[Selene]

Please share your experiences and opinions.

I’m referring to situations where your accomplishments and success were conveniently explained by the gender advantage of being female.

I have no need for recognition but excessive innuendoes at work have recently left me feeling both slightly annoyed and somewhat doubtful about my true abilities.

Without going further as to why and how, I'd like to know if there were times when your competencies were unfairly overlooked/not recognized by peers and superiors as a result of inaccurate assumptions?

Did it offend you? How did you manage such situations?

[firebee]

I had a string of minor incidents of this at one of my previous jobs -- hence one reason why it's a previous job.

I'm an engineer, and the job was one that involved writing control system software and deploying/troubleshooting it out in the field along with the industrial system controlled by the software. So there was a secondary aspect to the job that involved driving out to sites, working with machines, etc.

A bit after I was hired, one of the managers came by and said that I could not work in the electrical panels because I did not have safety training. Further inquiry revealed that the company did not yet offer safety training, that my coworkers who already worked in the panels could do so because they had safety training at their previous employer, and as to the safety training that I had at a previous employer... "Uh uhm er don't work in the panels until we get the safety training." The safety training never materialized.

Couple of months after that, we had an issue where it arguably would have been prudent for me to take one of the company trucks out to a remote site to install some software. I'd assumed that there was some sort of paperwork obstacle to my driving those trucks, that I needed to have my driver's license on file or whatever. It turned out not so, but "Well, I mean, you can't drive those trucks." These being medium-sized pickup trucks. The response to my quizzical look was "Well, what if you got a flat tire?" to which I answered "I'd... change the tire?" And again with the tappy dancing and mumbling and the not having me drive the truck.

These incidents kind of baffled me, and then also I was beginning to notice a series of petty things -- jokes about the emotional instability and physical incapacity of women about which I was "such a good sport", pointed not-swearing in the presence of the "lady" that I replied to with the omitted F-bomb, chain emails... Eventually I concluded that in addition to some other factors which made the place less pleasant to work for, that I was also dealing with persistent and never-quite-stated (and hence, not-quite-debunkable) assumptions that because of my gender I was not useful for certain "nice to have" tasks which were then not offered or that I was explicitly barred from. In other words, that I seemed to be being fitted for the role of the Woman Who Makes Extra Work For The Men Because You-Know She Can't Quite Do The Job -- a role that I wasn't particularly qualified for, actually.

So the way I managed the situation was, ultimately, I found a job at another company that didn't have that particular problem. Presto, no more problem. At least in my field, such companies seem to be common enough that it's often reasonable to save the trouble and just go ahead and seek out someplace that already has their act together.

[Nicole1975]

Are you kidding me? Asking for more hours, trying to get jobs etc. I've been told things like, "why don't you get married?" "Your father can support you-that's what dads are for." "Be a teacher-that's a good job for girls." I've also been conveniently let go on more than one occasion shortly after a male employer had flirted and I pretended not to notice.

I had a female boss who told us the story of when she applied for a job once also within where we worked and she got it but hadn't started yet. She was naive, but a male co-worker who was a halfway decent guy told her what was up and she went to speak to her new boss who said something like wear a short skirt and sit on my desk and I don't care if you don't do any work at all.

Oh, also, at a Tyco subsidiary right before all the scandals erupted with Tyco and Enron, some guys working there were complaining that women didn't cook nowadays. Hmm... Well, I'm freaking pissed that men expect us to pay, as well as do the cooking when we eat in.

---------- Post added 06-18-2012 at 11:04 PM ----------

The get married comment was when I was like 22 and the daddy should pay I was close to 30 years old.....

[AlfredSchnittke]

	Originally Posted by Nicole1975 To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	I had a female boss who told us the story of when she applied for a job once also within where we worked and she got it but hadn't started yet. She was naive, but a male co-worker who was a halfway decent guy told her what was up and she went to speak to her new boss who said something like wear a short skirt and sit on my desk and I don't care if you don't do any work at all.

Damn, I wish I could get that kind of work!

[AnotherMatt]

It annoys me when people are given freebies because of the way they were born. I go to school at Iowa State and a friend of mine from high school got a full ride there simply because he is half black despite the fact that I had much higher test scores, GPA, etc.

Same story goes for some of my female friends in engineering (who I respect and I'm sure they will do great in engineering). They get more scholarship money, and even extra credit in some classes simply because they are female.

Just my two cents. I feel like I'm almost being discriminated against because I'm an average 6' white male haha