An Insight Into Women’s Aggressive Behavior

I was going to post this as a response to Big Mike’s comment on a previous post, but it got so long I decided it needed its own space.

Regarding aggression in women in the workforce, I’ve seen both sides of the coin.

Growing up, I worked in what was almost exclusively a male environment – auto parts. In order to be taken seriously, I had to prove I knew what I was doing, and I had to do it longer, and harder, than any man in the industry.

In fact, we had a client with a motorcycle parts and repair shop who often called in for parts to be delivered. I was on the phone with one of his employees one day, helping him with his order, and in the background I heard the owner say to him, “Is that Candace? Ask for someone else” (meaning talk to a man, any man, other than this woman cuz she doesn’t know what she’s doing).

What did I do? I gave the phone to my delivery guy, who was all of 18 years old and knew next to nothing, in order to get the poor employee off the hook (and he was very embarrassed; apologized profusely for his boss’ behavior). I helped the delivery guy find the right parts and had them delivered to the owner’s satisfaction. It’s just what needed to be done, even though I hated it.

When I was in charge of managing the auto parts store (while my dad took off for a while), I was the boss of all-male crew. One night I held a meeting with the crew and my outside salesman (who is about Big Mike’s size- very big guy), got so angry at me that he pounded his fist on the counter and made the parts books jump (not an easy thing to do, they weighed a lot!). Everyone else was flabbergasted for a moment and anxiously waiting to see what I would do. I didn’t put up with it, I’ll tell you that much. If I had, it would have opened the opportunity for everyone to treat me that way. Would you consider that aggressive behavior?

I also was part of the team for the store which made a vendor proposal to the biggest economic driver in the area – the copper mines. Again, I was aggressive in sealing the deal to ensure we got what we needed, but we ended up with an exclusive contract to sell heavy duty parts onsite to each of the mine locations.

On the flip side, in the 1980s the government instituted “affirmative action” and deemed that the mines had to hire a certain percentage of women employees – regardless of skill or knowledge. It ended up creating an atmosphere such as you might have seen in movies like “North Country”, with Charlize Theron. While some women just wanted to do a good job and get paid the same as the men, there were some who took advantage of it and used the opportunity to do next to nothing while still getting paid exorbitant sums. Obviously, at the same time this was both beneficial and detrimental to getting women into a previously male workforce. If anything, I think women took a step backward at this time due to the few who made us all look bad.

So what does this all mean? It means that in some cases women HAVE to be aggressive. And by aggressive I mean assertive, firm, and confident while maintaining a business-like demeanor. Sometimes we have to be the bulldozer. We certainly have to earn our respect. Because women so often have to go further and work harder and longer to be taken less seriously and get paid less, aggressiveness is a given in order to succeed in a man’s world.

I will say one thing, though. When I was the manager of the auto parts store, I also strove to make sure all my employees were treated fairly and taken care of by offering them health insurance and annual bonuses – things they previously had no access to. During my tenure, our turnover rate was the lowest ever. The couple problem children who couldn’t handle a female boss didn’t last long but I made sure the remainder enjoyed their jobs.

Okay, I’ll step off my soap box now.