Last week, a friend asked me for career advice, which is not something that I’m qualified to give. Specifically, she wanted to know how she can stop getting passed over for new assignments at work.
“There are all these opportunities,” she said. “But my managers always give them to the guys on the team. And the only reason why, that I can think of, is because my managers are also male.”
Unfortunately for my friend, that’s not a problem I have much experience with – not because I’ve never been passed over, but because I don’t often work with men. PR is mostly a woman’s world. Even if most of the very top positions are filled by men, the majority of middle managers and staff are female. There’s still favoritism, but it doesn’t have much to do with gender norms.
“I think I need a mentor,” she continued. “But I can’t find one of those either. All these men who seem interested in helping – they end up either wanting to sleep with me, or thinking of me as their daughter.”
I laughed, then apologized. That’s happened to most women, even ones in female-dominated industries. The saddest part isn’t that it’s a common experience – it’s that we, as a group, have resigned ourselves to choosing between two equally terrible options. It’s like a question straight out of that real-life either/or article for women that’s been going around:
Would you rather block a series of unwanted sexual advances in exchange for incremental career gains, or be infantilized to the point that you have no chance at a career in the first place?
I consider myself a professional success, so I guess you know which route I took.
In the end, I told my friend two things:
- Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that a mentor is one, single person. Maybe there are “fairy godmother” or “rich uncle” types around that will open all the doors and solve all your problems, but I haven’t met any. Instead, I’ve assembled something of a mentorship dream team for myself, drawing on different people for different things, like writing advice, career development or conflict resolution. I wouldn’t, for example, rely on the person who helps me find a book agent to also know how to negotiate a raise at work. My needs may run a bigger gambit than most, but the point is applicable to anyone: If you want to know how to do something well, ask a person who is good at doing it.
- Don’t confuse a manager and a mentor. As my friend described her situation further, it sounded like a lot of her needs were not strategic, big-picture questions fit for a mentor, but low-stakes tactics firmly in the domain of her manager. For example, she wanted someone to send an introductory email on her behalf to another organization to help kick off a joint project. It’s a door that her manager should open, if not directly then through delegation. From my point of view, this type of support and attention from a supervisor is not optional. It’s part of the job. And if he’s not doing his, you can’t do yours – which might mean finding a new one.
Unfortunately for my friend, none of that was going to help her solve her initial problem of getting passed over for opportunities. Aside from telling her to take initiative and volunteer for assignments – two things that I’m pretty sure she thought of before calling me in Finland – I really couldn’t add much of value to the conversation.
A few days passed before I realized that my friend and I had both missed the point. Opportunities can be offered, sure – but the big ones, the ones that will really set you apart, those need to be made. When no one is giving you a chance, you need to take one yourself. What, exactly, are we waiting for anyway?
I find this to be true in most professions, but especially so for people working in service-related industries. My friend, who is a director for a community engagement organization, has a job that is based on outside-the-box thinking and novel, fresh ideas. They hired her not to execute a set program, but to help create a new one. The job is about networking and making inroads with different groups to help improve the community overall. For her, this isn’t a matter being passed over for an opportunity, so much as needing to create her own.
I told my friend that if she was waiting for a hand out, she was going about it all wrong. Why would she want to service someone else’s idea when she has ideas of her own? Why is she relying on the experience of others to say what the world needs, when she knows better herself? Why is she letting these old men with their dated agendas pass on a legacy to young men without imagination when she’s just as capable?
I told her: Fuck all that. This is a make yours/take yours world. Do your own thing. Do it well. Do it so well that you’re impossible to ignore. Then you can worry about what someone else is offering.
When I think back on my career and the catalysts for reaching the next level, they’ve always been a result of that type of thinking – not following orders. For example, when I was living in Philadelphia and PR agency after PR agency turned me down for lack of experience, I applied for jobs in New York City instead. A few years later, when I got a huge promotion, it wasn’t just because my billable hours were through the roof – but because I caught the attention of top brass when I started doing non-business things that the company never tried before, like organizing fundraisers and, in one of my finest hours, inviting twenty kids from the local YMCA to visit our office and learn about careers in marketing. Finally, this job I have now – the one that allowed me to travel around the world for a few years before transferring me to Germany – wasn’t the result of a referral or recruiter or an online application. It was because someone saw an article I guest wrote for free about how patently ridiculous our industry is and reached out.
Those were not opportunities given, those were opportunities made – even if I had no idea what I was making at the time. Part of the reason why I never felt passed over was because I was always advancing myself. I never took no for an answer. I never accepted the idea that the way things were done before is the way we should do them today. I never let someone else set the parameters of my career or tell me what was possible. Most importantly, I never waited for permission for the chance to do my best.
Of course, I am not so arrogant as to think that I am fully responsible for my professional success. I did not recruit and hire myself for my current job, just as I did not promote myself to middle management all those years ago. The opportunity may have been mine to make, but it was others to recognize and reward. In that sense, I’m thankful to have worked for people who are more interested in collective success than personal gain. I feel fortunate that my talent and hard work were acknowledged by managers who understood that their team’s accomplishments were as much a testament to their good leadership, as they were to the individual’s strengths. That’s the way it should be.
Even though I sometimes daydream about how much easier life would be if I had been born a member of the club or at least looked the part, I know that easy street isn’t where I want to be. When you take an opportunity someone else has offered, you are furthering their agenda instead of your own. You are limiting yourself to what others think you can do instead of deciding what it is you really want. To do your best work and live up to your full potential and know the joy of a vision realized – you need to take control. Besides, not for nothing, I really doubt that something of value is ever just given away.
But maybe it is. Just because my friend hasn’t yet been handed a golden opportunity, doesn’t mean that one does not exist. Life is long and she may, in time, benefit from the dumb luck of being in the right place at the right time with the right person. If and when she has the good fortune of being paid a visit by a gift horse, I most certainly hope she rides it, shame-free, as far and as fast as she can. Knowing her, she’ll probably pick a few people up along the way.
This was the perfect way to start my Monday. Thank you!
:) Go get yours!
Fantastic article–and one that absolutely anyone can benefit from reading. I believe that when it comes to a career and furthering your goals being more willing to ask for forgiveness rather than permission is the route to take, too. No one is going to hand you what you want, nor will they make it easy sometimes, so oftentimes we have to take the bull by the horns and go after what we want.
thanks so much! appreciate the feedback and I’m glad it resonated. I feel like any writer – such as yourself – has to have this quality. Otherwise the words would never get on the page. Go get yours!