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Ongoing Thoughts 22:
By William E. Steinman:
Maternal Profiling:
Is it legitimate? Is it fair? Is there a better way? First,
what is maternal profiling? It seems some employers ask prospective employees
if they have children. It is legal to ask that question in many states. On
surface, ht seems innocent enough. It is when we discover they usually only
asked it of female prospective employees that we realize it is not innocent at
all. The most important thing is, a woman who answers yes to that question in
less likely to land the position. Some employers do not want to hire women with
children. Oh, oh!
In the case, the media presented to us, a woman with
children did not get a position after she answered yes to that question. They
did not give me enough information to be sure of the conclusion they wanted me
to draw. They wanted me to believe being a mother caused her to be rejected. It
could be. For argument, I will assume that. Unfortunately, as is often the case
with the media, they selected a very poor example. The position being sought
was office manager. Huh? What does an office manager do? That is an overpaid
non-job if I ever heard one. Even if I were desperate for help, I would not
employ a person who called herself an office manager.
Well, so what? Let us assume this woman was not rejected
because she had no marketable skills. Let us assume she was rejected because
she was a mother. Does she have a legitimate complaint or are the employers
justified in their rejection? In the normal employment situation, the
employer’s concern would be that they might not be able to rely upon the
woman to be there when needed. She might have a conflict of interests. I think
we can all recall the classic case where the woman who prosecuted O. J. Simpson
had to delay the trial because she could not get a baby sitter. It really
happened. Of course, that is not the only bungling that went on in the
prosecution of that case.
So, is it fair? I will not venture an opinion on that,
because I believe there is a better way. There is a better way to employ people
and provide for their needs and even their contingencies. A better way in this
case would be to provide for childcare in whatever way possible. Why? The fact
is I think females are better employees and they should be nurtured. In my book
“The Gaffer’s Shorts”, I addressed this situation in a bit of
detail in an essay entitled “Principles of Ethical Business
Practice.” Here is some of what I wrote.
In observing people at work over many years, I believe the ideal
new colleague to be a very bright graduating high school senior woman. We have
to include the concept of brightness because we know some teenage women and men
are inane as hell. Here is the conundrum. If a person is inane at age
seventeen, they will probably die that way, even though it is learned behavior.
It is a behavior, which was once effective and will not be unlearned without
expensive help. What seemed precocious at age seven will be annoying at age
seventeen and sad at age fifty. This inane behavior is not as common as we
pretend. It is like any other stereotype. There are more bright young folks
than inane.
Here is the rationale for young women colleagues. These are
not laws and have many exceptions. They are just the sum of personal observation
over time. Women are easier to train because they are relatively free of that
male ego dumbness. You know! The silliness that causes a man to nod his head
and say, “Yeah I know,” even when he doesn’t have a clue. He
just can’t let the other person start to think he is dumb. Therefore, he
will go and waste time learning it by himself instead of asking questions.
Young people, in general, are easier to train because they don’t have so
much baggage. They don’t have things to unlearn. Unlearning is much more
difficult than learning.
Young bright women are eager to learn. They want to
understand. They listen carefully and ask questions. Women on the job spend
more time actually working than their male counterparts. Here is a tough one.
It is a known statistical fact that a woman will work for less compensation
than a man in the same job. Many employers take advantage of that. It is a
pretty short sighted philosophy. I believe an employer who pays someone less
than they are worth simply because low self-esteem causes them to accept it
should be summarily executed. It is unethical and counterproductive in the long
run.
Low self-esteem is a likely problem with some female
colleagues. Many women have a somewhat diminished ego. This is due to early
conditioning. They are not as likely to speak up in group situations. They are
not as likely to offer ideas even though they have an abundance. Sometimes it
gets so silly that a woman will go with an inferior idea because it came from a
man. An employer must be vigorous
in encouraging the female colleagues to express themselves lest the very best
creative talent be suppressed. This is necessary even if it means paying for
the women to take a Carnegie. I wrote about many other issues in that essay but
they are not relevant to this discussion.
Now, let’s get back to the idea of providing for
children. Most employers take the dodge, they would like to do it but it costs
too much and there is inherent risk. As to cost, I am convinced the women who
know they don’t have to worry about their kids will be super productive.
About risk, there is risk to all employees and all employment situations. There
is a risk of kids getting hurt in the workplace. The is also a risk of the
manager getting hurt in the work place. These are risks that we deal with in
risk analysis. Then we can put safeguards in place. Then we buy insurance to
cover what happens when the safeguards fail. These are things that employers
must do all the time if they want to be successful.
If we want the best employees, we will provide for these things. No one chokes up over the fact that we routinely provide the same health care coverage to a male employee with seven kids as we do to a woman with no kids. Let’s get honest here. Let’s get fair. If we provide for the kids care, the problem of women being absent to deal with domestic problems will disappear. Nuff said!