A recent article in Business Week magazine made some interesting, albeit
very controversial, observations about the role of gender in the modern
workplace. First let me admit that I didn't read all of the piece. I skimmed
it looking for buzzwords, finding plenty. But the point of the article
interested me, which was made explicit, and that is that women probably make
better executives than men. Hmmm. I'm skeptical.
Look, there are some women who are good bosses, and who are probably better
than any men in their particular office. It's a contextual issue, and
several factors are involved: What kind of business are we looking at? What
is the product or services sold? Who has more experience, and so forth.
That's what bothers me about articles such as the one in Business Week and
makes me skeptical.
I believe business is business, i.e., what counts is the bottom line. I
can't for the life of me understand the media's fascination with men vs.
women, or blacks vs. whites, or college graduates vs. non-graduates, and so
forth, in the workplace and everywhere else. Maybe it's just that such ³hot²
topics make supposedly good copy and move issues off the shelf.
Unfortunately, I think it's more than that.
At one time in this nation, individual initiative and merit was what
mattered, in business and other endeavors. If you could do the work, you
were rewarded accordingly, regardless of your race, gender, etc. Now I'm not
naive, and I'm certainly not ignoring the obvious blatant and unfair
discrimination that once existed in America. History shows, though, (even
though this point is usually forgotten or ignored) that federal and local
governments did most of this discrimination, not private businesses. (Let us
not forget Jim Crow government-created laws, and the fact that Rosa Parks
rode on a city bus, among many other such racist polices endorsed by
legislation).
So, I really get disappointed when I see the continued balkanazation of just
about everything in our nation, from sports to music to now even business,
which was once the great equalizer. Why should anyone care whether a man or
a woman is a better boss? What difference does it really make? Why in the
world create a battle when none should exist? I don't care if my boss is
Tinker Bell if she knows what she's doing and rewards my effort.
But we live today in an Us vs. Them culture. It looks like it's going to
stay that way for a while, too. Everybody wants a piece of some static pie
in the sky they are told exists, but not too many want to find the
ingredients and do the baking. Most just want to lay a claim to such a pie
because of personal characteristics other than effort and initiative. Man,
woman, black, white, Hispanic, gay, straight, et al., so what. Just do the
job. It's not right brain vs. left brain, or nurturing vs. delegating, or
any other such nonsense. It's: can you get the job done?