Blog 5 - Reading 4.1: Women Don't Ask

Hello Everyone!

Thanks for checking back in! This week's blog post is about a reading in our text 4.1: Women Don't Ask. I'd like to remind the reader that I did not write the article and that I am just analyzing it. I'd like to start off by saying I hope not to offend anybody with my writing, but if you have a different view on the idea please let me know in the comments section below.

The reading started off with one of the authors of the text, Linda, flashing back to when she was director of the PhD program at her school. A group of female graduate students came in and were wondering why the males were teaching classes and the females were stuck being teaching assistants to other faculty members. Linda is agrees of the unfairness of this and brings it to the associate dean who handles teaching assignments. The associate dean states, "“I try to find teaching opportunities for any student who approaches me with a good idea for a course, the ability to teach, and a reasonable offer about what it will cost,” he explained. “More men ask. The women just don’t ask.”

“More men ask. The women just don’t ask.”

This statement really took Linda back and she was yearning for a reason why it's true. The reading states something farther down that could explain this reasoning almost seamlessly.

Unfortunately, however, in our largely male-defined work culture, women’s strategies can often be misinterpreted and can leave them operating from a position of weakness. And in many cases, the only way to get something is to ask for it directly.

 Knowing this statement, this semi-explains the reason why more men ask than women ask. While negotiating for many is uncomfortable, women are the minority gender is this "male-defined work culture". Starting a negotiation is already uncomfortable enough, so this prevents many women from asking for things.

It also could be that many, men AND women, assume that things are non-negotiable. I could take an educated guess and say that this happens a lot in salary negotiations. For example, I was making minimum wage at a deli job in NJ for about 3 years. I left that job and sought employment elsewhere for a better wage. I applied to the local Lowe's Home Improvement thinking that they would solve my wage problem. After the interviews and everything, they brought me back in to confirm the job a few days later. They presented me papers that were terms of employment types of papers. At my old job, I was making $7.25 an hour, then shortly $8.25 an hour. When I was finished looking at the papers, I saw my new hourly wage. $11.40 an hour. You can only imagine my excitement when I saw a double digit in the dollar amount. I thought "man if I was surviving on $7.25 an hour, then I'll be rich with $11.40!". I tried to hold in my excitement when HR asked me, "Will this wage be OK for you?".  I tried my hardest to play it cool and only say, "Yes this should be fine".

I was 20 years old an $11.40 was great for me. I got to pay my bills and have a little extra to pay off my car and save some. The only problem is that I did not know that this would be negotiable. Could I have negotiated for more? Perhaps. I was in the mindset that I needed a job and anything better than $9 an hour will do. One would say that my reservation salary was $9 and my bargaining surplus was $2.40 an hour($11.40 minus $9).

In relation to class negotiations, I cannot recall many instances where a specific female backed down in a negotiation. I have noticed that many had weak arguments or no arguments at all in the beginning of the semester, but are growing into more experienced negotiators as these weeks go by.

Any of these instances, assuming things are non-negotiable and failing to start a negotiation, are missed opportunities. Becoming more comfortable and informing oneself about a negotiation would be greatly beneficial to that individual. Had I know that I could have negotiated for a higher wage at Lowe's then who knows, maybe I'd be driving a Ferrari by now (just kidding).


Well thank you yet again for the read. I appreciate every single view and read that I get on these blog posts. Tune in next week for more riveting negotiating topics.