I am a female manager

Why you ask, am I not identifying myself as a manager without gender connotations? Or as a “humanist” would point out- here is another feminist! That is because identifying oneself as a feminist, as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie pointed out (and I paraphrased a bit) was to bring to light the struggles faced by females in this mostly patriarchal world. And no where is the struggle more apparent than the male driven & testosterone fuelled corporate world. There are a lot of angles here( and several posts :)), I am only going to be focusing on one- the struggle faced by FLMs-front-line managers who are female. FLMs are usually the line of authority just above the field executives and this is a term largely used in sales/business development environments. The FLMs face a unique kind of pressure in companies- they are not junior enough to get the work done independently and often times they are promoted because of a job well done in an individual capacity and they are not senior enough to assert any real authority. Their authority is usually circled by how strong their bond is with their bosses.

Let me digress a bit here and talk about how important recruitment is and if done well, can lead to a company’s sustainability. In good culture driven companies, the focus of recruitment is usually to stock up the best of the lot across levels in an organisation. This develops a unique kind of flywheel for large companies- employees are hired on merit(usually defined by pedigree/experience at similar companies), they are ambitious, they grow and eventually all levels see a healthy amount of churn with growth near constant across. In smaller companies, the levels usually max out and the employees will exit at some point, as they would have reached a ceiling between themselves and the founder or the founder-1 level that they wouldn't be able to breach. I have had the good fortune of working with companies across the stratum- early age startups to fairly well established companies and therefore have had some experience in understanding the recruitment trends across several industries.

I return back to my original point- what is the unique struggle faced by FFLMs? The bond with the bosses. And oftentimes, these are with managers in the direct line of authority. Now if the company has stacked up meritocratic candidates across levels, chances are your direct manager is in line for a promotion soon and will want all of his/her team members to succeed and grow. The problems with a high growth focused culture(think investment banks and the like) are different and I will not get into that. But in a company where growth has been scarce or the rules are bent for a favourite few, a disgruntled senior can be a tough gravestone around one’s neck. I had a bad experience recently where my ex-boss had spent the better part of a decade in the same company with irregular promotions. While growth focused, his growth focus was of a unique kind- he only wanted a certain type of employee to succeed- males(surprise, surprise) and slightly junior ones who wouldnt threaten him in any forseeable future and promoting them would look good on his card as well. A win-win situation for him, but a lose-lose proposition for someone like me. There was only one other female in the team who preferred to toe the company line. So here I was- stuck between a rock and a hard place- I wasn't obsequious enough and quite obviously wasn't a male. To add to my misery, my team had been seeped in a culture which is insidiously patriarchal. Merit as defined by the metrics in the previous paragraph, has another beneficial effect- employees are not easily given to displaying outright patriarchy. In my case however, my team particularly came from lesser known colleges and experience at worse off cultures than the present company or no experience at all, thus a blank slate to soak up the worst kind of influences out there. In my short stint there, I was exposed to sexual harassment, asked as to why there weren't enough “girls” in the team and felt an undercurrent of resentment, especially reserved for female managers. I highlighted this to several authorities, sometimes getting my way, oftentimes getting ignored.

Finally, I would like to throw some light on the training/induction resources available to an employee. And I am not talking about the generic here’s-what-our-company-is-famous-for and this-is-why-we-are-awesome paraphernalia. I joined your company right? So I don’t need to be sold your virtues again. What I would much rather like is a real world skills training. If I am an external hire, I’ll need some time understanding the technicalities of the business. If I am joining in a management position, I will need to be made more aware of the inner workings of the company. I’ll need to be made aware of the subtle nuances of culture and the resources available to me. Often, this is highlighted as a virtue- you are networking on your own, you are reaching out on your own, so this will lead to some magical skill building that the company will inevitably be proud of and will display a badge of. But for a company to be truly successful, to be inherently sustainable, employees have to be nurtured. They need to be trained quantitatively and qualitatively. And this inorganic training has to be continuous. The training complexities can be different basis where the employee is in their life cycle at the company. For sales, as the need is usually for a shorter ramp time, this should be organised and hard-coded in the employee manual for mentors to follow. Mentors should be a carefully chosen bunch of people who have are proven trainers and are well equipped to usher in the employee in the right way. Mentors should also be given a chance to red flag a hire if required. Direct managers have to be a part of this process and while it’s perfectly okay to not be able to be a full time mentor, should at least have weekly check ins with their team members to understand the progress and roadblocks if any. For a female employee, sincere check ins have to be done across all levels to understand the progress in a deeper, unbiased way.

In my example, I gave my own advice to myself and decided to get the f*k out of companies which did not have the necessary screws in place in their policies. And this will be my advice to you as well- research the shit out of prospective companies before joining them, ask questions in the interview process-what are your female hire policies, what is the induction program like, what is the culture like and keep your eyes open for fake or lip service notions and lastly, be aware of what is going on at the company when you are hired. At the company where I faced harassment, I was told early on presumably as a show of transparency, that some executives and junior employees had been fired in the past on grounds of harassment. That to me, should have been a precedent to be wary of and to be intolerant of when it would inevitably happen to me as well. Lastly, if things go south, just f*k it and leave. You will be happier for it.