Monday, August 10, 2009

Guest Post from LilMissFemmeFatale

Hey Everyone, Shabs here. As I am away in Vegas this week, one of my fellow YUPBs has generously offered to post in my absence. Enjoy, or don't- but let's hear what you think of her POV! 


Nature Vs. Nurture: Professional Edition


It’s a strange world we women live in nowadays. Our biological nature tells us to “be nice, especially to your fellow woman” and “help people” and “think of yourself last” and all that shit. Meanwhile, feminism and the women in the work-world that are a product of feminism are telling us “do what you have to do to get ahead” and “you deserve to succeed” and “think of your professional future first” and all that shit. Seriously, what’s a girl to do?! Working women are having an identity crisis, and we don’t even know it. 


I like to think that I’m a nice person. I want to have good relationships with other people, especially other women. Women these days have to deal with far too much other crap to turn on each other: rape, sexual, physical and mental abuse, prejudice, racism, the list goes on. (And that list doesn’t even include the less mentally-, physically- and emotionally-damaging crap, like pregnancy, cellulite and trucks with testicles hanging off them.) If we want violence against women to end we have to fight against it as a united front, both in and out of the workplace. Especially when violence and prejudice against women in the workplace is still, after all these years, a problem.


(Sorry, mini-rant there. My “pet” cause is violence against women. But I’m sure you picked up on that.)


However, while I do want women to cultivate good relationships with each other and be united and all that, I really do want to get ahead in my professional career. I’m a competitive person, and my professional life is no different. Between 9 and 5 I will work my ass off to be better than her, whoever “her” may be. Be a better writer, be more creative, be more charming, get more clients, get more money, get more promotions, get more recognition, more, more, more. And because I want to be nice, I won’t be upfront about it. I’m sure most people don’t realize how competitive I actually am, because all this is going on in my head. I’m constantly secretly working out how to do better than you. If you ask me for help I’ll purposefully give you just enough to make you think I’m helping…but not enough to help you succeed, because I don’t want you to. Isn’t that bitchy? But I don’t apologize. My identity means that I’m nice until we’re in a boardroom together. It’s easy for me to separate how I feel about you personally to how I feel about working with you.


So yes, I love my female relationships. But if you get in my way in the job setting, I will take you down. And I’ll smile sweetly while I do it.


- LilMissFemmeFatale


1 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am just like this too. Who is this imaginary woman we are all trying to best, I wonder? Is it just that we realize really fabulous upper echelon jobs are few and far between, and we might have to claw someone to get there?

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