blogger profile

Cate M

I'm a recent college graduate just starting on the road toward my future and still asking myself "What do I want to be when I grow up?" I love traveling and learning new languages. My dream trip would be an adventure across the sights, sounds, smells and beautiful beaches of Spain, Portugal and Moro...

READ MORE

Working with Women

A Blessing or a Curse?

If you have ever worked in an office, restaurant or store with mainly women coworkers, you know that working with other women can be either really enriching or incredibly disheartening. Working in an all-women environment can bring out the best and the worst in each of us. Women bosses and women coworkers either show us the possible power and strength of hardworking, intelligent females or they magnify the pettiness and insecurities that can come between women.

I once worked in a retail store with a 30 to 2 ratio of  women to men. All my bosses were women and the majority of my coworkers were too. I happened to work in the men’s department, which meant that I also happened to be one of the few employees who worked along side the few men in the store, as well as, with the few male customers that came in. It was interesting to see the other departments gossip about each other while my department usually just worked and joked with one another. Thankfully, we in the men’s department did not face the same level of drama amongst each other as other employees in the store. However, the drama from one of my managers could not be escaped. She had convinced herself that I was a flirt. I talked too much to my male coworkers and was too flirty with male customers. The reality was, I talked as much too my coworkers and to my customers as other employees did in their respective departments. In my case, however, the only customers and coworkers for me to communicate with were male. Never before or since have I been accused of flirting inappropriately in a workplace. It was disheartening for me to see a woman who obviously held a position of power to degrade herself to that kind of pettiness. She had the opportunity to be an example of a successful women, but instead chose to break down the women working for her.

Working with women, a blessing or a curse? What’s your story?