What’s wrong with being bossy?
by Susan Shaffer
February 12, 2014
I have worked in educational equity for more than 40 years. I have an expertise in gender/multicultural issues. More than 40 years ago, Congress enacted Title IX to prohibit sex discrimination in education. Yet women still face a basic divide in our culture.
Recently I was listening to a TED radio hour about disruptive leadership. One interview was with Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook and founder of LeanIn.org. She talked about the cultural constructs that still exist. She reported that by middle school, boys are more interested than girls in leadership and when girls are asked why, they say they don’t want to be called bossy.
She went on to recite statistics of women in leadership around the world. In 2010, they made up just 13% of parliaments, 15% in corporate leadership, and 20% of non-profit leadership. Since then, the numbers have remained flat. More alarmingly, though, is the perception. In the last congressional cycle, women were elected to 20% of the U.S. Senate. She quoted how all the headlines announced women were taking over the Senate. Ms. Sandberg (and I) would like to point out that 20% is not a takeover, particularly for 50% of the population.
When girls lead on the playground they are called bossy.
When women lead in the workforce they are called too aggressive.
If we acknowledge it, we can change it.
There was another interview with Bunker Roy, a man who established the Barefoot College in Rajasthan, India. Its mission is “to provide basic services in rural communities to make them self-sufficient. These ‘barefoot solutions’ include solar energy, water, education, health care, women’s empowerment and wasteland development.”
As a recent new grandmother, I listened in awe when he said he believed grandmothers were ideal agents of change. He takes grandmothers from remote villages in Africa and the Himalayas and trains them for six months in a remote desert in India. He explained that he needs to take them away from their world – so they can learn to view themselves differently. They return as solar engineers who bring electricity to their villages and also as leaders. Yes, it initially causes some hostility because the men must learn to view them differently. But Mr. Roy believes it is good. It makes people think. It is disruptive. And it leads to something better.
I return to Ms. Sandberg and her ending advice:
We can understand how we discourage girls and women from leading and start encouraging them. We can do that in little ways and small ways. It starts with not calling your daughter bossy. And then in the workplace, about not saying that a woman is too aggressive. Instead, that a woman is leading and getting results.
We can do this today.
I’m not bossy. I’m a leader.
