Being a woman working in government, pharma, and biotech can come with moments that are hard to put into words. The idea that was only recognized when a man repeated it. The comment in a team meeting that made you freeze. The 1-1 where you were told to smile more. You may not be sure if you’re overthinking it, and you may not know how to handle it.
In Episode 232, I’m sharing some of my own experiences from 8 years in government and 12 years in pharma and biotech, including the most stressful stretch of my career. This isn’t a trash-talking episode. It’s what I’ve learned, so you can handle these moments professionally, create safety and care for yourself, and keep your career on track.
Key takeaways
1. Experiences that won’t show up in an HR video but impact a woman’s experience at work
A leader looking a new woman executive up and down during a site town hall. Being called a young woman, or too young to be a manager. Getting every party planning duty. When you live through moments like these, you get to decide what to do: report, leave, transfer, or stay and navigate it. “Your safety and comfort is what is most important and that looks different for different people.”
2. The science behind stressing with this issue in silence
When people get us down, it’s easy to say nothing over time. That silence reinforces a thought pattern that validates the negative things being said to you. “Research on women who confront sexist comments found that speaking up was linked to feeling more competent and more empowered, while staying silent, even when it’s the understandable choice, tends to wear down how you see yourself over time.”
3. Simple phrases to advocate for yourself when something is said that makes you uncomfortable or you’re just not sure if it was meant how it came off
Advocating for yourself can be small and professional. “I’m not sure you meant that the way I heard it, can you describe that to me differently.” Or, “That’s not my perspective, are you open to hearing my take?”
4. The difference between allies and advocates, and what to avoid sharing with them
Allies support you in private. Advocates “will speak up for you in rooms you’re not in.” Build both in other departments, with other leaders, and at other sites, so your reputation doesn’t rest on one leader’s view of you.
The Bottom Line
In pharma and biotech, there are still many more men than women in senior positions, and the decisions about your career often happen in rooms you’re not in. You can acknowledge what isn’t ok, care for yourself, and still build the career you earned. Listen to the full episode for my stories and the three steps. I got your back.
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Transcript
Hello and welcome to this week’s episode of the podcast.
Today is an episode that I’ve danced around a bit but not an episode I saw myself ever recording – as a stand alone.
But I was doing some reflecting, my own self-coaching, on the different experiences I’ve had in my pharma and biotech career…my government career too.
Before starting my business, I worked in pharma and biotech for 12 years and worked in government for 8 years before that.
Through my reflection, it’s become abundantly clear that my secret sauce, the thing that helped me in my career and that I help my clients do well – is to build, maintain, and leverage relationships for personal and professional growth. Relationships weren’t only how I grew, they were how I got through the hardest stretch of my career.
And I had my fair share of women’s workplace issues. I had a mutli view perspective. I was a woman working in pharma and biotech, I had led the network of women employee resource group in my career, I was responsible for DEI initiatives for my role, and I had exposure to leadership teams and real conversations about work.
I’ve shared before when I went to grad school, I wanted to specifically study and apply organizational psychology and behavioral science to this specific work environment and so that is what I did. And today I want to talk about some of the real experiences I’ve had being a woman in industry and how to navigate it. Because the little things can feel big and really make work hard.
This isn’t a trash talking episode, I’m sharing vulnerable moments from my own journey so they can be a lesson for you or someone you know.
I want to acknowledge the big and small experiences I’ve had with what I’d call a Boys Club or issues that I have had to deal with as a woman, and maybe you have too.
I want to preface this by saying that these were my experiences, and there are always different sides to the same story – right? I can only speak to how I felt, what I witnessed, and conclusions I made.
That is different than someone’s intent and there is a margin of error in that we see things based on our own brain’s filtering system.
These are moments that just stood out to me and made me uncomfortable in one way or other and they are nuanced right?
Because our feelings are valid, and the reality is, that because of this nuance, because I didn’t always know if I was overthinking it or misreading a situation, and these were more like micro-moments, not the things you necessarily see in the HR compliance video on sexual harassment, and that is what I think the point is.
That the experience have as women is complicated. We have expectations of ourselves, of everyone around us, our bodies go through things men don’t have to, and because of the societal inuendos, norms, harrassment, and overall just physical strength we have to have, I truly believe that makes women extremely powerful.
I’m not saying men are bad, all women have it hard, or there are issues 100% of the time. I’m raising, or I suppose raised at this point, a man. I love him dearly. He’s kind, sweet, inclusive, and treats his girlfriend with the utmost respect. Sometimes women are the ones in the wrong and being inappropriate 100%. But for the scope of this episode, we are talking about working in a male dominated space, where there are many more men in senior positions than women.
This is complicated and nuanced. We have decades of propaganda telling us what we are supposed to be, rights that vary by state, yet we create and raise all of our population.
It’s wild, right?
And while we navigate things at work we have current events, like the terrible monologue on SNL recently that was misogynistic and tone-deaf at best, or the Cornell 7 case and seeing who speaks up and who doesn’t and how people talk about women. The lack of justice for women who are victims of sex crimes – I mean honestly, I don’t want to get to off course.
You know what I’m saying.
So everything that happens in our society, happens at work because people are people. If someone sees women in a certain light that isn’t favorable, that is objectifiying, I don’t believe you can turn it off because you entered the zoom room. Instead, you learn to shield it. But it’s still there.
And we as women have to understand it, of course it’s wrong, but we also have to be able to navigate it. Because that is what this episode is really about.
While we are fighting injustice and trying to be our best for everyone around us, we can’t simply say well it’s a boys club, it is what it is.
No.
We have to be the Cheetah – we have to accept it, to honor what we see, even if companies say everything is perfect, and not let it stop us from having the career we earned. That we desire.
So you might have experienced some of these things I’m going to share, or maybe you have your own list. It’s important to allow yourself to acknowledge what isn’t ok or makes you feel uncomfortable and then decide what you want to do about it.
Sometimes it’s something you need to report or escalate.
Sometimes it’s something you take note of and make adjustments.
Sometimes you see it and decide you’re going to stand up and work through it.
But you get to decide.
So let’s just get into it.
I was sitting in a town hall, for the entire site. The senior leadership is in attendance, and we had new woman leader who joined. And by typical standards, she was an attractive person. And you could tell because of how the men acted around her.
I remember looking over at one particular leader as this new woman leader was presenting, and he was looking her up and down. There was a look in his eye that made me think he wasn’t looking at her like a senior leader at that moment.
Such a small thing, but I just happened to notice it and it made me uncomfortable not just for her, but for all women. It was a reminder that at the end of the day, that is how people can look at people.
As I got to know this leader, I got the sense that she was used to it. I believe at one point we had a conversation where she mentioned that a lot of the women leaders would dress more masculine, sometimes to prevent being minimized to a woman, but that she was going to be her. And she wasn’t going to stop wearing dresses and skirts, and being feminine. I really admired that about her. She wasn’t going to change who she was, but she did have the skill and maturity to navigate the boys club.
Now in an opposite situation, a different woman leader told me once that she didn’t think there was a such thing a women discrimination or unfair treatment because you are a woman. She said she herself never experienced it. She made her feedback to women trying to grow their leadership presence as all about what they needed to fix about themselves, that had nothing to do with being a woman, just being less leadership material. My paraphrasing there.
So for example – she’d tell women not to say I’m sorry, to dress a certain way, to make their hair a certain way, and so on.
This stuck out to me because I find it very hard to believe she never had any experience where she was treated differently or objectified as a woman – in her favor or against her.
But that is her truth, not mine so I can’t say she’s wrong just saying it stuck out to me.
Also, I found it interesting that she almost ignored the woman experience – by saying it doesn’t exist and then focused on the things that made the woman who she was a problem to fix.
Of course leadership presence and communication are real and a skill for everyone, but this idea that you need to strip some parts of your personality was something that didn’t align and still doesn’t align with my values.
I have seen and helped many women advance, even when they felt they were too different, by being more them, not less. There is a way to communicate and have your own style and personality and still be seen as a leader. That is the balance I help with.
Now of course I had my own fair share of things like male leaders who stared at my chest and not my face as I spoke or being called a young woman or assuming my experience or lack there of based on how I looked or how old they thought I was.
I’ve heard leaders say oh she’s too young to be a manager, which has nothing to do with the actual qualifications.
At one point in my career I was made the manager of a 40-50 year old man when I was a 20 something woman. And he made it known that he didn’t sign up to report to me, he signed up to report to my boss. And my boss was so supportive but held me accountable to work through that and I did. He came around and we had a great relationship. It was one of the most profound and valuable leadership lessons I had in my early career.
But there was one experience I had that was probably the most stressful time of my career. Where it got to the point that my wife told me to quit and we’d figure it out. She didn’t want me dealing with certain people anymore.
For a period of time, I would classify my manager and team a boys club.
My manager was from a background that has more traditional male and female roles and maybe that played into it, maybe it didn’t but he certainly treated the men and the women differently.
He would for example, dismiss ideas from women, but then when my male colleagues would say the same thing, he would say it was a great idea and then tell the women we should learn from these men.
If I had a question on a project our team was working on, he would sometimes CC the group and scold me and infer I didn’t know what I was doing while praising again, only the men.
It didn’t just stop there.
Once in a team meeting he asked me if I was on my period.
One of my other male colleagues on the team was close to this boss, and even had reports against him for his inappropriate comments about women and other ethnic groups. This colleague would notoriously take credit for my work.
I ended up confronting him, booking a 1-1 and asking what happened that he did what he did. He said he could see how I could take it how I did and that was it. Didn’t apologize. Didn’t say he wouldn’t do it again.
My boss had a meeting with him and I together once, and told me I was passive aggressive and no one likes a woman who acts like me, when I asked a direct question.
He told the other woman in my group that she and I should fight in the bathroom and he’d like to see it.
My daughter had surgery and the day I came back to work we had a Dept meeting. In my next 1-1 he told me I looked like I had resting bitch face. And that he doesn’t think so but this other woman in HR would think so and mentioned it so I should be aware and smile more.
I was assigned all administrative and party planning duties, you know because women are good at it.
Now all of these things happened over a couple of years.
And what made this even more toxic is in my 1-1s he acted like he was my biggest fan. All of this ridicule and inappropriate comments, never in a performance review, never heard outside of him, never part of any official feedback. My performance reviews were all glowing.
He would also talk negatively about my male colleagues to me. Tell me they needed to learn from me, that they struggle, etc.
But with the men, he was someone different.
Then, when he left, the one problematic man on the team that had reports against him, became my boss.
And so it continued…but luckily he was moved out shortly after.
So there was this period of time that was very difficult. Where I didn’t want this to derail my career, and it was extremely stressful never knowing if I was going to get the boss showing me cat videos or the boss asking me if I was on my period because I’m not smiling.
So what did I do?
I addressed it with the men directly. Each of them, over the couple of years.
I decided only I can stand up for myself and my experience.
I didn’t escalate formerly because I didn’t think it would be a good outcome for me, I wanted to handle it myself. Telling HR, who was also my colleagues who rumored to say I had RBF at least once didn’t seem like a good avenue – it all comes down to he says she says and as you know, just like the SNL monologue – some people will say – oh it’s just a joke.
Was that the right decision? I don’t know, but it was the right decision for me at the time.
I think as women only we can decide what we are comfortable with.
Some things could put us in more harm than good and that doesn’t mean don’t report, it just means, decide what is going to give you the best outcome.
Because sometimes justice isn’t served fairly.
Some people will just leave the company, some will try to transfer out of the group, deal with it, wait it out, some will report, there isn’t a right and wrong in my mind.
Your safety and comfort is what is most important and that looks different for different people.
The point of me sharing this with you is so you can feel seen if you’ve experienced something similar but also to know how you can break through this boys club and build the career you want to have in spite of it.
If you’re experiencing anything like this, or maybe you have in the past. There are 3 things I’d suggest.
- Acknowledge it and decide what you want to do (stay, leave, report, navigate)
- If it’s something you want to navigate – I think it’s incredibly important that you advocate for yourself professionally. Sometimes when people get us down it’s easy to just say nothing over time, but from a psychological perspective it reinforces a thought pattern that validates the negative things being said to you. Research on women who confront sexist comments found that speaking up was linked to feeling more competent and more empowered, while staying silent, even when it’s the understandable choice, tends to wear down how you see yourself over time. The journal of social psychology reported When a woman pushes past the social discomfort to name a sexist remark, it reinforces her internal locus of control, leaving her feeling more capable and self-assured. So speaking up in a way that feels safe is beneficial for you internally. Here are some small ways to speak up, I’m not sure you meant that the way I heard it, can you describe that to me differently. Or, that didn’t land well with me, what did you mean to say? Or, can you say that another way? Or, That’s not my perspective, are you open to hearing my take?
- Whether you experience the boys club or not, have allies and advocates outside of your immediate group. Especially with leaders being the ones with the offenses, they are in rooms you’re not, and you can take control of your reputation and opportunities by being visible for your work outside of just your leadership’s perspective. You could get mentors, build relationships with other departments, with leaders, different sites. When I say Allies and Advocates these are 2 different things to me – Allies are people who support you private and Advocates support you in public – they will speak up for you in rooms you’re not in. Now one caveat friends, do not complain to your Allies and Advocates about the situation or the boys club, here’s why – you want them to see you as your best self, the real you, and these are sticky uncomfortable topics that can make people feel like they are in the middle, they are going to get drawn into an HR thing, that’s a he said she said that minimizes you and your great work to gossip. So keep it professional and think of these people in your network as your networth. It’s like playing offense and defense at the same time.
Ok so we have to acknowledge and decide what’s best for you. If you stay and navigate, advocate for yourself, don’t go silent and lastly build relationships of allies and advocates outside of the impacted person or people.
That is where I’ll leave some action items for you as I don’t want to make this too overwhelming. Being seen, acknowledging this does happen, even if it isn’t all bad, is important in itself. And now you also have a couple ways to navigate it without letting it deter you from your career goals.
I got your back.
That’s all for this episode. If you enjoyed it, if it is what you needed to hear, send me a message on LinkedIn or Instagram and let me know – or even leave a review on Apple podcasts – this is all in service to you so hearing how it helps makes a difference to me.
Alright, have a great week.
