MARCH 23, 2005
March
is National Women’s History Month. So with that
in mind this article is about women…
A
New Way of Thinking
My
good friend Kathleen is currently reading Wired
Magazine. Now, that may not sound strange to you, but
if you knew Katy, you might laugh just picturing it.
For over 25 years she owned an expensive, trendy fashion
boutique. In keeping with her vocation, she read mostly
Vogue, W, and InStyle. But today,
she works for Microsoft – and she has turned into
a super geek.
Now,
she can’t stop talking about the magazine. She
brings up articles that she has read in it so often
that I decided to risk geekdom myself…I just had
to get my own copy.
And
I was drawn in right away.
The
article that hooked me most recently is titled “Revenge
of the Right Brain” (February 2005, p. 70). According
to the article, logic and precise left-brain thinking
gave us the Information Age. No one can argue that the
Information Age served its purpose, but now here comes
the Conceptual Age, and – that’s right –
this whole new world is being led by the right-brain.
In the Conceptual Age, we are entering a time where
artistry, design, creativity, empathy, and emotions
reign.
Creativity,
empathy and emotion? Hmmmm. It all sounds suspiciously
female to me. Could the Conceptual Age be the Age that
values the contributions of women?
In this article the author, Daniel H. Pink, references
the fact that in these times of uncertainty in which
the economy has gone from boom to bust to blah, there
is a metaphor that explains what is actually going on
… and it’s right inside of our heads. We
all know that the left side of the brain is the linear,
logical and analytical side where our success is measured
by our scores on the SAT test. The left side of the
brain, the side that CPA’s and engineers live
in, has ruled for some time now. But today, in this
complex and diverse world, the left side is no longer
totally sufficient.
The
left brain is not enough on its own. For today’s
world we also need the skills, talents, and creative
thinking that comes from the right hemisphere of the
brain. At last, we need leadership that combines left
and right brain thinking! …
Women,
listen up! Our time is right in front of us.
Did
you know that:
- Forty
percent of the world's 2.8 billion workers are women
(Global Employment Trends for Women 2004)
- In
Fortune 500 companies, there are fewer than 10 women
holding the title of CEO — which equates to
just 1% of the total Fortune 500 CEO positions...and
now there is one less with the CEO of HP stepping
down.
- According
to a recent article in the March, 2005 Harvard Business
Review (pp. 43-54), 58% of college graduates are women
and “nearly half” of those earning professional
and graduate degrees are women. The later number is
expected to increase 16% in the next 10 years U.S.
Department of Education). This same article talked
about how crucial it is at this time for companies
to support their female professionals and make efforts
not to lose the “highly qualified women”
that make up today’s workforce.
-
Companies with a higher representation of women in
senior management positions financially outperform
companies with proportionally fewer women at the top.
(2004 Catalyst Financial Performance and Gender Diversity
Report)
Right
brain thinking and women
Helen
Fisher in her book, The First Sex, talks about the natural
talents of women and why they are so necessary for the
21st century.
Fisher explains that the basic difference between the
sexes is in the way we think. Men tend to discard extraneous
data, compartmentalize relevant material, and analyze
information in a linear path. Women tend to gather more
data than men, and integrate these details faster and
put them into more complex patterns. As women make decisions,
they take into account more variables, and consider
more options, and actually see a wider spectrum of solutions
to the problem.
Fisher
calls this process “web-thinking.” Web-thinking
is broader, contextual, holistic, a right-brained way
of thinking.
For
decades women have been misdiagnosed because their thinking
style was foreign and confusing to men. Some men saw
women’s behavior as indecisive, unfocused, scattered,
or even “loose cannon” behavior. Those negative
appraisals have held women back for decades.
But
maybe it’s not our thinking style that confuses
men, but our communication style.
Today,
as we celebrate our web-thinking, let’s focus
on the way we communicate our ideas. The trick is to
condense our language, to boil it down, to get to the
heart of the matter. If we as women can embrace our
ability to see a broader spectrum of solutions, we must
use our communication talents and speak in a language
that does not confuse the listener.
If
Daniel Pink is correct and we are moving from the Information
Age to the Conceptual Age, then we are moving into an
age where men and women must celebrate their differences
and bring out the best in each other. In the Conceptual
Age, emotional intelligence rules. It is a time when
facts and figures and logic is not enough. It is a time
where interaction, communication, empathy, and how people
manage their feelings will determine their successes
and failures.
We
are entering into a collaborative society where the
merits of both men and women are being understood and
valued. That is exciting news.
The
other day I stopped MicroCenter to pick up a cable for
my computer, and there was my friend Kathleen working
on several of the store’s X Boxes. Katy was practicing
using the left side of her brain.
She
told me that she can cross over at will. That’s
using your head!
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