Do Women Have Less Opportunities in the Workplace?

Emily Bell: Hello and welcome to the Blueprint Round Table. Today we’re going to talk about a topic in honor of Women’s History Month. We actually have a really cool topic, and the question is, do women have less opportunities in the workforce today? So here is where that question stemmed from. This is a topic that I think given any women in the work, We all have unique perspectives, but that theme is resounding across all of us.

Emily Bell: And I think it comes down to the basic concept of we have to make different choices a lot of times than our male counterparts in our respective professions. I think it’s transcendent across industries. So, you know, just from knowing individuals in the medical field and educational field and sales field we might have the opportunity to go for that job, but we might have to make the decision of it’s not the right time for our family. It’s not the right time for my mental wellness. There’s a lot going on that I’m balancing. I maybe just had a baby nine months ago, and so sometimes it’s a conscious decision of our own because of the kind of unspoken labor of women that we do just to keep the world turning outside of our day jobs. And it plays a factor more than people think in the decisions that we make. Also with the opportunities that were provided that I don’t think our counterparts and our respective fields quite have to deal with on the same level. Lizzy, I’d love to hear your perspective.

Lizzy Castro: Yeah, I mean, I definitely agree that women don’t have the same opportunity. Just in my personal career alone, I’d say the biggest thing I’ve noticed is seeing a lot of men in leadership roles. In my own personal experience, I’ve probably had five managers, I would say, and the majority of them have been men.

Lizzy Castro: Now I’ve had the opportunity to work with some phenomenal leaders that are women and be able to see the drive and really able, I’m sorry, I am like rambling so much right now.

Krissy Manzano: No, you’re not.

Lizzy Castro: Okay. Okay, lemme get back

Emily Bell: You’re doing really good.

Lizzy Castro: Okay. I don’t know why I just got nervous. Okay. Anyway. But yes, I do think that shows one thing in particular is women don’t always have the same opportunity when it comes to that growth.

Lizzy Castro: The fact that I’ve been able to work with so many leaders that are men and not as many women really sometimes can be discouraging as to wondering where will my growth continue to grow and will it be halted because I am a female?

Emily Bell: Yeah.

Krissy Manzano: I mean, I agree with everything that you all are saying. I think the first thing that we have to recognize is it will never be fully on equal playing fields to some extent. And whether you wanna have kids or not, there are a lot of women that have kids. Right? Not that there’s not a lot of men that don’t have kids, but obviously for women, we have to carry the child.

Krissy Manzano: There’s things in the beginning that only we really can handle and take care of, right? And so there is just a different level of choices and challenges that we face, right? And that’s just the nature of the world. No one can change that, right? Only females can physically give birth to children, right? You can adopt and all those things. But there are physical medical things that keep you out and make things more challenging that are never going to, that are gonna, you know, hold us back. And I think, and Emily, you had said this, but you know, we just need people to understand and be educated on that.

Krissy Manzano: Right. And I think that’s in order to have empathy, because right now, you know, sometimes I remember one of our very first clients when we first started out at Blueprint, they wanted to hire women. And, but they had like 75% travel with their jobs and they couldn’t understand why they weren’t getting any women.

Krissy Manzano: And I was like, but listen, that is only gonna apply to a certain age. And even that age isn’t gonna necessarily wanna do that, right? Because number one, if you wanna have a family or that’s not gonna be fun to travel around being pregnant and trying to also potentially take care of a kid, you could say, well, you know, a man that has a family that’s gonna be hard for him if he wants to be with this kid’s fair. Right? But there’s an extra level of complexity for women. And then also two, you know, it, you as you grow up as a woman, and there are certain things that you’re just like second nature are taught, like you have to be careful of, right?

Krissy Manzano: Like, hey, make sure that you know, someone knows where you’re at when you’re in a rural town and you are taking a taxi or whatever, right? Like, make sure you stay at a safe place at a hotel. You know, are you traveling by yourself? That can make, I mean, I always felt nervous and a little uncomfortable depending on where I was traveling to some extent.

Krissy Manzano: And I was fine with it, but it’s just, you know, my, my guard has to be up, right? Like, you talk to most women and it’s not, you don’t sound crazy if you’re like, oh yeah, when I go to my car after I’ve come out of the, you know, grocery store or Target, I look in the back to make sure no one’s there. I look around me to make sure, is someone coming?

Krissy Manzano: Like, that’s just like second nature, right? So I say all of those things because there’s a level of like safety and things that we have to like be more mindful of. So when we take opportunities, it’s not just, you know, I want this, but figuring out how it plays into our life for our safety family, and there’s just additional elements that fair or not, we have to take into account and will never change to that stance.

Krissy Manzano: So I think people just have to be really mindful of like understanding that, and I, and if they’re like, I do understand that it shouldn’t be the case. Well, there’s a reason why you have more men in leadership roles than women, and it’s because people don’t understand those things and they don’t have empathy and they don’t care for it.

Krissy Manzano: Right. Or this, that’s why the whole like, you know, I love it when people say, you know, we would never penalize a woman for going on maternity leave or spending time with her family. But when you tell them the reason for the gap in their resume, they’re like, I don’t believe ’em. Like, and it’s just an example of unconscious sexism, right.

Emily Bell: About like the safety and like, I remember being in obviously have experience in the individual contributor’s sales model, right. At a very high level where you’re with like the best of the best in a great way and it felt very accomplished, but there would be, you know, people that are asking about, well, why couldn’t you have done a there and back flight? Why’d you have to stay overnight? And it’s like, because I don’t feel comfortable getting into an Uber at 4:30 in the morning by myself, going to an airport, and then also not getting back until 11:30 or 12, and then getting into another Uber by myself.

Emily Bell: And so even at this age, and it’s like hard to explain that. And it’s just this unknown and this lack of the female perspective and what it is to be us in the world. And it’s interesting. You know, the empathy piece is huge. I think we’re getting more and more there. I think especially with newer generations where you have dual income households and things have to be divided to survive and to maintain a level of living.

Emily Bell: But if we all sat with ourselves for a minute, we’re all here. Male and female because a woman had us. And for what, however that happened. Right. And on a very like non-romantic level, right? Like the economy can’t continue on a global scale unless people continue to be born. So it really does blow my mind that it’s not more accessible to have a woman in any type of role? Not just leadership. Having to nurse after I went back to work and then having to also travel. Most major airports don’t have nursing areas and you also can’t, you don’t have a feasible and financially aligned way to get that back to your baby, so it’s all wasted.

Emily Bell: And so it’s like little things like that like whether you’re in leadership or not, people just don’t quite understand the perspective. And it does limit women. It does mean that we have to say no to some of the same opportunities or we’re turned down because there’s a perception of unconscious bias that we can’t handle it when really we could, if the playing field was leveled where we were able to stay the night instead of having to do a there and back flight, because that was just okay.

Emily Bell: But yeah, it, you got me thinking on that one. You were talking about the safety piece, like it’s such a huge element to what women are willing to take on in the work.

Krissy Manzano: Yeah, totally. The founder, I can’t remember her quote verbatim, but she says, like, I take a working mom over anyone any day because what she has to balance for like the temper tantrums, the food pickiness, all of these things. And she’s gotta try to keep calm and get all that stuff done.

Krissy Manzano: I know she can execute and I know she can plan and do those things. And so it just, but it, I’m not wording it as well as she did. But it really is a way of like, The amount of whether you’ve had a kid or not, like the way that our brains work and how we plan and how we execute, how we have to, right?

Krissy Manzano: Like we aren’t and I was talking to someone about this the other week, but like the bar that we have to hit to be, for things to be like good or acceptable is pretty high. And it’s pretty high our whole life, no matter, you know, what type of family you’re born into, where you live, where you come from.

Krissy Manzano: Like, there are certain things that like we have to, we’re, we just are born into having to execute at a pretty high level. And so, you know, for that matter, like we, that’s where we can handle a lot of different things because that’s, that is expected of us, right? I’m sure you can think of people that are not doing that, but as a whole, at the end of the day, you know, the what we, you know, to get from good to great is not that big of a jump to some extent because of the level we’re already executing at.

Krissy Manzano: So anyways, my 2 cents on the matter.

Emily Bell: No, I think all of it is incredible. I think there’s many powerful women and honor of Women’s History Month that have gone before us, and I think that we’re doing them very proud, in my opinion, and just the women that I have had the privilege to work with. So, a topic that is near and dear to all of our hearts, and one that I think has a presence to be talked about, even more so outside of one month. But hopefully this is just one drop in the bucket to get us where we ultimately want our daughters to be one day.

Krissy Manzano: Yeah, for sure. And look, if you want to try to attract more women or to figure out how can you make them more comfortable, cuz we’re not asking you to change things that are needed for your business. Do something very simple and ask them. Right? Ask them. I can tell you we will answer. And we’ll give you pretty realistic things like most time like, Hey, I don’t expect you to change the fact that we need to have in-person meetings in order to be successful for this type of role.

Krissy Manzano: But knowing that, you know, I can’t do things in 24 hours and that you appreciate how hard it is for me to try to plan all that out, to get a sitter and you know, daycare situated and knowing how attached my kid is to me. I did grow them inside my body, right? So it’s just a natural thing. You have a meltdown, all that kind of stuff.

Krissy Manzano: Just knowing that you appreciate that is enough, right? And so you don’t have to like jump over the moon here. It’s actually pretty simple stuff that you can do. And you know, like not judging someone for when they have a gap in their resume, being willing to have that conversation with women, right?

Krissy Manzano: Hey, where’s this gap from? Why was this short? You would be surprised how I would say eight times outta ten, it’s because of a really valid reason.

Emily Bell: So true. What’s funny is like odds are if you ask and you really think about it, they probably already told you. You just didn’t hear them. So I think like active listening and really just the appreciation. I think women are willing to move the moon especially for those we love and for our careers in particular.

Emily Bell: We, that is a passion. But that appreciation goes a long way outside of any financial payout of what we accomplish on a day-to-day basis. So really good point.

Krissy Manzano: Totally. I agree. Well, that’s all the time that we have today. But thank you ladies for joining. Till next time, we’ll see ya.

Emily Bell: Bye.