Business

Why everything changes when ‘tough’ women reach the top

When Claire attended a leadership meeting for her small startup this spring, it was supposed to be business as usual, with talk of budgets and expansion plans. Instead, the meeting devolved into a two-hour session with her mostly male cohorts accusing Claire, a vice president, of being too self-promoting. She was soon fired without cause and told she was not a “cultural fit.”

She’d just been Jill Abramson’ed.

“I don’t shy away from conflict,” says Claire. (Like most of the women interviewed for this article, Claire declined to give her real name for fear of retribution and that it will hurt her career prospects; in several cases, the women had signed non-disclosure and non-disparagement agreements which prevent them from talking openly.) “And often, I would lean into disagreements — no pun intended — with the argument of, ‘No, we are not doing enough, what else can we do?’ ”

Like Abramson, the recently ousted New York Times editor, she faced the problem of Working While Female, told by some of her male co-workers over the course of her 15-month tenure that she was too cold.

“There were a couple of comments made that I was not warm,” she says. “At one point the CEO was like, ‘I don’t like it when women are upset. I would love to be able to make you happy.’ And I [said], ‘It is not your job to make me happy. Don’t try to placate me like you do with your wife.’ ”

I [said], “It is not your job to make me happy. Don’t try to placate me like you do with your wife.”

 - Claire
Like Abramson, the 30-year-old Upper West Side resident scored wins for the company in her short time there. She’d opened several international and national offices, secured a six-figure grant for the fledgling company and had been given a 40 percent raise and a promotion.

But as one of two women in the executive tier, she often found the same ideas coming from a man — 10 years her senior who had a military background — went over better than coming from her. “When he would say something and it would be well-received, it was coming from a place of experience and leadership and a little bit of gray hair,” says Claire. “When I [said] it, it’s a 30-year-old woman who cared too much and is becoming emotional.”

Claire isn’t alone. Many professional women have long been regarded as pushy, aggressive or the “b” word — bossy — and demoted or pushed out from their high-powered jobs, usually in favor of a male colleague. Roy Cohen, a Wall Street banker-turned-career counselor, says it’s not unusual for women to have it harder than their male counterparts when it comes to being tough.

“Sometimes the same behavior that is delivered by women is viewed as very different than if it’s delivered by men,” he said. “We’ve heard this repeatedly that a man can be tough and he’s viewed as firm and decisive. A woman who is tough can be viewed as being bitchy and inappropriate.”

Many high-profile women — Martha Stewart, Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer, Hillary Clinton, Oprah, Madonna, Tina Brown — are seen as more difficult and tough than their male counterparts. And indeed, being a woman at the top can be a lonely place. A 2013 study of CEOs over the last 10 years by management consulting company Strategy& found that women comprised only 3 percent of CEOs and are forced out more frequently.

Yahoo Chief Executive Marissa MayerReuters

“Often they set a very high bar for themselves, and there is a level of intolerance that exists. They’re very difficult to work for,” says Cohen of top female executives. “In order to climb the corporate ladder, they had to be exceptional. They had to work twice as hard as everybody else to prove a point.”

Sometimes, women are scrutinized for such tough behavior — even when the job calls for it.

“I have a running joke that I always say with my interns, ‘The shy need not apply,’ ” says Jessica Bellucci, the New York-based director of communications for Tribune Broadcasting. She says that after she was hired, she’d heard from her boss that she almost didn’t get the gig. “The HR person had told him, ‘I don’t think she’s the right person, she’s really aggressive and she’s sort of pushy,’ ” recalls Bellucci, 39. “And he kind of went back to her and was like, ‘I think those are qualities we would be looking for in our p.r. director.’ ”

She laughs about it now — she’s been there eight years. “After all these years here people realize it has certainly served me well.”

Hillary Clinton has long been criticized for her outspoken, take-charge demeanor.Reuters

Bellucci says that the publicity industry lends itself to strong women. But the newspaper business “has always been a boys’ club,” says Rita, a newspaper industry executive who was replaced by a man when new ownership took over.

“They hated, hated, hated the fact that I talked back to them. Or that I confronted them, or that I would walk out on a meeting.

“For me, I was often the most aggressive person in the room — or assertive person in the room, regardless of gender. Because I didn’t feel like I was held back, I was making money for people. You make money for people, they respect that.”

Eva Pendias (an alias) found herself relieved of some of her duties after a male chairman was appointed to her department at a New York University. The associate professor had been with the school for 16 years, and was very popular with the students, but found herself at odds with her new boss, who called her a “bully” when she disagreed with some of his proposed changes to the curriculum.

Oprah Winfrey has also spoken about the challenges she has faced in her career.AP

“I would say, ‘I’m not so sure that would work,’ and he would cut me down, cut me down, cut me down. At a faculty meeting, he slammed his fist on a desk and said, ‘I’ve had about enough of you as I can take!’ ”

The standoff between the two culminated in a letter he wrote to her, in which he advised her to get psychiatric help and even suggested there was something wrong with her marriage.

“In no way, shape or form do I believe that a man would have written that to another man, ‘You need psychiatric care,’ ” she says of her boss, who has since left. “In a million years I couldn’t imagine a man saying to another man, ‘Perhaps it’s a problem in your marriage, don’t bring it to work.’

“There are men who just cannot work with, or tolerate, strong women,” adds Pendias, 59. “It took me awhile before I realized, ‘This is not my problem.’ ”

Sometimes, it’s better to walk away than fight, says Claire. “By the end, it was as clear to me as any romantic relationship I have ever been in, which is like if they don’t want you for all the things you bring to the table, you are going to twist yourself into a pretzel trying to be something they want and you still are not going to be effective,” she says. “So just leave and find a place that wants you.”

But next time, she won’t go quietly into the night: “From here out, I am not going to sign a piece of paper to shut up.”