Just be a Woman

Paul Samuelson once quipped that “women are just men with less money”. This aphorism is an an apt one-sentence summary of classical feminism.

The first generations of successful women insisted on being judged by the same standards as men. They had nothing but contempt for the notion of special treatment for “the sisters”, and instead insisted on getting ahead by dint of working harder and thinking smarter. Margaret Thatcher made no secret of her contempt for the impish men around her. But I believe that women will never fulfill their potential if they play by men’s rules. It is not enough to smash the glass ceiling. You need to audit the entire building for “gender asbestos” – in other words, root out the inherent sexism built into corporate structures and processes.

It is undeniable that women are wired differently from men, and not just in trivial ways. They are less aggressive and more consensus-seeking, less competitive and more collaborative, less power-obsessed and more group-oriented. Women excel at transformational and interactive management. Peninah Thomson and Jacey Graham, the authors of A Woman’s Place is in the Boardroom, assert that women are “better lateral thinkers than men” and “more idealistic” into the bargain. Feminist texts are suddenly full of references to tribes of monkeys, with their aggressive males and nurturing females.

Women being women is important for both feminism and business. I believe these “womanly” qualities are becoming ever more valuable in business. The recent financial crisis proved that the sort of qualities that men pride themselves on, such as risk-taking and bare-knuckle competition, can lead to disaster. Lehman Brothers would never have happened if it had been Lehman Sisters. Even before the financial disaster struck the best companies had been abandoning “patriarchal” hierarchies in favor of collaboration and networking, skills in which women have an inherent advantage.