©2022 Alicia Dara
A few years ago I was flying to Los Angeles a lot, to visit close friends and work with clients. My main LA client was an entertainment company with an impressive employee gender balance. They’re considered to be industry leaders in the subject, with a good track record of promoting women to high positions of power, and a solid female-led mentorship program that is available to any woman who wants to participate. For my first time with this group, I was brought in to give my signature 90-minute Power Voice training. Needless to say I was looking forward to spending the day with them, because their commitment to increasing the power and influence of women in their company was legendary.
The day I landed in LA was a typically gorgeous 78’, and I was in a great mood at the airport as I hopped in the company car and rolled down the windows to enjoy the sunshine. As is my habit, I arrived at the company’s headquarters 10 minutes early. I was prepared to wait in the plush lobby, but a sweet young woman I’ll call Reina* was waiting for me. As we entered the elevator and whooshed up to the 15th floor, I noticed her open smile and beautiful posture, which was stately and elegant, as if she were floating on air. She told me she’d studied dance in college and had been accepted to a professional ballet corps, until a knee injury ended her dream. She didn’t want to give up on entertainment completely, so she’d applied for an internship at this entertainment company, and was now a Junior Executive working with dancers and helping them find placement in the company’s many TV shows and movies. She loved her job and the people she worked with, and was committed to helping the women find their path to success in the company, which is why she headed their in-house Women’s Group.
I followed Reina into the conference room, where my Power Voice for Career Women training was scheduled to take place. Inside, it looked like an office birthday party was winding down. The wreckage of a big pink cake lay on the table, along with crumpled napkins, broken candles, and various cups, glasses and plates. Crumbs and splashes of soda marked the carpet, and the chairs were smeared with icing. There were about 40 people in the room, of all genders, but as soon as I walked and was introduced, the men stood up and walked out, leaving the women to clean up every single thing on the table, and the room itself.
The whole process took about 20 minutes. The women brought out various cleaning tools including mops, sponges and two different vacuums. They worked hard, scrubbing and hoovering like mad. When they were done the garbage can was full and the room was spotless. Yet we were now 20 minutes late to start the Power Voice training, which their company had paid for out of the Women’s Group’s annual budget. I had already been warned that their schedule was very tight and that we would have to end on time, but I was compelled to point out what I had just seen, in hopes that it might lead to some kind of breakthrough.
First I asked them who had planned the party. It was Shelly, a young woman in accounting, who had organized the guest list months before, making sure that each person RSVPd. Next I asked who had baked the fluffy pink cake. It was Reina and her co-worker Jenny, who had both stayed up all night at Reina’s house working on it. Then, I asked them who had made the birthday card, which was hand-painted on thick cardstock. It was Estella, a Junior marketing executive, who had a background in graphic design. I also asked them how many times a month they put on these events. They told me they did it once a month, for anyone in their office whose birthday fell inside that time. Lastly, I asked them how many men ever participated in the planning and execution of their parties.
They went completely silent.
I don’t even need to tell you what happened next. They looked at each other sheepishly, and I saw Reina’s beautiful posture sag as the realization of their predicament swept over them. We completed the Power Voice training, then I asked Reina if I could meet with her after work. I wanted to hear more about the “party paradigm” her group was stuck in, and see if I could help them break free. She directed me to a cafe nearby, and I caught up on emails and blog posts for a bit until she arrived. During our conversation I learned that the women in Reina’s group had indeed grown tired of being the designated party planning committee, but none of them knew how to stop. Essentially they were so afraid of “rocking the boat” that they just kept going.
Over the years I’ve learned that when women use phrases like “rocking the boat”, they’re usually terrified of conflict, and would rather stay stuck in a bad situation than engage in a conflict, even if staying is draining their energy and making their real work a lot harder. I asked Reina if this was the case, and she agreed. I pointed out all the latest research, which shows that while women make up more than half of professional workers, they are more likely to volunteer (or be "voluntold") to do so-called "office mom" tasks like organizing parties, doing office cleaning, and overseeing the daily social mechanisms of company culture. Don’t get me wrong: strong social bonds are an important part of your resilience strategy. But when women take on all the tasks that enable those connections it can amount to HUNDREDS of unpaid work hours per year, for work that is distinctly un-promotable. I also pointed out that her company, at least on paper, claimed that gender equity was a huge priority for them, so once they learned the situation they were likely to respond positively to the party-planning group’s desire to retire from their task.
Reina asked if I would be willing to stay an extra night in LA and coach her group on their conflict resolution skills, which I did. A few months later I went back to that company to give another Power Voice training to a different group of women. To my surprise, Reina greeted me in the lobby, and told me that her group had successfully confronted their Vice President, and the matter of birthday parties had been taken up by HR and outsourced to a catering service on the company’s budget. We had a warm hug, and I told her how proud I was. I also suggested that they share their story with the whole company, which they did later that year at their annual all-hands retreat. Reina gave the talk herself, and sent me a video clip. I watch it anytime I want to be inspired!
If you are trapped in the “party planning paradigm” with a group of women in your workplace, show them the research, and give them time to process the information. Going forward, you have a couple of choices:
Retire: You can do what Reina did and bring it to the attention of management/HR, and inform them that you will no longer be handling those tasks.
Recruit and Rotate: You can recruit an equal number of men and non-binary people to your party planning group, but make sure that you limit the amount of total hours you’re spending on the tasks, and DON’T spend a penny of your own cash! Pare down your work, keep it simple and short, and rotate the members of your party-planning committee so that everyone in the office takes their turn.
Opt Out: If your group doesn’t want to stop spending their own time and/or money on party planning, you can opt out gracefully by saying, “I need to stay focused on my work right now, but I appreciate everything you’re doing, and I encourage you to get full recognition and payment for your hard work from HR.”
This story is one of a few that I tell during my group event, "The Power Position: 5 Powerful Strategies to Support Your Own Career", my 60-minute talk for the women in your workplace. These skills based on my work with thousands of career women from around the world, and they are a great way to make sure you stay strong and don't burnout. Reach out to me here for my rates and availability.
*name and some details changed to protect privacy