I rushed from the office to my son’s school drama showcase last night. As a recent recruit to the Music and Drama Committee (MAD for short) I needed to be there half an hour early to sell drinks and raffle tickets, alongside the group of mostly mothers.
Attending my son’s school events is an absolute priority in my life. One thing I’ve learned from my 20 years of being a working mother is that down the line no one will recall a client event that I was unable to attend or a report that I was delayed in writing, but my son will remember that I wasn’t there for him.
His dramatic performance of Dada theatre was extraordinary. He was entirely lost in his own world and had morphed into another being. I barely recognised him. Where did that confidence come from? It caused me to reflect on the conversation I had earlier in the day with my sales director Stacey Delaney and Hyland Media CEO and founder Virginia Hyland. We were discussing the challenges faced by women as we move up the career ladder.
One of the greatest challenges, we all acknowledged, centred on the discussion of money. We all admitted that we found the payrise discussion difficult. We could all speak reasonably and confidently about it when advising other women. In fact I recently assisted one of the women that I mentor in achieving a signicant payrise from her employer. I gave her step-by-step advice, relevant for her situation. It’s advice that I have never used myself. But I now know that it works courtesy of my mentee.
Virginia suggested that it’s an area where women could do with a bit of training, perhaps even via video. We know that women learn from studying others which is why I am a big believer in the power of role modeling: more women in visible leadership roles will result in more girls believing they can do it too. So it stands to reason that if we watch other women and men successfully negotiate a payrise then it should improve our negotiation skills.
We wondered aloud how men were able to simply walk in and place their demands on the table without skipping a beat. As managers, Virginia and I have experienced the different approaches taken by men and women in pay negotiations. We laughingly suggested that perhaps we needed to act like men when it came to asking for a pay increase. But that got us thinking that maybe there is something in that. Perhaps role-playing is a solution to the general reluctance of women to demand what they deserve in the way of pay. If we put on an invisible mask, like my son and his friends did during their drama performances last night, would the confidence that comes from pretending to be someone else kill that inner fear?
During one of the drama performances, two year nine boys wore masks designed to give each boy an understanding of character. One of the masks appeared quite conservative and dull, the other just plain silly. When the two boys came out wearing them, they were immediately extreme versions of their mask. The Master of Drama explained that they use masks to teach the students character development. Apparently hiding behind a mask allows you to become someone else very quickly.
If women were to practice wearing confident, fearless masks over and over again, would that make a difference to the way we feel about ourselves as we broach the money subject? Do we need to inject a bit of drama into this?