Linda Babcock

Sara Laschever

When Linda Babcock asked why so many male graduate students were teaching their own courses and most female students were assigned as assistants, her dean said: "More men ask. The women just don't ask." It turns out that whether they want higher salaries or more help at home, women often find it hard to ask. Sometimes they don't know that change is possible--they don't know that they can ask. Sometimes they fear that asking may damage a relationship. And sometimes they don't ask because they've learned that society can react badly to women asserting their own needs and desires. By looking at the barriers holding women back and the social forces constraining them, Women Don't Ask shows women how to reframe their interactions and more accurately evaluate their opportunities. It teaches them how to ask for what they want in ways that feel comfortable and possible, taking into account the impact of asking on their relationships. And it teaches all of us how to recognize the ways in which our institutions, child-rearing practices, and unspoken assumptions perpetuate inequalities--inequalities that are not only fundamentally unfair but also inefficient and economically unsound. With women's progress toward full economic and social equality stalled, women's lives becoming increasingly complex, and the structures of businesses changing, the ability to negotiate is no longer a luxury but a necessity. Drawing on research in psychology, sociology, economics, and organizational behavior as well as dozens of interviews with men and women from all walks of life, Women Don't Ask is the first book to identify the dramatic difference between men and women in their propensity to negotiate for what they want. It tells women how to ask, and why they should.

Negotiation and the Gender Divide

Women Don't Ask

Presents an approach to negotiation that explains how women can identify important goals, takes them step by step through the preparation process, and offers strategic advice on the negotiation stage, with tips on confidence-building techniques.

How Women Can Use the Power of Negotiation to Get what They Really Want

Ask for it

Brenda Peyser

Lise Vesterlund

Laurie Weingart

A practical, timely guide for bringing gender equity to the workplace: unburden women’s careers from work that goes unrewarded. The No Club started when four women, crushed by endless to-do lists, banded together over $10 bottles of wine to get their work lives under control. Running faster than ever, they still trailed behind their male colleagues. And so, they vowed to say no to requests that pulled them away from the work that mattered most to their careers. This book reveals how their over-a-decade-long journey and subsequent groundbreaking research uncovered that women everywhere are unfairly burdened with “non-promotable work,” a tremendous problem we can—and must—solve. All organizations have work that no one wants to do: planning the office party, screening interns, attending to that time-consuming client, or simply helping others with their work. From office housework to important assignments that inevitably go unrewarded, a woman, most often, takes on these tasks. In study upon study, professors Linda Babcock (bestselling author of Women Don’t Ask), Brenda Peyser, Lise Vesterlund, and Laurie Weingart—the original “No Club”—document that women are disproportionately asked and expected to do this kind of work. This imbalance leaves women overcommitted and underutilized as companies forfeit revenue, productivity, and top talent. But it doesn’t have to be this way. The No Club walks you through how to make small, yet significant, changes to your own workload and empowers women to make savvy decisions about the work they take on. At the same time, the authors illuminate how lasting change calls for organizations to reassess how they assign and reward work to level the playing field. With hard data, personal anecdotes from women of all stripes, self- and workplace-assessments for immediate use, and innovative advice from the authors’ consulting Fortune 500 companies, this book will forever change the conversation about how we advance women’s careers and achieve equity in the 21st century.

Putting a Stop to Women's Dead-End Work

The No Club

Laurie R. Weingart

A practical guide for bringing gender equality to the workplace with a new imperative: unburden women's careers from work that goes unrewarded. THE NO CLUB started when four women who were crushed by endless to-do lists banded together over $10 bottles of wine and vowed to get their work lives under control. Running faster than ever, they nevertheless trailed behind their male colleagues. And so, they vowed to say no to requests that pulled them away from the work that mattered most to their careers. This book reveals how their over-a-decade-long journey and groundbreaking research uncovered that women everywhere are unfairly burdened with "non-promotable work", a tremendous problem we can - and must - solve. All organizations have work that no one wants to do: planning the office party, screening interns, attending to that time-consuming client, or simply helping others with their work. From office housework to important assignments that inevitably go unrewarded, a woman, most often, takes on these tasks. In study upon study, professors Linda Babcock (bestselling author of WHY WOMEN DON'T ASK), Brenda Peyser, Lise Vesterlund, and Laurie Weingart - the original "No Club" - document that women are disproportionately asked and expected to do this kind of work. This imbalance leaves women overcommitted and underutilized as companies forfeit revenue, productivity, and top talent. But it doesn't have to be this way. THE NO CLUB walks you through how to make small, yet important, changes to your own workload and empowers women to make savvy decisions about what they take on. At the same time, the authors illuminate how lasting change calls for organizations to reassess how they assign and reward work to level the playing field. With hard data, personal anecdotes from women of all stripes, practical self- and workplace-assessments, and innovative advice from consulting in Fortune 500 companies, this book will forever change the conversation about how we advance women's careers and achieve equality in the twenty-first century.

Linda Babcock

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