Caroline Fairchild’s Post

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Editor in Chief, VP at Lean In

Female leaders have stepped up to address the growing needs of their teams amid the pandemic. But companies continue to ignore these contributions. Women senior leaders are 60% more likely than male leaders to provide emotional support to their teams and 26% more likely to help team members navigate work-life challenges, according to a new study from LeanIn and McKinsey & Company. Despite the increased importance of this kind of support at work — 86% of company leaders surveyed said that it is “very or extremely” critical — only 25% said they formally recognize this work a substantial amount in performance reviews.   “It’s a huge red flag that what companies say they value and what really matters during these times of turbulence is not being reflected in performance reviews,” said McKinsey’s Jess Huang, a partner and co-author of the report. “It is signaling that the work is not important.” How has the pandemic changed the way you lead at work? Do you think the performance review process needs to change to reflect the new world of work? Let me know in the comments below. #WorkingTogether

One thing the pandemic hasn’t changed: Women still do most of the “office housework”

One thing the pandemic hasn’t changed: Women still do most of the “office housework”

Caroline Fairchild on LinkedIn

Not anti feminist, but this is kind a of "pat on own back" kind of thing. "Researches" are often bogus tbh to generate numbers and need not reflect reality. Recently I read about one research that says "steam inhaling causes more problems than benefits" and it only tried to say steam inhaling causes burns and I was thinking at the moment, ah who will have interest on selling alternatives to steam inhalers. This kind of quoted numbers only spread misinformation.

Carolyn Montrose

Career Coach | I help candidates navigate the artificial and human sides of the job search process. | Columbia University Lecturer

2y

Performance reviews should evolve as the business and our world evolves; we should give extra weight to areas that need more focus at a given time. Most importantly, we should reward the people who take on extra responsibilities to benefit employees, and ultimately, the business. If "office housework" and extra emotional support surface as needs, it should be established by leadership as an expectation to contribute to those causes, regardless of who you are, as much as it is an expectation to contribute to the bottom line.

The fact that these aspects of our work life are not considered in our performance as leaders is a shame. Has the last year and a half taught us nothing?

It's not "office housework," it's simply "human capital management." To call it "housework" perpetuates the gender stereotype and devalues these activities as increasingly critical to a business' success.

I wouldn't say this is housework. This is simply about the nature of men and women in general. This is been produced by study after study. Women by nature are tend to nurture more. Hence why this stat doesn't surprise me. It is supported by numerous studies. Men tend to give support where needed. They are less likely to nurture simply just not in their nature to do so. They will give advice but not much more than that. This is an intangible thing to hold as a work benchmark. Do you give extra credit to those that do it and penalize those that don't? How do you hold someone who isn't good at doing that or are more introverted culpable? I hate to say it but I don't think you can. It is simply an intangible bonus that frankly you can't get any extra credit from. We all support our co-workers in one way or another. it is expected.

David Armes

Advancing humanity ➞ creating a sustainable future.

2y

The performance review process should absolutely be adjusted. The "soft skills" of being an effective leader are becoming the hard skills most people don't have. Yet ensuring your people feel supported means they are relaxed and doing their best work. Problem is, these skills are hard to even verbalize, much less quantify. Maybe we should invest in a more qualitative review process where we spend the time to see the entire value people bring to the team.

Larry Chao

Organization Change Founder | Managing Director

2y

The performance process itself is an output of a redesigned evaluation system The problem is THE ATTITUDE of those giving the performance reviews. As you wrote: "86% of company leaders surveyed said that it (emotional support) is “very or extremely” critical — only 25% said they formally recognize this work a substantial amount in performance reviews. " It is ridiculous that the leaders in a company know and admit something is wrong, yet do nothing about it. Who is accountable, God?! I'll say it again for effect: The problem is not the process it is the ATTITUDE of the people giving the performance reviews.

Katie McEwen

The Procurement Girl | Just A Girl Who Loves Jesus, Family, Procurement & Rock n' Roll | I Help Procurement Rockstars Share Their Legacy | GTM Advisor | ProcureTech Brand Ambassador | Community Builder🎸

2y

These sort of absolutes drive me crazy. I have worked with great men that have been incredible and attentive whenever I needed emotional support. Women are naturally more nurturing but should they get paid extra for that? No! That's like being paid extra for being a positive person. Yes, it makes the workplace better but it's just a quality of personality, not a talent or skill that should be compensated. To say that ONLY women have a nurturing quality is just wrong. If we want equality for everyone in the workplace we need to stop dividing the workplace with unsubstantiated absolutes about sex and race.

Danielle White

SAS Platform Administrator, BCS Resources

2y

In my experience it's work that is only valued by management when nobody is doing it. It tends to fall under "I don't care who does it, it just needs to be done!" (quoted because more than one of my prior managers has directly phrased it in so many words) and in too many workplaces it will be brought up in the performance reviews of women but not for men. This work even extends to in-house training and mentoring and my own experience at a prior job demonstrated that being good at that - being good at helping my team to perform better - can have the effect of closing off promotion paths because "but we need you in this position so you can keep training others."

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