Women, Beware the Pink Net

I hear this all too often from my clients and friends. The glass ceiling is still there, though recently women are getting more aggressive at poking holes through it. But some of the women I talk to are more worried about getting trapped in what I call the Pink Net. Many corporate women are getting caught up in the male culture of competition and dominance. In order to climb the ladder they are turning on other women, holding them back, keeping them down.

Ouch.

Talk about the unkindest act of all.

To succeed, many of my corporate clients have been working hard to become more like men – tough, competitive, driven. For men this style obviously works. There’s a reason the “old boys club” has been around so long.

There is a big difference, though, in how men and women play the competitive game. Men dwell mostly in their heads and are less ruled by emotions. They like to compete – be the top dog – yet they don’t personalize the battle. They go out for drinks after a heated conference room battle and hash out the latest ball game like the best of friends.

Women, however, are relational; we are more in touch with our feelings. While this has some obvious benefits, it also makes it tougher for women to keep our emotions out of the equation. We tend to personalize disagreements – business or otherwise. After a conference room battle, our emotions can be stirred up. They can linger and fester. Internalized, women can turn these negative emotions on other women in the male hierarchical tradition of keeping others down to raise ourselves up. Or they can harden themselves to their emotions and become the dragon lady boss. (I had one of these once. It was not pleasant.) This personalization of conference room disputes hurt women individually and collectively in corporate life.

A women’s cultural and natural inclination is to form circles of collaboration where we can support, listen to, and encourage one another. As a result, when we start throwing punches like the boys, there’s an internal cost. It’s hard to divorce ourselves from our feelings and stay in our heads. And in an effort to stay one-up, the cost can mean keeping other women down.

So what’s the solution? One is for women to build on what comes naturally: circles of collaboration. Artemis, the Greek Goddess of the Hunt, refused to follow the traditional female role of wife and mother. Instead she asked her father, Zeus, for a bow and arrow so she could roam free in the woods with her circle of nymphs. Artemis and the nymphs were self-sufficient, hunting and supporting each other. They created a circle of collaboration.

Instead of buying into the competitive game, women might focus on building networks of support, encouragement and guidance within the corporation. Men have a system of mentoring. Their mentees are advised, guided and encouraged through their development. Then the mentees are brought with them up the ladder, or the mentees move on to become colleagues in other companies.

There is a growing tradition of female mentoring in US corporations. There just isn’t enough of it YET! Are we really too busy or too competitive to stop and help one another through the ranks? Mentoring should be the type of collaboration women can embrace. I know this is happening in some of the younger newer and savvier companies, but we still have a long way to go in the larger more male dominated corporations.

If you feel you are not getting the support and encouragement you need from other women, then I invite you to visit one of our In Her Name Circles. We are an open community of women who honor each other and the Feminine Divine, as well as the Masculine.

Our mission is to create a safe place for women to gather to:

If this speaks to you, then I invite you to join us. You can find a list of upcoming circles at:

or