Better DEI Will Teach Women How To Handle Conflict With Male Colleagues

A DEI reboot could more consciously train women to be proactive and assertive, and handle conflicts like powerful adults, not just focus on male behavior

With Girl Power comes personal responsibility. From Rawpixel

Criminy, I didn’t even scratch the surface of what DEI could accomplish with my recent article, Why DEI Is Still A Good Idea.

I almost want to take it down after brainstorming with my new creative partner, Radical Radha at Radically Pragmatic. I wasn’t thinking outside the box when I wrote it. When you’ve been locked in a ‘social justice’ prison for what, like twelve years?—you can’t see the sunlit field beyond the trees. But, I did suggest diversity of thought, at least, which DEI sorely needs.

But what Radha and I uncovered is that it’s about the people and the workplace exclusion problems that DEI has thus far not identified, or flat-out ignored because of too much, rather than the right amount of focus on biology—skin color, sex, ethnicity, etc.

Radha and I are collaborating on a couple of articles exploring in meatier detail how DEI can become a real force for good. This article focuses more on improved DEI for males and females, and Radha is handling racial and ethnic challenges. I haven’t yet been organizationally worked over like a Mafia snitch for being white, but I haven’t worked in an office in nearly six years.

To misquote jazz vocalist Dinah Washington, What a diff’rence a second perspective makes!

Cleanse DEI of harmful assumptions about lack of female agency

DEI is hailed as the ‘fix’ for ‘systemic’ bigotry and the unfortunate natural human tendency toward ‘othering’, but in a stunning revelation last November, the New York Times and Bloomberg News shelved a groundbreaking study that shed a very negative light on DEI, to which more than half of Americans have been subjected. The study found that the psychological impacts of DEI training were overwhelmingly negative—that certain practices “could induce hostility, increase authoritarian tendencies, and foster agreement with extreme rhetoric.” It also found that ‘anti-oppressive’ rhetoric actually increased it in participants, finding “consistently amplified perceptions of bias where none existed. Participants were more likely to see prejudice in neutral scenarios and to support punitive actions against imagined offenders.” It increased ‘hostility’ and ‘punitive tendencies’ by double digits across several measures.

The study addressed antiracism DEI, but it sounds exactly like what’s been happening with male/female work relations, too. DEI encourages ‘authoritarian attitudes’ and ‘coercion and control’. Racial and sex discrimination and prejudice share many similarities.

DEI’s sex focus has historically targeted male power—tunnel-visioned on men’s responsibility toward women, whether managerial or not. Its obsession with ‘white male privilege’, the COVID-19 of the social justice world, demonizes them for a birth circumstance while consistently ignoring the clear benefits for those with far more relevant ‘wealth privilege’, and its symbiotic twin ‘education privilege’. Both are greater predictors of success in life than skin color or genitals. You don’t need wealth to acquire a college education, including an elite one, but it certainly helps, and the better your education, the more wealth opportunities become available.

DEI initiatives single-mindedly counsel (still mostly) male executives to help women get ahead, succeed, and get promoted, assuming women aren’t because of ‘systemic sexism’ and ‘misogyny’. It tacitly ignores female agency and the responsibility women have for themselves. It encourages female self-infantilization, applying the social justice principle that ‘oppressed’, ‘marginalized’ people are helpless in the face of overwhelming ‘oppressor’ power, so it’s the job of DEI to cajole those at the top to be magnanimous and give someone ‘marginalized’ a leg up.

It’s a laudable goal, and we don’t argue people in power shouldn’t pay more attention to making sure people aren’t overlooked because of unconscious bias.

But it’s not the only restraint. Better DEI would address or at least recognize other reasons why women fall behind—like prioritizing family over career, or being unable to keep up with job demands. Or, and this is a big one, Imposter Syndrome. A researcher at Harvard Business School found that women are far less likely to apply for their dream job if they don’t have 100% of the job skills listed, whereas men will jump at it even if they only have 60% of them. Women also shy away from positions more stereotypically held by men, such as managerial or analytical roles.

Someone needs to survey HR and hiring managers about the difficulty of recruiting women into levels and departments that need that diversity. It’s quite possible DEI needs to teach more female empowerment—to females. Or that many women may be forgoing the career success men customarily pursue because they’ve learned they can’t, in fact, ‘have it all’. At least not to the extent Hollywood depicts. That’s a work/life balance policy that may have to change.

Social justice-ridden DEI discourages asking questions outside the narrative, which centers around what men need to do for women, much like race-focused DEI demands from white managers.

There’s a suggested passivity for women drawn from the social justice school of feminism that regards all women as victims of ‘patriarchy’ and all men as misogynists to one degree or another.

Misogyny and sexism persistently exist, of course, as exemplified by the public CEO or business executive du jour forced to resign ‘to spend more time with his family’ because of some allegation of subpar dick control. Unconscious bias is real too, but so are the aforementioned female values and sometimes self-limiting beliefs. It’s not that women are necessarily being passed over because on some level of the male brain—‘giiiiiiirlllll!’—but because they’re simply not applying.

Women possess an enduring confidence problem, clearly. This is where DEI can focus more effectively.

When women fail to pepper the C-suite, male executives are blamed for not doing enough. Countless articles detail male frustration with DEI initiatives focused on what a lousy job they’re supposedly doing, how it’s their responsibility to hire more qualified women, when they’re trying but they can’t always cajole them on board.

Others feel, or receive in employee feedback, the widespread feeling among male employees that DEI sex equity is a zero-sum game, in which a woman who wins means a man loses (as opposed to, say, a man who doesn’t get the job because another man got it?). Or that the people being hired aren’t the most skilled, and it shows.

DEI, some critics claim, stands for Didn’t Earn It. That’s not always accurate.

Women’s workplace responsibility

Every woman in an office raises male fears—and the real possibility—that a male employee may get accused of something he didn’t know he was doing—sexual harassment, or a ‘microaggression’.

Greater female inclusiveness can mean a litany of complaints to the HR manager about alleged male predations, transgressions, and ‘microaggressions’. Operating on the non-social-justice assumption that women are full adults with their own agency and responsibilities, DEI can smooth workplace relations by teaching women, as well as men, how to handle workplace conflicts, assuming equal responsibility for both.

Many workplaces hold sexual harassment training workshops, to teach men how not to act with women, and women to respond a certain way if they do.

Not so much, the woman’s responsibility for her own behavior, words and actions, and whether minor issues can be resolved between the two disputants. Where a new and improved DEI could serve to clear the path for a smoother workplace experience is to teach women to be politely assertive and to consider whether she needs to subject the alleged offender to potential embarrassment in front of an HR manager, or something that could wind up in a report on his record.

It’s terrifying to confront a male colleague about a comment or behavior you found inappropriate, not knowing how he might react. But men have good reason to fear female overreactions too.

Years ago I worked in an office where a male colleague conducted live seminars for businesspeople, in conjunction with a facilities-providing business partner. During one seminar, one of the business partner’s female colleagues was assisting in the presentation, and Bob said, intending it as a joke, “Can you please change the next slide, Vanna?”

The colleague didn’t appreciate his comment or find it funny. She felt professionally diminished. Whether we agree with her assessment is beside the point; I took issue with how she handled the problem, rather than whether she was right to feel that way. Everyone’s experience is different, and we are all individuals. I wouldn’t have felt diminished, but that’s just me.

This woman raised a holy fuss. She went back to the office and screamed to the boss about Bob’s comment. The boss then called our office and screamed at Bob’s boss about what happened. Our managers now had to repair a relationship with our business partner because our male employee had been accused of offending a female employee.

It didn’t have to go that far.

It was an offhand comment, meant in humor that landed the wrong way with the female colleague and perhaps with seminar attendees as well. In retrospect, he clearly shouldn’t have said it. But it was a comment, not even an overtly sexual one. It wasn’t a rape at an office Christmas party. On the scale of male workplace offenses against females, this one rates pretty low.

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

What if she’d been trained to handle minor problems on her own? What if she’d called Bob, explained she wasn’t happy about his embarrassing comment but she wanted to address it with him personally, because she didn’t believe in creating unnecessary drama for him because she doesn’t want to hurt his career?

This approach would have first offered him a reason to not get mad and also to listen to her, hopefully more openly, because she’d shown him professional respect by stating up front she didn’t want to create problems for him at the office?

If Bob had handled it poorly from there, then it might have been necessary to escalate. But even still, she could have kept it in perspective, with less emotional drama, like, you know, a stereotypical woman, and not damaged the business relationship so much.

And you know what? I had my own separate problem with Bob, and I went to our manager first, and guess what: He told me to attempt to work it out with Bob.

And I did. And we did.

It’s time for DEI to address how male and female colleagues can address grievances with each other first, in a prescribed manner, with guidelines on how to address the complaint, and how to react to criticism.

Related: The ‘Sheila Agreement’ - How To Handle Conflict Like Big Girls (And Boys)

This would apply both ways; women can be klutzy and inappropriate too, and sexually harass; men have a right to expect professional behavior and communication too. The purpose would be to impress upon both parties that it’s best for them to resolve their grievance with the other like adults rather than running to HR.

The alleged offender can agree or disagree with how the other party took the comment or action, but should then be on personal notice that it’s best not to repeat that action or comment again, because continuing harassment or offense is a better reason to escalate.

A fairer, more professional workplace requires everyone to accommodate a little more, not just men. For women who aren’t very assertive, it will push them more, perhaps make them more inclined, eventually, to apply for jobs and promotions they can handle, whether they tick off every skill on the hiring manager’s fantasy list or not.

Improved DEI can equalize women’s responsibility toward their behavior and treatment of their male associates and encourage both to attempt to resolve their differences personally.

And men will feel less threatened by the potential for female theatrics.

How to fix this

• Get rid of harmful, toxic, social justice ideology—the simplistic view of biology-based oppression dynamics that don’t apply in First World democracies or the notion that only ‘oppressors’ need to ‘do the work’ and challenge their biases. All humans are biased, and everyone needs to ‘do the work’.

• Assume that all workshop participants are adults who need to understand issues from another’s perspective and attempt to be less judgemental and quick to jump to the wrong conclusion. That both sexes bear personal responsibility for themselves and to address grievances with the opposite sex first with professional respect and then with a calm explanation of the grievance.

• The grievance receiver needs to listen, and whether s/he agrees with the offense or not, agrees at least not to repeat it.

• Cover bias for both sexes. Emphasize not making assumptions; not letting minor aggravations build up toward a big emotional blowup.

Ditching social justice ideology and embracing a more mature, more inclusive view that everyone is a grownup who perhaps needs to better understand how the opposite sex views them and their behavior would create a more comfortable work environment, teach employees more effective conflict management skills, and assume equal responsibility for both sexes, even in a power hierarchy.

And maybe women will apply for leadership positions more.+

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The Mixed Messages Of The Sexy Workplace
Women And Power: Would We Be As Good At Running The World As We Think?
I Confronted My Sexually Harassing Boss And I Won

When I’m not dreaming of living in a world full of grown-ass adults I do my best to encourage it here at Grow Some Labia. Please, also check out ex-woke now right-of center Radha’s Substack Radically Pragmatic!