Gender and the New C.E.O.

One of the more poignant stories we know about organizational dynamics goes like this:

A Black man in his mid-30s was hired as a business development executive in a large consulting firm.  On his first day of work, his boss, a White man in his early 50s, said to him, “I’m glad you joined our team. Although I don’t want you to think that you were hired because of your race.”

To which he replied, “Why not?  You were.”

Whether we’re comfortable admitting it or not, we all notice physical characteristics of the people around us, including:

  • skin tone
  • height
  • body shape
  • hair texture and color
  • nose width
  • fullness of lips, and
  • size, shape and color of eyes.

From this data, we make inferences about individuals’ gender, race and ethnicity. And from these assumptions we often form conclusions about one’s competence, work ethic, and likeability, for example. Indeed bringing your whole self to work involves having conscious awareness of how your  gender, race, and ethnicity — plus other salient parts of your identity — impact your work.

So when Virginia Rometty was recently named the new chief executive of IBM (NYSE: IBM), it was surprising to read the perspective of Samuel Palmisano, the current chief executive. In a story from the New York Times:

Gender, according to Mr. Palmisano, did not figure into Ms. Rometty’s selection.

“Ginni got it because she deserved it,” Mr. Palmisano said, using the informal first name by which she is known to friends and colleagues. “It’s got zero to do with progressive social policies,” Mr. Palmisano added.

Just like the protagonist suggests in the story above, why wouldn’t gender be among the multiple multi-faceted factors that play into the selection of a chief executive?

Palmisano seems to be saying that Rometty’s promotion is not an affirmative action-related decision, which will ultimately help authorize her in her new leadership role.

We empathize with his need to be politic. Still, it would deepen workplace conversations if everybody acknowledged the role that gender often plays in hiring decisions. Not to mention provide significant relief in knowing the truth.

Up next: How gender impacts the world of journalism.

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Come Out at Work: As Undocumented

If you want to change the world, that is.

We’re reminded of the pain and anguish that can be part of revealing your true self at work. While exposing our vulnerabilities often makes us stronger, it can also come with great risk. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas knows first hand, and in the New York Times he recently asked the journalistic questions to himself and published the story of coming out as an undocumented American.

Born in the Philippines, at the age of twelve Vargas was sent by his mother to live in America with relatives.  He earned a merit-based scholarship to California State University San Francisco, and through diligent work–and sometimes illegal means–as a first year student he gained employment at The San Francisco Chronicle. Vargas built on this experience, and procured journalist roles at other preeminent media outlets such as The Philadelphia Daily News, The Huffington Post and The Washington Post.

But his identity as an undocumented immigrant took unsustainable amounts of energy to hide. In the Times, he recounts: Read more

Come Out at Work: As an Immigrant [video]

Call us American-ist. Every time we’ve seen a picture of Arianna Huffington, we expected she spoke with an American accent. Her skin undertone seems pink, her hair is blondish, the Huffington name sounds WASP, really American dominant culture, wouldn’t you say?

Then at last we heard Arianna Stassinopoulos Huffington speak in a video produced by Dreams Across America, below, in which she describes her experience as an immigrant.

Upon closer inspection, we see some slight olive undertones in her skin, Huffington is her married name, plus hair color is easy to change. And lo and behold, she has a glorious Greek accent.

The new chief executive of the Huffington Media Group talks in the video about being born in Greece and going to Cambridge on a scholarship. She recounts moving to America and trying to get rid of her accent–which we interpret as trying to adopt an American accent–because as an immigrant, an accent sets you apart. She says:

I actually tried for a while to get rid of my accent–I haven’t done a very good job as you can hear–and then I kind of embraced it. I realized it was really complicated, changing your accent, and in a sense it’s now part of my identity.

Even the brightest among us sometimes work to change ourselves and fit in, to varying degrees of success, and much of the time–certainly in Huffington’s case–it’s energy wasted. Today she’s known as a charismatic leader, and her accent is part of her charm. She uses her immigrant status to engaging effect, referring to herself as a “Greek peasant girl,” for example.

An accent typically represents so much of who we are. It hints at multi-lingual capabilities, for example.  Those who speak more than one language use a part of their brain that monolingual folks often do not. An accent may also indicate a bi-cultural worldview. A broad perspective like this can be extremely helpful in solving complex problems.

So coming out at work as an immigrant can establish your worldliness, bring out your inner charms, and then land you a $315M merger deal. A pretty sweet realization of the American dream.

Were you born in a country outside of where you live? Are you out at work as an immigrant? How does this influence your work experience?

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Exploring Ethnicity + Motherhood = Brisk Business

Today is Chinese New Year. Coincidentally, the Internet is ablaze with commentary about Amy Chua’s Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother – 7,728 comments (and counting) on the Wall Street Journal piece alone. In this new memoir about raising two children, Chua reflects on her Chinese-American ethnicity coupled with her identity as a mother, to outrageous effect. There have been rebuttals, a public letter of support by her daugher, numerous appearances on television, countless book reviews, and ultimately:  brisk sales.

Currently #2 on the New York Times’ “Best Sellers List,” the polarizing book has become a phenomenon stemming largely from Chua’s candid discussion of how she’s raised her daughters. The examples already feel legendary. From the New Yorker review:

Chua’s rules for the girls include: no sleepovers, no playdates, no grade lower than an A on report cards, no choosing your own extracurricular activities, and no ranking lower than No. 1 in any subject. (An exception to this last directive is made for gym and drama.)

Publishing a memoir typically requires plumbing the depths of your existence in order to identify and share the aspects you find most meaningful. It takes sharp writing skills, and having a friend at a literary agency or publishing house helps too. Good timing is a final bonus. In looking into her self, Chua taps into the zeitgeist around China’s upward mobility in the world; timing like hers often translates into good business.

Chua brings her sense of humor to the prose, yet it seems some readers aren’t easily getting it.  That’s OK, having revealed intimate details about who she is, she’s laughing all the way to the bank.

Image by Larry D. Moore, used under a Creative Commons ShareAlike License via

Aziz Ansari Reveals Some of Himself

Comic Aziz Ansari, of Raaaaaaandy! and “Parks and Recreation” fame, is originally from South Carolina and his parents emigrated to the U.S. from southern India. The way Ansari accesses his ethnic background in his work was recently explored in a New Yorker profile, wherein he receives the star treatment by staff writer Kelefa Sanneh:

Ansari has become one of this country’s most popular young comedians while generally declining to highlight his Indian-American identity. It can’t be a coincidence, though, that many of Ansari’s favorite subjects–his heroes, and therefore, his targets–are African American. His jokes and stories about Black celebrities allow him to acknowledge his own status as an anomaly in the mainy white world of alt comedy.

One of his most reliable new routines is a great story about overhearing the rapper 50 Cent ordering a grapefruit soda in a restaurant. When it arrives, 50 Cent says, “Why isn’t this purple?” And from this Ansari draws a conclusion –“50 Cent has no idea what a grapefruit is!”

While not directly working with his ethnic identity, he’s in tune with this part of himself and incorporates it into his stand-up routine. To give credit where it’s due, we can say he brings a lot of himself to work.

To what extent do you incorporate your ethnicity into your work?