Honestly? Honesty...

Bill Cosby once said

Don't play the honesty, find the honesty in the moment

and this my blog readers, is as true and real as the water we drink.

In this holiday season, I have decided to write a bit about honesty and how it plays in the workplace. I believe being an honest person makes a great leader and the opposite just sets ourselves up for failure...

A couple of weeks ago, I was assigned a "one of a kind" project at work that was given to me given my expertise. As this blog is anonymous, I can't really provide specifics on the project, however the overall picture is that I was to be the project manager and was to work with a team to implement. My new boss however, was to be in charge of getting approvals from senior management when required. During the project implementation up until launch, my boss decided to make decisions outside the scope so as to please senior management and launch on time.
I warned her not to do so and requested written approvals from her in order to launch as she specified. Although she hated me for it, she knew she had no choice but to provide approvals in writing as I was not in agreement with her decision-making and actually advised her against it.
Upon project launch, everybody was extremely happy. We launched on time and the project showed great results. Senior management congratulated my boss and gave her great reviews on the success of it once we/she showed the results. Never once was my name or that of my team mates' mentioned, nor was there any recognition, nor did she acknowledge me.
No biggy, I saw it coming given the fact that we bumped heads a bit during the implementation, and of course, I had a feeling things will surface one way or the other. So I kept quiet and went out of my way to congratulate her and show it was ALL her.

As the days went by, a few hiccups in the project started to show up...nothing major, just that the project had the wrong contact info in one market. Nothing major...right? WRONG! During project approvals, instead of showing the project "template" to senior management, she reviewed herself and off she went approving. Once a person from up above noticed the error, the s%&^* hit the fan. My boss was called on meetings, conference calls, etc. Even the CEO got involved as this person was really upset and she was called into a meeting to explain what had happened. Although this error could have been a mistake by anybody in the food chain (including me), senior management at my company always believe that as mid manager and project leader, the facing person is always in charge of making things right and taking responsibility for the project. I found out later on she threw everybody under the bus, including me. But I never once heard a bip of it from my peers or even the bosses themselves. So at the end of the day, I was happy I never got recognition as I was not directly responsible for the end result and I had written confirmation on all approvals. Like I said, no biggy.

I know this blog post is not as exciting as the "Dark with a bit of sugar" one, but it does goes off to show that you can not play the honesty. I believe that being humble, and not in the sense of one of my first posts, but in the sense of realizing when one makes mistakes...is paramount for one's career. Accepting to be wrong is accepting to be continuously learning and hence getting experienced on it. Accepting to have not done any wrong, its like denying one ever needs to learn. So to my boss...Honestly? Really though? Honesty :)

Sincerely,
A woman.

How to fold a napkin

Today, I am going to teach you how to fold a napkin. The only thing is that there are no instructions on how to fold it...nor will it come to you by osmosis.

In the workplace, as in life, we have always been taught to follow instructions and get good at following them.  Instructions to get somewhere (aka directions), instructions to assemble a piece of furniture (e.g. via Ikea), instructions on how to date (e.g. via our BFF's), but did we ever get instructions on how to handle certain situations at work? And most importantly, on how to just learn that sometimes it is not about how we fold a napkin, but the action of folding it?

Let me explain what I mean.  A couple of Friday's ago, a group of people from my work and I went out for lunch. For some reason, I ended up going with a group of seven guys. During that lunch, all I did was laugh my butt off.  I know most of you enjoy the company of guys a lot more than girls at times, and I do too. But this lunch was something I will never forget.

While we were waiting for our order, one of the guys started playing with his napkin. When done, the napkin had a rare shape that from far away I could not decipher. When I did however, I was back to laughing my butt off. The guy had literally made a male genitale out of that napkin. Although there was some embarrassment, there were definitely laughs, and laughs turned into a complete instructional class (for the guys only of course) on how to fold the napkin just like that. Needless to say, that was one of the most fun lunches I have had at work.

When I compare guys’ workplace rendez-vous with girls, I clearly see the difference in the dynamics.  Although more ‘ego’ driven, they are definitely more fun and less gossipy.  A lunch with a group of girls from work would have covered topics like dating, work gossip and at times some hypocritical comments; on top of the fact that we always want to get juicy details on the people we work with. And although I can at times count myself in that group, I now realize how much we women just need to relax a bit.  We need to be more reserved with the work gossip and definitely more attentive to just enjoying ourselves and have a good time.  I think we are all too consumed into making it happen for ourselves (professionally I mean) that it becomes our world…our life.

So in work as in life…how do we fold the napkin ourselves and make it the shape we want?

New URL for us + Follow us on Twitter and FB

Hello Ladies and Gentelmen,

Women and the Workplace has a new URL - http://womenandtheworkplace.blogspot.com/

As well, we you can now follow us on twitter at - http://twitter.com/womenandwork

See our Facebook badge on the right hand side of our blog and join us, or simple search for the FB group "Women and the Workplace" and become a member!

November's blog post "How to fold a Napkin" is coming soon!   Stay Tuned!

The ROCK

The much awaited rock! We, women, in general , dream about this very thing since the moment we got to know about Barbie and her long time companion - Ken.

But this one very sparkly, brilliant, shinny ROCK comes with its workplace disadvantages...

It all started a year ago when a good friend of mine got engaged. While engaged, she was looking for a job and ecstatic to not only begin to plan the wedding, but also to kick-start her career as she had recently come back from completing a Masters overseas. As a recently engaged woman she was proud to showcase her ring and her pearly whites to the world! But little did she know that the one thing that made her smile was going to be her Achilles heel at the workplace.

After months of job hunting, she landed an interview at a very well known company who she longed working for (thanks to the good word of an acquaintance). She passed to the second interview and after coming close to think the job was hers; one morning she received a call that will forever teach her a lesson....According to the recruiter, she had come very close to landing the job as she was tendering against another candidate with similar capabilities; but after much thought, management had decided the other candidate was more "suited" for the job. This nearly killed her, as she was almost certain the job was hers.

A few weeks after the bad news landed on her lap, she ran into the one acquaintance who had referred her to the job. He explained to her that he had found out through the grapevine that the final decision was made by a man who chose the other female candidate because she was "younger" and had no family attachments. According to him, to them it was very risky and expensive to hire a recently engaged woman as wedding plans and baby plans will come in the way very early in her career, so they could not afford to hire her.
Needless to say my friend was devastated to hear that the very one thing she loved the most, had caused her a career.

This, my blog readers, is what I mean by playing the cards right at the workplace...because, if we could change the system, and we should, then women should be able to be hired based on their capabilities and skill set alone...but since we live in a business world that still very much belongs to men, we need to continue to push and push until we get where we want. =)

So embrace your ROCK, for those of you who have met the one...just don't show it during interviews and avoid showing it too much to senior management once hired...let them be hit with it when the time is right...after that, the game is all yours!

Sincerely,
A woman.

My Blog :)

Let me start by saying that I strongly believe I have now hit the spot with this blog. I never really realized how much I like writing about a woman's life in the workplace, until I thought about the many anecdotes and stories one can get out of working. I enjoy my work, with its up and downs, but above all, I think its a pretty decent job...pays well, love what I do, people I work with are "nice", I am constantly recognized and I have some freedom.

Nothing wrong with a decent job...but what comes on the day to day, 9-5 time spam, is what makes it truly fun and interesting to write about.

I will try to update this blog as much as possible and truly hope you enjoy reading it, as I continue to embrace what comes out of Women and the Workplace.

Sincerely,
A woman.

Humble at work

What does humility mean?

Today, I was told at work that I am not humble. That I assume as though things are a given to me and that I need be more humble.
In the workplace, as I have come to learn, being humble means beign like I sponge...take it all in and dont release until squeezed!

Yep, this is the new feedback at work. The problem is that when one has met her entire objectives for the year, that are measured as revenue for a company, exceeded expectations and has a loving client base...one wonders what the hell a sponge has to do with a promotion?!

Am I to be the next spongebob square pants cartoon character?
You tell me.