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USATODAY.com - Study says flirtatious women get fewer raises, promotions
Women who send flirtatious e-mail, wear short skirts or massage a man's shoulders at work win fewer pay raises and promotions, according to a Tulane University study to be presented Monday at the Academy of Management annual meeting in Honolulu.

In the first study to make plain the negative consequences of such behavior, 49% of 164 female MBA graduates said in a survey that they have tried to advance in their careers by sometimes engaging in at least one of 10 sexual behaviors, including crossing their legs provocatively or leaning over a table to let men look down their shirts.

But...

The other half said they never engaged in such activity, and those women have earned an average of three promotions, vs. two for the group that had employed sexuality. Those who said they never used sexuality were, on average, in the $75,000-$100,000 income range; the others fell, on average, in the next-lowest range, $50,000 to $75,000.

So without a well-defined dress code, it's not so much that women 'might be using their wiles, or some such', but that a good proportion of women will certainly try.

Although it's not often labelled as such, this is actually a form of sexual harassment.

Now, in the real world everyone understands that while all employees should be completely adult goal-oriented productive models of maturity and detachment at work, that's not what actually happens. Flirting and sex, sometimes calculated and manipulative or pressured, sometimes not, sometimes welcome, sometimes not, are always going to be an issue, from both genders.

But it's maybe not so unreasonable to want to keep them down to a reasonable background noise if people are trying to concentrate on other stuff.

Obviously the corollary is that women have the right to assume there will be no pawing, whistling, ass grabbing, innuendo, or suggestions that a weekend away might just swing that promotion.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sun Jan 31st, 2010 at 09:08:09 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Although it's not often labelled as such, this is actually a form of sexual harassment.

Why, yes, yes it is, and, so far as I can see, entirely off-topic to the subject of the post.  Do people act stupid and shitty and behave badly in innumerable ways?  Indisputably.  Are dress codes sometimes necessary?  Probably.  (am I permanently doomed to feel I'm channeling Rumsfeld when indulging in this sort of communication style?  absolutely)...

BUT!  What I'm talking about is more a CLIMATE than the specifics of who wears what in individual circumstances.  The climate which 1) makes an issue of women's sexuality no matter what and 2)  makes an underlying assumption that we need to be TOLD how not to make these sorts of "mistakes" or create these sorts of "problems" even if we're not doing ANYTHING and 3) that the CLOTHES (or underwear) in and of themselves is in no way the issue -- the clothes as SYMBOLS and SYMPTOM of the cultural problems we women are experiencing is the problem I'm trying to shed some light on here.  Perhaps I'm failing.  

But this part of your comment is a perfect illustration of what I'm talking about:

So without a well-defined dress code, it's not so much that women 'might be using their wiles, or some such', but that a good proportion of women will certainly try.

You're identifying women as the problem, not human behavior.  What you're saying is that women NEED an enforced dress code or they'll "certainly try" to behave badly.  Where does it say in this article that ANYONE interviewed was outside the bounds of a dress code?  If I follow your reasoning, then a lot MORE rules would stop these pesky women.  Maybe they should just all kneel in the foyer every morning and measure the space from their hems like schools do, right?  Are you seeing the problem here?

To my eyes, the closing paragraph of the article is the pertinent bit (bold mine):

Almost all the women in the Tulane study who said they used sexual behavior said they did so infrequently. But executive coach Debra Benton, who has long asked business leaders about the pros and cons of sexuality in the workplace, said that if a similar survey were given to men, they would say that women use sexuality "all the time." Women need to be aware that when they say "It's a nice day," men will often conclude "She wants me," Benton says.

What should we make the men wear or not wear to put a stop to this outrageous behavior?

Maybe we can eventually make language a complete impediment to understanding. -Hobbes

by Izzy (izzy at eurotrib dot com) on Mon Feb 1st, 2010 at 01:39:09 AM EST
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