Technically Women » Uncategorized

Always Technically A Woman

Rachel Happe — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 10:50:40 +0000

Dennis Howlett doesn’t fool around. When he wanted an authentic perspective on a McKinsey Quarterly report on women and leadership, he collected a really interesting group of women to comment. I was flattered to be included and fascinated by the group he had assembled. Collectively the perspective presented was also much richer than any one part. And that collective perspective doesn’t surface very often.

As someone with a background in technology, product management, and software I’ve often been the lone woman on management teams or in engineering design sessions. I’ve experienced very few overtly sexist issues and, for the most part, I’ve been treated fairly and on my own terms. Having gone to a women’s college I am certainly aware of a variety of gender-related issues but have always been hesitant to get involved in women’s professional groups. Why? Gender is such a nuanced issue in today’s world. Sure, it’s been difficult to establish high trust relationships with some of my male colleagues and I have a lot of conflicting and stressful tugs at my time that I have a hard time juggling but I know many men who share those issues. I’ve also had some wonderful relationships with male colleagues – from early mentors to my current business partner Jim Storer. Making the issues of women and leadership an us vs. them situation is just not helpful. It’s not that simple.

Having said all of that, I think women – with all of our many priorities – probably have a different perspective on technology and why it is important. From personal experience I am less likely to enjoy technology for its own sake than the men I know – it can be cool but it has to be practical or helpful for me to use it regularly. So I believe there is a different perspective that women bring to how technology integrates with our lives and our businesses – but it’s often subtle. The concept of Technically Women intrigued me as an opportunity to collaborate with a bunch of whip-smart woman who have interesting perspectives on technology and to see if, over time, that collective ‘voice’ can be better articulated. But really, we are a bunch of technology professionals that just happen to be, technically, women. It’s an opportunity for me to share my love of technology, its potential, and its limitations and collaborate with some great people.

Looking forward to it!
Rachel Happe

What Women Know and How it Drives Profitability

Rachel Happe — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 18:13:12 +0000

Forget about what women want – women may want a lot of things that have nothing to do with running a business (oh that cute pink handbag!). But let’s discuss what women tend (and I say tend because nothing is absolute when discussing gender roles) to know and you can start to see why businesses with more women in senior leadership positions are more profitable and innovative.

In my experience, here’s how what women know translates into business performance:

Women know high risk comes with high potential upsides and high potential downsides. We tend not to get overly excited about what could be and focus on what can be today. That focus means we we more likely translate current market needs into solutions that will pay off today but we may not be as likely to go for the long shot ventures.

Women know relationships and know that the more open and transparent we are, the closer the relationships are that we can foster. This allows us to form really persistent relationships with employees, partners, and customers – and not through the use of money and rewards – which is more profitable and less vulnerable. See Diane Hessan’s excellent example of Return on Openness.

Women know how valuable communication is – at all levels. That means a lot of us are chatty (it’s been proven) but it also means the people around us are never left in doubt of what is going on. That means there is less distrust and gives others the chance to bring up any issues they see.

Women know how to navigate emotional conflict better and interestingly have an easier time discussing deep rooted differences of opinion between colleagues in a more collegial fashion. This allows for conflict resolution before things escalate into business problems.

Women know how to identify subtle social queues and can identify whether or not someone is being open with us – whether we choose to acknowledge that or not. This allows women to more accurately assess relationships with customers and others.

Women know that telling people what to do is not the most effective way to lead. Showing by example and using Socratic methods of mentoring often facilitates the response we desire without the negative side affects of the other party feeling controlled.

Women know complexity. We can never focus on just work, or just money, or just family. It is always about the best decision for everyone rather than the best decision for any one constituent. This gives us a balanced perspective of a business and keeps us from maximizing revenue in the short term if it damages relationships in the long term – thus preserving sustainability and long term profits.

This is not to say that women are better and that this is true for all women (or that men don’t have these qualities) but bringing women into leadership positions will bring a diversity of approach, a different perspective, and some much needed skills to the board room. In a business environment where transparency and relationships are becoming core principals of business how can you afford not to bring more of those skills into your business?

From a personal perspective *not* having more of those qualities in companies is what has driven me to start my own. I don’t want to work in an environment that doesn’t understand balance, is driven to ‘win’ at all costs, and only values relationships while they result in revenue. It’s not what I am about and the more senior I get, the more aligning my values with the businesses I associate with matter to me. Is that a zero sum rule? Of course not – women don’t tend to view things that way and I certainly don’t.

What do you think? Is this too generalized? Do you think this is a sexist perspective? Does it reflect the women leaders that you know?

Don’t know the woman in the picture? That’s Indra Nooyi wife of a former boss of mine (who was quite a smart cookie himself) and CEO of Pepsi – great to see!

Survey shows influx of companies using social networks for recruiting

Jennifer Leggio — Mon, 25 May 2009 15:08:33 +0000

Jobvite, a recruitment solutions provider, today issued the results of its second annual Social Recruitment Survey. The data shows that employers are more and more extensively recruiting on social networks, such as Facebook and Twitter. It also shows that the companies appear more satisfied with these types of recruits versus the ones they find solely from job boards.

According ot the survey, due to these satisfaction levels companies are likely to invest more in these type of candidate sources in 2009, trimming down their spend with job boards and even search firms. Here are some more data points:

76 percent of companies surveyed plan to invest more in employee referrals
72 percent plan to invest more in recruiting through social networks
80 percent of companies are planning to use social networks to find or attract candidates
LinkedIn use grew from 80 percent in 2008 to 95 percent in 2008
Facebook use grew from 36 percent in 2008 to 59 percent in 2009
Twitter ranked third at 42 percent

According to Jobvite, however, employee referrals and internal transfers are the most highly rated sources in terms of quality of candidates generated, however, employee involvement in referrals is still low.