Hey Ladies, Let’s Reclaim This Whole “Aggressive” Insult
“There’s no award for being the richest woman in the graveyard.” I was a couple hours away from hopping on a plane to London for a work trip, and the judgment of me was clear.
Prior to making that comment, he had been asking me why I was working so hard, why I hadn’t taken a longer maternity leave, and about how important it is for mothers to stay home with their kids. Meanwhile at the same dinner party with friends, no one blinked, let alone balked, at my husband’s discussion of his upcoming work trips.
This comment reflected something I’ve heard many times in my life, even from people who believe they are looking out for my best interests. The overall message is this: “Tone down your ambitions.”
Twenty years ago, I would have been hurt by those words, and perhaps even second-guessed myself and my choices. I’m not alone. On the one hand, women want to speak up and ask for that promotion, job, or raise. But when we do so, we run the risk of being seen as overly ambitious, self-serving, or the big insult — aggressive.
A Life-or-Death Wake-Up Call
I finally lost my fear of being seen as aggressive when my life was on the line. Abducted at gunpoint in South America with my husband, we were told that we would be killed. As I saw snippets of my life pass before my eyes (yes, this really happens!), the one thought overriding everything else was one of total denial: “This can’t be the end. I have so much more to give to this world!”
After the kidnappers released us, it took a few days to process what had happened. But once I got back to my normal life and returned home to the States, I became more determined than ever to pursue my goals aggressively and leave something tangible behind in the process.
Four months after the abduction, I was promoted into my first ever C-level position at work. Two years after that, I published a book with Penguin. A year after that, I became an executive at a software company. Eight months after that, I had a baby daughter (after seven miscarriages). A year after that, I became an executive at a public company. Eight months after that, I moved into another executive role with broader impact at the same company. And eight months after that, I recently had my second daughter.
In other words, I became more aggressive about pursuing my goals, and not just work-related ones. I put myself on the fast track to aligning my passions with making an impact. I became acutely aware that we only have one life, and it can end anytime, in the strangest and most unexpected of ways. If we want to make a mark, we can’t just sit around waiting for opportunities to fall into our lap. We have to create them ourselves.
Being Aggressive, Even in a World That Looks Down On It
If you’re a woman facing your own struggles with being perceived as too aggressive, here is some advice I wish I could go back in time to share with my younger self, without having to learn the hard way through a near-death experience:
1.Make being aggressive a positive thing. When we aggressively work on something, whether it’s fighting for the rights of our children, or our employees, or anything else that matters to us in life, we’re simply working hard, with passion, and putting forth our best effort. That is something we should never shy away from.
Be intentional about how you use the word aggressive, and start using it to praise other women who are excelling at work and in life.
2. Stop worrying about coming off as aggressive. In fact, don’t worry so much about what others think of you in general. Instead, focus on whether you are being aggressive enough by your own standards, and whether you are supporting other women in doing the same. It’s liberating, and will empower you to focus on what matters instead.
3.Recognize the power you have to change things. So often, women give up our own power by blaming the situation we find ourselves in, as if we have no control. Many women I’ve mentored over the years stay in roles that make them miserable for far longer than they should. If you have the choice to quit a job that is punishing you for being aggressive, do it. Honor your own self-worth. And do it for the women who can’t afford to make that decision.
4.Promote yourself wisely. Many women are bad at collecting evidence of our success, let alone sharing it with others. We brush off compliments and downplay achievements. Then, when it’s time to ask for that promotion or raise, we can’t even communicate why we deserve it. Does your boss know what you’re capable of? Or even what you’ve already done? Are you making your accomplishments visible, or are you sitting quietly and hoping someone will notice your hard work? Make sure your boss and others know what you’ve contributed.
5.Assume that you’re qualified. Many women wait to be asked (or worse yet, told) to jump in and take on a new challenge. Sometimes, we care so much about others’ opinions that we wait to be validated by someone else’s opinion of our readiness. Start with a default assumption that you’re capable, and go for it. Why not? Men do it all the time!
When women ask me for secrets of career success, this last point is one that I often share. Move forward with conviction in your own ability to stretch and grow. Work hard, look for areas that need some help, and pitch in without waiting to be asked, but most importantly, believe that you can do it. You’re more likely to succeed than not.
Aggressively Support Other Women
The five-point formula above might make it sound easy to achieve career success as a woman. I’m sorry, but it’s not. It’s extremely difficult. A very real bias exists for working women, even those who over perform. We don’t even need wage gap data to prove it. We all still feel it in spades.
We need to be aggressive not just in fighting for our own careers, but for those of other women.
As a manager, when I spot someone who is aggressively tackling her job, my biggest concern is doing everything I can to retain her, promote her, and keep that fire in her belly lit. All of us who manage teams that include women, and all minorities for that matter, owe it to each other to cultivate this talent and remove barriers to their success.
Here are some specific ways you can support and celebrate aggressiveness and assertiveness in women at work:
Praise the accomplishments of other women.
Knowing that so many women struggle with promoting themselves, do your part to lift them up. To help remind myself to do this, I have a standing item on my calendar that says “Wowza Women Wednesday.” The term “Wowza” is something our CEO, Brian Halligan, attributes to something highly impressive or special. When that item pops up on my calendar, it’s my visual prompt to do something for an outstanding woman, whether it’s scheduling lunch or coffee, supporting an initiative she’s leading, or sending kudos to her boss.
Encourage women to take on new challenges.
Because women struggle more than men do with valuing our own contributions, we sometimes need a little nudge. Tell your female colleague, “I think you could pursue that point more aggressively if you back it up with some more data,” or “Why don’t you go for that new position? You’d be perfect!” Speak up, and help other women see what they are capable of.
Share your goals with others.
Find some like-minded female colleagues and discuss your goals, both short-term and long-term. Create your own support network, devote time to identifying your goals, and share them with others who can help you achieve them while holding you accountable.
Try to work with, and for, more women.
If you’re in a people management role, go out of your way to hire more women. If you’re searching for a new job or looking to change roles, seek out a female boss, or better yet, a female CEO. There’s a myth that strong women can’t work with each other, that they’ll be too competitive. My experience is the exact opposite. I think that belief is just another way to stop women from making progress. The more women join forces in the workplace, and in leadership positions, the more strength we have to collectively bash that glass ceiling wide open.
All of this said, I’ll be the first to admit that success in your career isn’t always rosy. In my experience, the higher you climb on the career ladder, the more likely you are to be judged… and to hear a comment like the one I heard at that dinner party. However, now that I have many years of experience under my belt, I’m able to hear, “There’s no award for being the richest woman in the graveyard,” and not react with anger or self-doubt.
Today, I’m able to calmly and confidently give that person, who isn’t always male by the way, a good talking-to about how while I support and appreciate non-working moms, children of working women have excellent outcomes in life, among a litany of other points that are backed by research, not by outdated opinions.
Like many other women who have worked aggressively to get where they are, I don’t care about being the richest woman in the graveyard. But I do care about enriching the lives of others while I’m still here. And while I’ve never been strictly motivated by money or awards, the ability to achieve financial independence and pave the road for other women are parts of a legacy I actually do want to leave behind.
But even more importantly, the lesson I want to share with my daughters, and with any young woman out there reading this, is to never, ever be afraid of fighting aggressively for what you want. Take it from someone who has looked that graveyard square in the face, as I once did: the fear of something as insignificant as an adjective should never hold you back.
Don’t let it.
