I normally don’t get angry on Tuesdays.
Tuesdays are fun days. I like my professor (certain of my friends will probably
say that I like him too much and they’re probably right). I like his class
(even though it’s half psychology and ew psych). He lets us watch How I Met
Your Mother during class time. Dude is awesome. But yesterday was Tuesday. And
yesterday I was angry.
I wouldn’t have been mad if we hadn’t been
talking about social capital and social networks in class. I shouldn’t have been
mad because I saw this conversation coming at the beginning of lecture. You
can’t do a lecture on networking in a business program and not get into “If
Robert knows X, Y, and, Z, he has –this many–opportunities. Would Robby,
Roberta, and Roberto have those same opportunities?” You can’t not do it. If
you can find a way not to do it, you probably shouldn’t be teaching.
Anyway, we’re discussing the politics of
professionalism and that good ol’ Good Ol’ Boy System and workplace
discrimination, and we come to a really complicated diagram that I will spare
you and the example of Robert. Robert has lots of connections inside and
outside of the organization, and will probably get lots of promotions
relatively easily because of it. Would this same model work for Robby, Roberta,
or Roberto?
No, says the text. Most likely not. It’d be a
lot better for Robby (a young man), Roberta (a woman), or Roberto (a minority)
to find a way to be one of Robert’s
(a middle aged white male) multiple connections, and use him as a
mentor/springboard to “lend you credibility.”
Let’s not talk about how I hate that “lend you
credibility” bs. Not right now.
Now my professor, young, cool bro that he is,
asks us as a class, “Who thinks that that’s not true anymore? That young people
and women and minorities don’t have to network differently within organizations
to get ahead?”
And no one raised their hand. I was shocked. My
professor was shocked. Shocked in a pleasant way, but shocked nonetheless.
Everything was good.
Until one lone white guy raised his hand.
My professor, bless him, tried to stem the
carnage because I sit in the front row and if I could feel myself start glaring
I know he could actually see it. “Oh wow,” he says, fumbling for a save. “Okay.
Well, who doesn’t think that?” My
hand shot up. Last I checked, I was young, a woman, and a minority. I’m pretty
sure I know a little more about that kind of thing than him.
“Well, you’re both right, in a way,” says my
professor, still trying to salvage what I think should have been a cut and dry
conversation. He said something else that I don’t quite remember and moved on,
but I couldn’t get back on track for the rest of class. I was angry. And so,
once class was over, I pulled him aside to ask him how the heck we both could
be right.
“Because I’m young,” I said, “and a woman, and
several minorities all rolled up in one little brown package (he laughed at
that part), and it makes me very angry
when some outgroup person or someone who’s not a combination of those things
tells me I don’t have to work that hard.”
And we talked about it. It’s not often I get a
chance to explain my frustrations to an out-group person and they understand, or if they don’t understand they’re quiet and
listen. It wasn’t a particularly enlightening conversation (not for me,
anyway), but it helped. He told me that he was glad I came to talk to him about
it, because it lets him know that that portion of lecture is still relevant. I
told him that I was glad he included it, because like I said earlier, if you
can find a way to not include that in
your subject matter you shouldn’t be teaching. He agreed, and then we talked
about how it’s never mentioned in textbooks. He apologized again; “I’m sorry
this is still relevant,” and asked if anything he said made me feel better.
"A little," I admitted.
He laughed a little. "But not enough to un-vex you?"
"Definitely not enough to completely un-vex me."
Then I told him to have a happy Thanksgiving and
was off.
I’m still not happy about the dismal prospects
of my career—and yes, I do consider that particular bit of strategic advice to
be dismal. Who would be glad about constantly being told to fix themselves to
an older, successful, preferably white male mentor to get ahead? Don’t people
realize that that brings up its own unique set of challenges? I’d be his
side-project, his affirmative action baby, his mistress (don’t scoff; I’ve heard those allegations before). It's not that simple.
But I’m not about to ignore what I’m given to
use either.
