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LookieNoNookie -> RE: Working For A Woman ... (10/26/2011 8:18:55 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: FirmhandKY
I just read an interesting short article about how legal secretaries view working for female lawyers:
Not One Legal Secretary Surveyed Preferred Working with Women Partners; Prof Offers Reasons Why
Extracts:
When Chicago-Kent law professor Felice Batlan surveyed 142 legal secretaries at larger law firms in 2009, not one expressed a preference for working with a female partner.
Asked whether they preferred to work for male or female partners or associates, 35 percent preferred working for male partners, 15 percent preferred working for male associates, 3 percent preferred working for female associates, none preferred working for female partners, and 47 percent had no opinion.
Ninety-five percent of the legal secretaries who responded to the online survey were women. Most were middle aged and had considerable experience. They came from firms of more than 100 lawyers.
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Some secretaries elaborated on why they preferred to work for males, with these survey comments:
• “Females are harder on their female assistants, more detail oriented, and they have to try harder to prove themselves, so they put that on you. And they are passive aggressive where a guy will just tell you the task and not get emotionally involved and make it personal.”
• “I just feel that men are a little more flexible and less emotional than women. This could be because the female partners feel more pressure to perform.”
• “Female attorneys have a tendency to downgrade a legal secretary.”
• “I am a female legal secretary, but I avoid working for women because [they are] such a pain in the ass! They are too emotional and demeaning.”
• “Female attorneys are either mean because they're trying to be like their male counterparts or too nice/too emotional because they can't handle the stress. Either way, their attitude/lack of maturity somehow involves you being a punching bag.”
• Women lawyers have “an air about them.”
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Batlan suggests that women lawyers may be “in a double-bind situation.” If they don’t behave like males, they are perceived as too emotional, and if they do act like men, they are perceived as putting on airs.
Other survey findings:
• Nearly 71 percent of the surveyed secretaries said the recession had affected their jobs, and nearly 81 percent said their firms had laid off secretaries. Some now worked for more lawyers, some reported decreased benefits, and some reported no or little pay increases. Eighteen percent had been recently laid off.
• Asked about the traits that make a good legal secretary, many indicated that it was important to control their emotions. One secretary listed the traits this way: “Gets to work on time, does the assigned work, hasn't murdered a lawyer by the end of her day.”
• The legal secretaries were generally satisfied with their work schedules. Seventy-five percent worked 30 to 40 hours a week.
• Asked if attorneys respected them, 67 percent of the secretaries said they were respected, and 29 percent said “it depends.”
There is also a longer article from a female lawyers point of view: Women Lawyers and their Secretaries : An Emotional Sweatshop?
I work with attorneys from time to time. Most are men. Three of them over the past couple of years have been women. The first two, I didn't really see much difference than with men, although one of them was a bit ... particular ... and I didn't like all that much, but she did what she was suppose to do, and seem to know her job.
But, the last one I worked with ... well, let's just say that this article resonated with me a little. In fact, this specific lawyer has caused me to tell the client that I will no longer accept any work from them if I have to work with her.
However, this incident and then these articles got me to thinking about women who are "in charge" of things, or the boss or supervisor of men. On reflection, I don't really remember ever ... ever ... having worked under a women. Perhaps I'm forgetting some when I was younger and first getting into the work environment ... nahh, none.
So, my question is: how have you found working for a women, in comparison to a man? Do you find things similar to what the legal secretaries found? Or is this a lot of fluff about nothing?
Would you prefer to work for a woman, or a man, all other things being equal?
Firm
"Savvy" magazine (now defunct), a woman's magazine (much like Elle or Cosmo), years ago put out a study showing that women, in a position to be raised up in the ranks, once raised up...brought more men up with them than women.
But, of course...it's men that have that giant thumb (because of course...we're assholes).
Women are their own worst enemies.
When women quit accepting 70 cents...they'll get paid a buck.
When women quit leaving to have children, making them less attractive to (male OR female) employers, they'll make a buck.
When women quit suing men for the same sexual shit that they do to men in the workplace....but men can't sue for the same reasons....they'll make a buck.
When women (as a whole) quit doing stupid shit....they'll make a buck.
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