Unspoken truths about women in business

👗"Jingjin, what are you wearing right now?" The question caught me off guard. It was eight years ago. I was in the office preparing for the upcoming QBR, when my phone rang. It was our division VP. “Can you be in a client meeting this afternoon?” he asked. One of the world’s largest automotive OEMs. High stakes. 200 people are working around the clock to close the deal. I had 6 hours to prepare. My heart raced. This was the kind of meeting that could change many things! Of course, I said yes. Then came the pause. And that question: “What are you wearing right now?” "Is there a dress code?" I laughed. "Kind of..." He continued, a bit apologetically yet firmly: “I need to tell you that the president has a reputation for hitting on women. I want you to be prepared.” Suddenly, my job wasn’t just to represent the business. It was to calculate risk. To protect myself in the room. In those five hours, I still worked on my talking points. But I also asked a junior male colleague to join me, as a buffer and braced myself for inappropriate comments. The meeting went well. I delivered. There were no inappropriate comments But that experience never left me. ... If you're a woman in leadership, you need to prepare for two battles: The work, and the room. And if you're a male leader, your silence is complicity. Here’s what I now teach women privately, and what I wish someone told me earlier: 1. 🛡️ Bring your buffer.    Don’t be afraid to request someone in the room with you, not to assist you technically, but to dilute the power imbalance. It’s not weakness. It’s strategy.     2. 🚫 Pre-empt boundary crossing.    If you’re warned someone is inappropriate, name it before it happens. “Just to clarify, I’ll be focused strictly on business today.” Let them know they won’t get away with casual harassment cloaked as banter.     3. 📍Control the setting when you can.    Suggest public venues, group meetings, or shorter time slots. Private dinners and “casual drinks” are not neutral spaces. Stop feeling guilty for adjusting logistics to protect your dignity.     4. 📝 Write it down.    Any inappropriate comment, no matter how subtle, goes in your private log: date, time, what happened, and who else was there. Not because you’re planning to report it. But because memory fades, and patterns matter.     5. ⚖️ Stop normalizing it.    You’re not “too sensitive.”    You’re not imagining it.    You’re managing two jobs: your work, and your safety.    And the latter is unpaid labor.     If you're still wondering whether gender equity has arrived, ask yourself who’s planning their safety before they speak. And who just gets to speak. 👊 Until the answer is “everyone,” we’re not done.

I was the only woman in the room so through some unspoken rule — I was supposed to plan the farewell party? A University of California survey of 3,000 employees found that women were 29% more likely than white men to report doing more office “housework” than their colleagues. Planning team lunches, and parties, taking notes, cleaning up the table after a meeting, scheduling calls — and other such “thankless” tasks often fall into women’s laps. Each of these is significantly hurting gender equality. Harvard Business Review labels these tasks as 'low-promotability tasks' — that are helpful to the organization but the person performing them isn’t perceived as making an impact. The way work is allocated in organizations needs to change. Not only do we need to re-address the perceived value attached to these tasks, but we also need to ensure that women aren’t the only ones doing office housework. Whenever it happened to me, I didn't have the courage to push back. I still wish I had. It's an unappreciated burden that a lot of women carry but we’re afraid of pushing back because we want to be seen as team players. It's time leaders make sure all work is shared equally, including “Dave’s” goodbye lunch. The trend of non-strategic work being piled up on women's desks needs to stop. We don't need logistical tasks, give us career-making roles and responsibilities. We'll no longer accept being sidelined. #bias #genderequality #womenintech #womenleaders #career #leadership

You cheer for women one day and ignore them tomorrow. Two weeks ago, my LinkedIn was flooded with brands paying anything to book women creators for Women’s Day. It happens every year. The grand celebrations, the inspiring quotes, the LinkedIn love. But what happens on March 9th? As a woman entrepreneur, I don’t just deal with challenges once a year, I fight them every damn day and every woman entrepreneur will relate to it. The funding battles, the societal expectations, the constant need to prove myself. And yet, once the hashtags stop trending, nobody talks about it. Here’s what people conveniently forget: → Investors hesitate when they see a woman at the helm. Less than 2% of VC funding goes to women-led businesses. The bias is real. We’re told to “think big,” but when we do? We’re “too ambitious.” → Women are expected to run businesses like they don’t have families and manage homes like they don’t have businesses. The pressure is relentless and the guilt is huge. → Speak up, and we’re “aggressive.” Play it safe, and we’re “not leadership material.” We’re stuck in a game where the rules were never made for us. Women don’t need a holiday. We need funding, hiring, investments, opportunities and recognition EVERY DAY. Not just when it’s trending. So if you really want to support women in business, put your money where your mouth is. Invest in them. Hire them. Fund them. Amplify their voices. And don’t just remember us when it’s convenient. #womenentrepreneurship #womencreators

5 Uncomfortable Truths Most High-Achieving Women Spend Their Entire Careers Avoiding: 1.) Deflecting Compliments Hurts Your Career. For years, I was the queen of deflecting compliments—brushing off praise with "Oh, it was nothing" or redirecting it to others. I didn’t realize I was diminishing my value and reinforcing the idea that my contributions were not worth celebrating. This habit cost me visibility and career advancement. 2.) Your Achievements Won't Speak for Themselves. Here's why it takes women so long to learn this truth: 1️⃣ Belief 1: Good work alone should be enough. 2️⃣ Belief 2: Self-promotion feels like bragging. 3️⃣ Belief 3: Staying humble will make me more likable. Avoid this trap: Recognize that sharing your success is not arrogance; it’s accurately representing your value. 3.) Staying Silent Costs You Opportunities. Think of every opportunity you've missed because you didn’t speak up. I stayed quiet about a project that saved millions, assuming my work would speak for itself. It didn’t. A male colleague, who contributed far less but wasn’t shy about promoting his role, received the recognition—and the promotion. Face it: Silence doesn’t serve you. If you don’t promote yourself, someone else will—and they might not tell your story how it deserves to be told. 4.) You Can Be Liked and Respected, but Respect is Non-Negotiable. ✅ If you confidently own your achievements, you’ll be seen as a leader. ✅ If you continue deflecting compliments, you’ll remain invisible. ✅ If you stay silent, you’ll reinforce the status quo that women’s contributions are less valuable. Choose wisely: Would you rather be liked for your silence or respected for your contributions? 5.) Women Often Play Small, But the World Needs You to Play Big. Most people think modesty will open doors, but in reality, it’s flipped: owning your awesome is the key to unlocking new opportunities. Actions tell your story, so start making yours count by confidently representing your value.

We talk a lot about the mental load women carry at home. But what about the mental load women carry at work. In corporate environments, women disproportionately take on non‑promotable, invisible labor — note‑taking, scheduling, follow‑ups, calendar coordination, and making sure nothing falls through the cracks. Research shows this adds up to about 1 extra month of work per year compared to men. Women of colour are even more impacted. About 25 years ago, I stepped in to support my CEO while his Executive Assistant was on leave. My role wasn’t just booking meetings. It was ensuring his schedule was locked and loaded across systems: his computer calendar, his Palm Pilot (showing my age), and a printed daily schedule. My mistake? I didn’t verbally remind him before leaving the office that he had a 7 a.m. breakfast meeting the next morning. He missed it — and when he arrived at the office, he was furious with me. Apparently 2 tech reminders and 1 printed copy wasn’t enough. He needed a verbal reminder. Fast‑forward 25 years. I was sitting in a professional working group where the only man in the room said — very casually — that he would not be the one taking notes. The implication was unspoken but obvious: someone else would do it — and it would be a woman. Different decade. Same expectation. This isn’t about note‑taking. It’s about who carries mental labor at work — and who is allowed to opt out of it. And until that changes, we shouldn’t pretend this is accidental.

Let’s stop telling women to “just ask” for what they want. We’ve BEEN asking. The world just hasn’t been listening. New research out of Vanderbilt debunks the myth that women don’t negotiate. In fact, 54% of women MBA grads reported negotiating their job offers, compared to 44% of men. In promotion conversations, women again outpaced men: 64% vs. 59%. And yet... we’re still more likely to be rejected. We’re not the problem, the system is. The gender pay gap has actually widened in recent years. In 2023, women earned just 82.7 cents on the dollar. And 10 years after getting an MBA? Women’s earnings drop to just 63% of their male peers. This isn’t about “asking harder.” It’s about finally being heard and being compensated fairly when we are. According to new research from Harvard Business Review, even when more women enter a profession, progress stalls after what they call the tipping point, when women make up more than 14% of a job category.  Early on, adding more women shrinks the wage gap fast. But after that point? Companies slow their efforts, they assume the problem is solved. That’s what researchers call the false summit, when it looks like we’ve reached equity, but in reality, we still have a long way to climb. I’ve seen this play out firsthand. A friend of mine recently walked away from 2 months of unpaid work. Why? Because she trusted a client who was also a friend. No contract. No payment. Just a handshake and good faith. She delivered. They didn’t. As women, we’ve been taught to lead with compassion, connection, and trust. But too often, that trust gets used against us. And when we do ask, set boundaries, or push back, we’re labeled “difficult.” It’s exhausting. So here’s what I know to be true: 💜 You can be kind and still require a contract.  💜 You can lead with heart and still protect your time, energy, and worth.  💜 You don’t need to toughen up. You need to stand your ground and expect others to respect it. We don’t need to fix the women, we need to fix the system. This isn’t about gender wars. It’s about human first leadership, transparency, and refusing to settle for performative equity. Women are doing the work. It’s time the rest of the world caught up. #GenderPayGap #Leadership #WomenInBusiness #PayEquity #CareerAdvice

👩🏽⚕️ 𝗪𝗼𝗺𝗲𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝗕𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀: 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 ⬇ I used to work with a legal team who did many corporate M&A deals. Over time, they shared how some senior male clients were extremely difficult. These clients would send furious emails, swear, issue threats, assert their dominance & call at all hours. The law firm took pride in their male clients with big egos & deep pockets. One day, I raised concerns about poor quality work done by one of the legal team. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗶𝗿𝗼𝗻𝘆? When I raised these concerns, instead of discussing the quality of the work, the partner told me: “I don’t like your aggressive emails.” So, men could swear and throw tantrums, but my straightforward feedback was deemed offensive 🤔 𝗜 𝗳𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝘁𝗼 𝘀𝗮𝘆 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘁. The same team that rolled out the red carpet for rude, aggressive male clients scolded me for calling out subpar service. My stern but respectful emails were seen as offensive - no swearing, no name-calling - just standing up for myself. Channelling my inner Cindy Gallop I said, “We clearly don’t understand each other here. I’m firing your firm & will seek legal advice elsewhere.” My colleague who had joined the call said it was obvious none of the lawyers were expecting this response. They had expected me to politely acquiesce. 𝗦𝗼 𝘄𝗵𝘆 𝗮𝗺 𝗜 𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆? For younger women who might be facing similar situations for the first time. My advice: ➡ Stand your ground & stand in your own power. ➡ Never accept unfair treatment. If someone isn’t going to treat a man like this, they shouldn’t treat you like this. ➡ Don’t apologise for setting standards & sticking to them. ➡ Vote with your wallet. Money talks & I took my (very large) cheque book elsewhere. ➡ Know your worth: remember, people will treat you how you let them. My new legal team has several female juniors & female partners. The male partners at the new firm are allies who respect women leaders. 𝗜𝘁 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗱𝗶𝗳𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲. -- ♻ Re-share if this resonated with you. 👩🏽⚕️ Follow me Dr Fiona Pathiraja-Møller for more. #WomeninBusiness #WomenLeaders #FemaleInvestor

Being told you’re “easy to work with” is the worst compliment you could receive. Here’s why: Nine times out of ten, that “compliment” isn’t about your skills or leadership potential. It’s about your ability to shrink so that everyone else can be comfortable. How smoothly you silence your preferences, your truth, your self. How quietly you take on extra work and stay in line (whatever that means). If you're not careful, you'll mistake it for a badge of honor when in reality it's a receipt & proof that you've been paying the likability tax. The likability tax is the unspoken toll women—especially Black women and women of color—pay to be seen as non-threatening, agreeable, and palatable in the workplace. It’s the cost of downplaying your voice and muting your truth in exchange for being “liked.” And it’s expensive. It’s when you smile and nod, even when you disagree. It’s when you say “I’m good either way” when you're actually not. It’s when you edit the deck, run the meeting, take the notes, follow up, and still don't ask for credit because somewhere deep down, you've learned that being liked is safer than being loud. And don’t get it twisted—this isn’t about being a team player. This is about self-erasure dressed up as professionalism. Because we know on some teams, when a woman has a strong opinion, a clear boundary, or ambitious ask she's labeled. Either she's too much, too difficult, too assertive, too entitled, too ______. So instead of speaking up, she's always agreeable, pleasant, and quiet - trading her voice for job security. And what does she get in return? Praise but no promotion. Thanks but no pay increase. Titled "low maintenance" and applauded for her invisible labor. This is how women, especially Black women and women of color—get underpaid, underestimated, and overlooked while being told how “nice” they are to work with. But let’s be clear: Nice doesn’t build equity. Agreeable doesn’t close pay gaps. Being “easy” to work with won’t get you in the rooms where decisions are made. It just ensures you won’t be seen as a threat. So no, you're not thriving sis. You're surviving. And you're tired of downplaying your contributions so that others feel comfortable. Tired of working twice as hard and getting half the credit. Tired of claiming it's “teamwork” when it’s really just a masterclass in self-sacrifice. When you're as good as you are, certain people benefit from you being quiet than they do from you speaking up. You don't need to be easier to work with. They need to be better at working with women like you. The next time someone says, “You’re so easy to work with,” ask yourself why. You just may be paying the likability tax. — Found this valuable? Make sure to ♻️ repost because friends don’t let friends miss out on helpful content! Want to work with us? Book your Fulfilled Career Clarity Call here - isimemen.com/start

I sat in a talent review inside a global company. A room where promotions were discussed. High-potential lists made. And this is what I heard: “She won’t want that much responsibility” “She doesn’t want to move to a new geography” “She just had a baby, so we shouldn’t ask her” “She’s thinking about a family, so let’s not invest in her” “She’s pretty quiet. I don’t know if she could handle that big role.” This wasn’t 1995. This was recent. Let’s be clear— These comments need to be stopped in their tracks. No one should be making career decisions about others based on assumptions. Not about geography. Not about ambition. Not about motherhood. Not about personality. Bias doesn’t always show up loud and obvious. It hides behind “concern.” Behind “gut instinct.” Behind “She probably wouldn’t want that.” It’s still bias. And it still costs women their careers. If you’re in the room, speak up. Even when it’s uncomfortable. Especially when it’s uncomfortable. Because silence is complicity. And we’re done with that.

Too often, business advice—especially from successful men—doesn't account for the unequal division of labor at home or the fact that women often shoulder the bulk of childcare. I was reminded of this while listening to a podcast interview with Casey Neistat (on Diary of a CEO). His story of grinding it out, taking risks, and persevering is inspiring, but I kept asking myself: Where’s his kid? He talks about sleeping on couches, living in halfway houses, and staying out late, all things that aren’t possible when you're responsible for a two-year-old. The reality is, his child was probably with his mom—doing most of the caregiving and covering the day-to-day. That’s a piece of the success story that’s often left out. When men share their journey, the invisible labor done by the women in their lives often goes unmentioned. It’s a reminder that we can’t take business advice at face value, especially when it doesn’t reflect the realities of caregiving, unpaid labor, and the societal expectations placed on women. If Casey’s child’s mom had done what he did, would she be held up as a success? Or would she be criticized for “putting her career before her kid?” This difference in perception is exactly why advice that doesn't address these imbalances falls flat for women. #workingmom #invisiblelabor #successstories