#35 “Are men given the same career advice?”

“Early in my career, I attended a training session (I think it was on communication in the workplace, or something like that) sponsored by a women's mentoring club at my company and facilitated by an outside professional training agency. One piece of advice the facilitators gave was that, as women, we should eliminate the word ‘why’ from our vocabulary, because when we ask a man a ‘Why...’ question in a meeting, we may come off as too critical, which would cause them to become defensive. They suggested that we instead use more innocuous language like, ‘Help me understand....’

This was really infuriating to me. ‘Why’ is possibly the most fundamentally important word in science. It feels unfair that I should avoid it--and worse, replace it with self-deprecating language (‘it must be my own intellectual shortcomings that make it seem like what you are saying doesn't make sense’)--so that others don't feel too intimidated by a woman in their space.

Are men given the same career advice?”