How Women Respond to Frustration at Work, and Why When faced with criticism and rejection at work, women are stung harder and for longer (via Harvard Business Review): One Monday morning, I rode the elevator with an attorney who works in my building. She was fuming. Apparently, she and a male colleague brought an idea to their senior partner meeting. They had both been over-the-moon-eager to make the pitch and spent the week preparing a full presentation with video clips. Then, five minutes into the pitch their hopes were dashed. The managing director didn’t like the idea and he was in a hurry to close the meeting. He shut them down with a blunt remark, leaving zero room for rebuttal. My friend was in a spiral. The experience ruined her weekend and she was still thinking about it days later. She felt humiliated and couldn’t let it go. You’d think that her colleague would be equally insulted by the shabby treatment. Yet, according to her, he was barely fazed. He took the setback in stride, essentially brushing it off. Everyone has bad moments and foiled presentations, but not everyone carries it around with them for days or weeks. One anecdote does not indicate a trend, of course, but other evidence suggests that there may be a gender divide in how men and women respond to frustration at work. This is a common topic of discussion in my coaching sessions with female executives. They report feeling disappointed and sometimes defensive when a decision or debate at work doesn’t go their way. Similarly, my review of 360 feedback reports indicates that women harbor what my colleagues and I refer to as “retained angst.” That is, they second-guess themselves and take negative moments to heart for an extended period instead of reflecting on the incident and letting it go. On average, the managers we speak with say that they see more women than men “taking it personally” when the tide turns against them. They blame themselves, feel insulted, or harbor resentment for days at a time.
Posted on: Fri, 08 Nov 2013 19:24:23 +0000
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