of anecdotes has already fulfilled its purpose.

Because despite all the cognitive biases that influence our actions we humans can act very rationally. As Armin Falk so aptly puts it in his book about the difficulty of being a good person, "We make mistakes. But drawing the conclusion from that that we are cognitively not capable of doing the right thing, would be fatal."4 Therefore, our subconscious patterns are not an excuse to just continue as we have been doing in the past.

And one more thing: you are allowed to laugh at some points. Or shake your head. Or get upset. Men and women alike. I don't want to put anyone on the spot! And I don't have a bad image of men. I believe that most of them are not aware of the impact of their comments. They don't intend to harm or even hurt anyone explicitly. And the same goes for women! Somehow we all sit in this boat of "unconscious patterns". Men, women, young, old, urban hipsters and country folks. It's not about absolute truths. It's not about "right" or "wrong". It's about giving a face to the invisible and a voice to the unspoken. And how this voice sounds: is up to you!

I wish you an entertaining and conscious reading.

We don't see things as they are, we see them, as we are.

Anais Nin

Chapter One

Getting to Know the Subconscious

Actually we always knew it somehow: the majority of our actions are carried out unconsciously. Our brain would go crazy if we had to consciously process all the information that bombards us throughout the day. Just imagine if you had to consciously control every breath you take. You would literally do nothing else! Fortunately, our brain is trained to unconsciously monitor all the vital functions of our body, so we don't have to consciously worry about them. Because that would be a lot of work. That's why practices like yoga, meditation and breathing exercises are so incredibly effective for stress reduction: it demands our complete attention to consciously and deliberately perform an unconscious action like breathing. Try consciously to controll your breath while also doing a complex multiplication. It's impossible! We are not designed for this kind of multitasking.

Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman presents these insights about his two cognitive systems in various works, including his best-selling book Thinking, Fast and Slow, in a very impressive way.5System 1 is responsible for all unconscious and intuitive processes. We don't consciously think about the decisions made by our brain in system 1. They happen automatically and uncontrollably. We comply with the decisions made by system 1 without deliberately counteracting them. This is very convenient because these decisions happen quickly and require little energy from our body. On the other hand, system 2 is what is commonly referred to as "thinking". It involves more complex thinking processes that require us to "turn on" our brain. While probably every person who has completed elementary school can intuitively calculate 1+1 (system 1), the multiplication of 23x78 requires a true cognitive effort for most people (system 2). The solution to this mathematical problem does not come easily.

Sientists agree that in very few cases one of the two systems functions completely autonomously. Most processes in our brain are so complex that both systems are required. But the basic distinction between the two modes of operation helps us better understand how we make the majority of our decisions.

Most of our actions run unconsciously - mainly from the system 1 - and thus secure our daily survival. Try to make every decision consciously from the moment you wake up: do I get up now or in 10 seconds? Do I throw the blanket to the right or left? Do I step with my left foot or my right? One step, another step, another step - now more to the right or left with my foot? And don't forget to breathe. I'm sure you'd be exhausted before having your first cup of coffee. A very good exercise to remind ourselves of these unconscious mechanisms from time to time is, for example, to brush our teeth with the other hand or to cut bread with the other hand. It shouldn't be a problem, but suddenly such a trivial task becomes really difficult.

By the way, it's not easy to distinguish between unconscious and subconscious actions. In the Dictionary of Psychology6 the subconscious is considered the level of consciousness whose contents are not conscious, but can be made conscious through reflection. We usually don't think about brushing our teeth - but we could. In contrast, the unconscious is not accessible through pure reflection. So, the subconscious seems to be more of a mental concept while the unconscious appears to be more biological. However, there seems to be no clear separation that is beyond doubt at the moment. I leave the discussion to those who are knowledgeable about it and I use the terms largely interchangeably for this book. What is important to me is that we are talking about the part of our subconscious reactions that can be changed through reflection. Otherwise, any further lines of this book would be a waste of time. We are talking about the part that runs subconsciously in all of us and that we never think about. But with the right stimulus from outside - a book, a conversation or a movie - a process in our brain suddenly starts and makes us think again. What didn't seem to exist until just now suddenly becomes conscious to us. And once we have knowledge of something we can no longer ignore it. And that is exactly what my book is built on: once you have read all the stories based on true events or experiences you may find them absurd or exaggerated - but you cannot overlook them anymore.

Your brain will begin to think more and more about it. And that's the crucial point. Normally our brain is strongly trained to take shortcuts and rely on familiar patterns. These are either genetically or biologically determined in order to keep our bodies alive or they are based on our experiences. Since our earliest childhood we have been constantly collecting experiences that help us make decisions more intuitively and therefore faster. The first time you sat in the driver's seat of a car and felt the car move when you pressed the accelerator you were certainly overwhelmed frightened and highly concentrated in order not to hurt anyone at the tremendous speed of 20 km/h. After a few years this feeling has completely disappeared and we experience driving as something very intuitive that often happens aside. Have you ever caught yourself getting into the car and eventually getting out at work without really knowing how you got there? In this case your subconscious autopilot was literally at the wheel.

So far, so good. While in most cases our subconsciousness safely and reasonably brings us through everyday life, it also ensures that we no longer question most of our actions. In our decisions we rely on familiar patterns in order not to constantly consume energy evaluating situations and people. This is very useful when driving, cooking, handling emails and exercising. But at the same time it hinders us from making an objective evaluation at new situations. Our subconsciousness always searches for analogies or experiences from the past that can be applied to the new situation within fractions of a second. This saves us an incredible amount of energy and allows us to continue making fast (intuitive) decisions. However, it also has the disadvantage that we always decide based on our subconscious preconceptions - even if they may have become "outdated.

---ENDE DER LESEPROBE---