Another sits in the corner, knees drawn to her chest, face buried in her hands.
A third barely manages to speak. “It’s like my voice is stuck in my throat,” she whispers.
Over the past 30 years conducting presentation and media training, I’ve never seen these behaviours in men.
On stage, women minimise their size – as if they don’t have the right to take up space. The ‘fig leap’ pose is a social anthropological response from tribal times, protecting the genitals in case of attack. On camera, they can’t bear to watch themselves, using words like “horrible”, “fat” and “ugly”. Often, they’re reticent to project their voices, believing they don’t deserve to be heard.
None of this is coded in our brains from birth, evident in the brilliant work of neuropsychologist Dr. Cordelia Fine.
Call it what you will – Good Girl Syndrome or The Confidence Code – but “ways of speaking learned in childhood affect judgements of competence and confidence, as well as who gets heard, who gets credit, and what gets done”, according to Deborah Tannen in the Harvard Business Review.
Already, I see it in my 11-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son. Grace – the smartest girl in her class – uses upward inflections at the end of phrases and sentences, so she isn’t ostractised for being a ‘know-it-all’. No one wants to be called ‘bossy’, right…? Except for boys. Taj is happy to display his status, playing the role of the leader.
This is what we see in the workplace. Suddenly, women are expected to adopt a male way of communicating to succeed. Part of the gender pay gap is caused by this ‘confidence gap’.
Which is not to say it’s our fault. I agree with Catherine Fox’s premise in Stop Fixing Women: we need to fix the system. But we also must create a platform of outspoken women.
Research by the ABC shows almost 80 per cent of those quoted in stories are men. The problem is two-fold: journalists taking the path of least resistance by calling their regular sources, and women unwilling to put themselves forward for fear of being judged for their appearance or over-confidence.
As Hillary Clinton said this week, “The research is absolutely clear: The more professionally successful a man becomes, the more likeable he is. The more professionally successful a woman becomes, the less likeable she is.”
This is why senior women often make a conscious effort to play down their volubility – the reverse of how most men handle power, according to research by the Yale School of Management.
As the national convener of Women in Media, I’m attempting to address the unconscious bias of reporters when choosing ‘talent’ by opening a one-stop-shop on our website for female experts. And, I’ve joined with two communications experts to launch Outspoken Women, a series of master classes aimed at amplifying the voices of our sisters.
Public speaking, or agreeing to a media interview, is risk-taking. You’re effectively saying, “I’m someone worth listening to”. As girls, we learn to avoid making mistakes, leading to a crippling perfectionism.
Another possibility is that women feel the weight of representing their entire gender: “They don’t want to be at the mercy of their flaws, for even the smallest blunder is used against them and those like them. A woman misspeaks or miscalculates and suddenly it’s used as a reason why we ‘shouldn’t let women do this’ or ‘shouldn’t listen to women who say that’,” Dannielle Campoamor argues in the Huffington Post.
I’ve lost count of the number of female students who’ve crucified themselves after (what they perceive to be) an inadequate performance, while a mediocre male student will say, “Actually, I’m really happy with that”.
While women shrink in stature at any sign of nerves, men deal with the adrenaline rush by pacing the stage. As Dave Yewman writes on the Science of People website, they “often have no idea the audience is being forced to watch them like a ball in a tennis match”.
We’re socialised to think this is a sign of a sophisticated presenter – “Look! He’s left the lectern! The guy’s a rock star!” – however, it’s actually a little bit shit.
Breaking down the barriers to give women their true voice will take time. But we’ve come a long way since 2400BC, when the words on the Enmetena and Urukagina cones (the earliest know law codes) said, “If a woman speaks out of turn, then her teeth will be smashed by a brick”.
Sometimes, there’s a specific reason why a woman isn’t comfortable raising her voice.
Dozens of students have contacted me after class, saying they were victims of domestic violence. “I knew that if I spoke up, he’d hit me again,” one said. Now she understands the reason for her fear, she’s finally able to speak out.
Then there are the verbal modifiers, including “just”, “only”, and “I think”. Removing these uncertainties isn’t about turning women into men, or playing into a patriarchal paradigm. When you’re being hired as an expert, you should show that you know your stuff.
Creating a new generation of outspoken women is more than just body language, gesture, voice, messaging and diaphragmatic breathing. And it goes beyond the Amy Cuddy power pose. We must discuss the deep-seated reasons holding women back.
At Outspoken Women, our dream is to create a large bank of speakers, experts and activists. It’s unapologetically a feminist business model with an all-woman crew. And we’re offering plenty of scholarships to those from marginalised communities.
We are women: it’s time to hear us roar.
Outspoken Women in launching on September 26 in South Australia – the first Australian state to give women the vote – before rolling out master classes across the country. Register here for a place or scholarship.