091103b

Feminine vs. feminism in business?

 I was actually dumbstruck for the whole evening yesterday when I heard a friend say to a group of women, that “to succeed in the male-dominated world of business; to get men to help you; to win more contracts; you have to STOP ACTING LIKE MEN!” 

For those of my readers who don’t know me, I have to admit that I am much better at acting like a man than a woman! ….powerful, dynamic and highly competitive! (sorry!) J….I thought that was something to be proud of….”girl power” and all that! J of course I can also be highly co-operative, receptive and gentle but I thought that in the business world we would be falling prey to sexism by being feminine…..so back to survival strategies again…..women act like men to survive.

So, I had one of those “aha!” moments of awareness yesterday when I realised that my worst disagreements with male business associates have been when I am being very “masculine”…..competitive and confrontational…..sometimes, masculine men can’t deal with masculine women in an argument….you get a battle of wills….too much Yan vs Yan  

My friend warned that “acting like a man” is not going to get us to where we want to be…masculine men will not co-operate with masculine women….we are too much competition for them….only feminine men will co-operate with masculine women…… 

By feminine and masculine, we are referring to our posture; the kind of energy we emit; the way we speak and the inner values we project. 

Men and women are built differently not only biologically but also psychologically……whereas we  look for similarities racially, we look for differences sexually…..(we look for friendships with people who are similar to us and sexual chemistry with people who are different….in homosexual relationships, the difference is in the masculine vs feminine energy)…..John Gray explains all this really well…..this is one of those “must read” books if you wish to have more effective business relationships with people of the opposite sex ….click here to take a look at it:

Men are from Mars & Women are from Venus

(I know John Gray’s stuff really well but my BIG mistake was in thinking that it only applied to intimate relationships…..before I heard my friend talking about getting better results by being “feminine” in business, I was under the impression that I had to project very masculine qualities in order to be respected in the business world which is still predominantly masculine…..in fact, the thought of joining “Women’s Business groups” has always turned my stomach, ….OK…ladies! there is something for us to learn here!

Subscribe for our
FREE Success Newsletter
for regular life & business psychology ideas that will keep you up to date with current thought in personal development.