The classic start to – what – a joke? An anecdote? A casual story?
Nope. It’s the classic start for any female leader of color who enters a meeting, a conference, a board room.
An African-American woman, an Asian, Indigenous, mixed-race woman walks into a room, and stands in front of a white-board, a slide presentation, holds notes, holds charts, holds her hands tightly together before she remembers to loosen them. Unlike a white male who steps into the same room, the woman of color is unlikely to assume she will be positively received.
Our woman of color scans the room. The pack of older white males who will immediately judge her. The two other female managers who see her as competition. If the woman is wearing designer clothing, she can be judged for prodigal spending or trying “too hard” to fit in. If she dresses simply, she can be judged for failing to meet “appropriate executive standards” -- whatever they are. She can be belittled based on her hair, her nails, her jewelry, her shoes -- and the fact that she is a woman of color.
All of this happens before she’s opened her mouth -- and when she does, she had better conform to the accepted method of speaking: white American English. Accented English or African-American English face linguistic prejudice. A Los Angeles Times article reports that “Even when adults are perfectly capable of understanding speech in a non-native or unfamiliar dialect, they often find the words spoken to be less credible” (Sharese King and Katherine D. Kinzler). In other words, statistics, facts, and reports conveyed in a non-standard/white American accent are perceived as less true. The content may be valid, relevant, and well-presented but will be disregarded as lacking credibility.
Our speaker experiences the activation of her nervous system: dry mouth, shallow breathing, increased heart rate, sweaty palms, churning stomach. This isn’t merely “stage nerves”. Her physiological response is exacerbated because she doesn’t know if she is going to be believed.
The chronic and career-destroying effect may be that she assumes a meek-and-mild persona purely to avoid being judged, regardless of her capabilities, talents and leadership skills.
The clear solution is for management to create a genuinely inclusive and receptive environment. Often management may appear to embrace that idea – as long as it’s among those who are not rising in the ranks. You’ve heard the term “from office pet to office threat.” Women of color who are first seen as likeable and promising become decidedly less so when they develop and start to use their authority. They begin to lose support, and an example of that loss of support is a negative and reductive reaction to women demonstrating leadership in spotlight situations.
Women of color do have resources. They can track down non-older-white-male mentors. They can learn to manage their bodies through stress and create a force-field around them, knowing they have value to add. Those resources will boost confidence and center women in self-worth. Ultimately, though, is it her responsibility or the company’s – for their own fiscal future - to nurture a well-educated, talented and creative population of leaders?
Our woman of color walks into the room. Will she stay and command an attentive appreciation from the room of listeners, or will the listeners fail her? Will she see that she is respected for the leader she is or, in the face of bias where there is no place for a creative, innovative, world-building leader, will she vote with her feet?
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