Women at Work
137 episodes - English - Latest episode: 29 days ago - ★★★★★ - 1.3K ratingsWomen face gender discrimination throughout our careers. It doesn't have to derail our ambitions — but how do we prepare to deal with it? There's no workplace orientation session about narrowing the wage gap, standing up to interrupting male colleagues, or taking on many other issues we encounter at work. So HBR staffers Amy Bernstein, Amy Gallo, and Emily Caulfield are untangling some of the knottiest problems. They interview experts on gender, tell stories about their own experiences, and give lots of practical advice to help you succeed in spite of the obstacles.
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Episodes
The Essentials: Handling Fierce Criticism
March 25, 2024 19:00 - 35 minutes - 34.9 MBIf you’re in a leadership role, or any role where you are outspoken and visible, chances are that at some point people are going to criticize you, sometimes fiercely, sometimes publicly. Are you ready for that? Two women who’ve felt the heat because of decisions they’ve made or arguments they’ve put forward—or simply because of who they are—reflect on the ways they’ve steeled themselves and dealt with the fallout. Listening to them recount how they responded to fierce criticism will hopefully...
The Essentials: Setting and Maintaining Boundaries
March 18, 2024 18:43 - 41 minutes - 40.6 MBWe all need to set boundaries, even in the most structured jobs, because work has its way of encroaching on the rest of our life. Ashley, a senior analyst for the federal government, recently shifted to a schedule that helps her do her most important work and have some alone time before her family gets home. Now she’s trying to figure out how to further minimize interruptions, deal with slow and busy stretches, and get out of unproductive meetings. Amy G and executive coach Melody Wilding ta...
The Essentials: Building and Repairing Trust
March 11, 2024 18:30 - 46 minutes - 45 MBTrust smooths the way for collaboration, conflict resolution, and influencing. But how do you build this asset? And how do you repair it when you’ve missed a series of important deadlines or otherwise messed up? Organizational psychologist Ruchi Sinha talks with a listener who’s struggling to restore skeptics’ confidence in her and her team. Ruchi shares the three elements of trust and how to convey each one. She also offers advice on what to do if you’ve failed to acknowledge a broken promis...
The Essentials: Executive Presence
March 04, 2024 15:35 - 43 minutes - 42.2 MBExecutive presence is a mix of gravitas, communication skills, and appearance. But what does that look and sound like in practice? To help a fully remote insurance underwriter think through ways she can act like a leader, we bring in a role model of hers and an expert in strategic communication.
Sexism Is Everywhere
December 04, 2023 19:50 - 47 minutes - 45.9 MBIs there any way to know for sure whether something that someone did—or neglected to do—is rooted in sexism? When is confronting that person worth it? And if you’ll never know what drove their actions, how do you make peace with the uncertainty? Amy G talks through these questions with two professors who study perceptions and gender stereotypes.
Is Entrepreneurship Right for Me? (from New Here)
November 30, 2023 13:20 - 43 minutes - 40.2 MBIt’s a question that so many of us are grappling with. Should I quit corporate life and pursue my passion project? Today in this episode from our colleagues at New Here—HBR's podcast for young professionals—we’ll help you think through the possibilities and trade-offs, as we learn from one woman’s experiences leaving corporate life to build her own business. You’ll learn which of her fears were warranted, how she battled loneliness, managed her money, and whether or not she is actually happie...
Ever Consider Joining a Board?
November 27, 2023 20:48 - 47 minutes - 45.7 MBEight women who’ve been on boards share how they landed a seat, gained confidence in the role, and found unexpected personal and professional benefits in the work. We hope their perspectives and advice will encourage you to consider trying it yourself some day. Ellen Zane, who runs a Harvard workshop for women interested in board work, gives further insight based on her deep experience as a director for nonprofits and private and public companies.
Ask the Amys
November 20, 2023 18:56 - 35 minutes - 34.4 MBWhat if one of your first assignments at a new job was to fire people? What should you do if the person leading a project you’re on isn’t giving clear direction, demands that you work nights and weekends, bristles at your feedback—and leadership tells you to fall in line? These are two of the five situations that Amy B and Amy G talk through in this episode. They offer advice to the women who wrote in with their questions, with the hope that it will help them and anyone who’s been in a simila...
So Many Feelings. Too Many?
November 13, 2023 15:30 - 58 minutes - 54.2 MBLiz Fosslien believes “the future of work is emotional.” The Amys revisit our 2020 conversation with her and fellow organizational consultant Mollie West Duffy about the good that can come from being vulnerable with colleagues, and Fosslien returns to reassess where the line between vulnerability and oversharing is today.
Should I Change My Last Name?
November 06, 2023 18:42 - 46 minutes - 45.3 MBIf you plan to get married, do you see yourself keeping or changing your last name? How much, if at all, does your career factor into that decision? Our associate producer, who’s engaged, spoke with three recently married women about the professional considerations that factored into their decisions. Hannah and the Amys then join former co-host Nicole Torres to discuss how their names are connected to their personal brands.
ADHD Is Different for Women
October 30, 2023 21:24 - 57 minutes - 54.9 MBTwo women who have ADHD—one’s a psychologist and the other a life coach—describe what the disorder is and how it messes with the brain’s executive functions, like inhibition and emotional regulation. They give advice for managing the symptoms, asking for help at work, and what to do if what we’re talking about sounds an awful lot like your life.
Navigating Your Career When You Have a Disability
October 23, 2023 18:34 - 50 minutes - 48.1 MBMeredith Koch and Nicole Bettè are engineers who’ve bonded over conversations about their apparent and non-apparent disabilities. They recount how at different moments in their careers they’ve gotten the understanding and assistive technology necessary to do their jobs—and when they haven’t, all with the hope that you’ll be able to better advocate for yourself and your colleagues.
Let’s Talk About Our Failures
October 16, 2023 19:14 - 43 minutes - 42.3 MBThe Amys and their former co-host Sarah Green Carmichael revisit times they majorly messed up, in hopes that you’ll feel better about your experiences with failure. We’re not talking about honest mistakes with simple solutions; we’re talking about larger problems that were difficult and costly to correct. They share what happened, how they recovered, and what they learned.
October 16, the Amys Are Back
October 09, 2023 17:30 - 6 minutes - 5.99 MBIn this ninth season of the show, these are some of the big questions they’ll explore: How do you recover from a failure? What’s it really like to serve on a board? Do our careers influence the decision to keep or change our last name? How does going through a divorce affect us at work? If we have a disability, how can we get the understanding and assistive technology we need to do our job? Amy G and Amy B will talk with women who’ve been there, bringing in advice, stories, and expertise.
Women Who Are Making Work Better for Women
July 17, 2023 21:58 - 35 minutes - 34.5 MBWhen you see potential for your company to improve in some way—whether it’s to overhaul an outdated policy, round out benefits, or to make jobs more workable, how can you instigate change? Three women who saw that potential and carried it through describe what they did at their companies, the results so far, and how you can follow their lead.
Communicating Effectively When You’re Running on Empty
July 03, 2023 13:00 - 34 minutes - 32 MBLeadership development coach Muriel Wilkins talks us through communication techniques that meet you where you’re at mentally and emotionally so that you can rise to the moment (even when you’re worried you can’t).
How to Manage: Finding Yourself Again
June 26, 2023 18:54 - 39 minutes - 36.8 MBWho are you now, who do you want to be, and how can you stretch without taking on too much? Jen Dary regularly coaches first-time managers on these questions. She shares advice for finding yourself anew at work, dealing with disillusionment, and setting priorities and boundaries. Then, a former guest who’s one year into leading a major project tells us about her aha moments. Finally, Kelsey answers the question of whether or not she’s ready to try management again.
How to Manage: Negotiating for Your Team
June 19, 2023 14:02 - 28 minutes - 27.1 MBWhen you manage people, they ask you for things: to extend a deadline, to make an exception, to give them a raise or more resources. Maybe they don’t even have to ask; you notice the need and start thinking about how to meet it. Negotiations professor Martha Jeong explains the mindset, framing, timing, and tone that’ll position you to get the most mutually beneficial solution.
How to Manage: Conflict
June 12, 2023 20:47 - 40 minutes - 37.3 MBPeople management consists of a fair amount of mediation and diplomacy, and you can’t expect to get the hang of it right away. You’re in the middle of a lot now, and holding tension and resolving disagreements takes planning, practice, and restraint. Amy G teaches us about different types of conflict, natural tendencies, and options for responding.
How to Manage: Being Taken Seriously
June 05, 2023 21:10 - 37 minutes - 35.1 MBIf you’re a woman who’s a new manager, people will probably push back on your authority. As difficult as defiance is to face—especially when you’re settling in yourself—we have ideas for making it clear that you’re in charge. McKinsey’s Lareina Yee recounts the actions that senior leaders took that affirmed her position. Kelsey reflects on the disrespect she felt as a first-time manager, as well as her discomfort with power, and Amy B helps her make sense of those experiences and feelings. If...
Coming in June: How to Manage
May 04, 2023 14:29 - 4 minutes - 4.07 MBAre you a new manager? You may have some—er, a lot—of questions. How do you gain your employees’ trust and respect? How should you handle the inevitable conflicts that come up? And how much power do you actually have, and how do you use it for good? In this special series, we’ll address these questions and many others—including any you send our way.
Attend Women at Work Live April 27
April 13, 2023 15:20 - 2 minutes - 2.24 MBWe’ve planned a half-day of learning, guidance, and inspiration—all virtual. Here’s the session lineup, hour by hour: 1) Communicating effectively when you’re running on empty, 2) Lessons from women making work better for women, 3) The latest gender research and what it means for you, and 4) Ask the Amys. Register here.
The Essentials: Making Sound Decisions
January 30, 2023 18:00 - 40 minutes - 39.9 MBA dentist joins Amy Gallo to ask a behavioral scientist about the fundamentals of sound decision making: when to use a process, how to handle resistance to a call you’ve made, and making peace with a tough call.
The Essentials: Getting the Feedback You Need
January 23, 2023 20:53 - 43 minutes - 42.6 MBWe need actionable, useful feedback to grow and advance professionally. But our guest, an aerospace engineer, hasn’t received any of that for years, and she feels like she’s missing out on information that would clarify her standing at her company and secure her future success there. We bring in Ella Bell, an expert on interpersonal communication and organizational behavior, to offer advice, including suggestions on how to respond to, make sense of, and act on feedback you receive.
The Essentials: Managing Projects
January 16, 2023 14:05 - 35 minutes - 34.3 MBWhat’s a project charter? Why does this one person keep trying to derail our progress? Are our planning meetings effective? How do I actually get people to follow through? Figuring out how to successfully manage a project can make any professional’s head spin. One woman, new to this type of work, shares the challenges she’s already facing, including uncertainty, interpersonal conflict, and lack of responsiveness from the team. And an experienced project manager shares tips for motivating and ...
The Essentials: Playing Office Politics
January 09, 2023 19:04 - 35 minutes - 34.8 MBEveryone at work has their own priorities, concerns, and agendas, and knowing what those are allows us to navigate meetings and projects more deliberately and successfully. Organizational psychologist Madeleine Wyatt explains the interrelated skills that enable us to influence others, in conversation with a transportation planner who’s trying to figure out how to maneuver her way up in an often-exclusionary, male-dominated industry.
Season 8 Highlights — and a Host Reunion!
December 05, 2022 18:02 - 40 minutes - 37.1 MBFormer co-hosts Sarah, Nicole, and Emily reunite with the Amys to talk through the insights and advice that most resonated with them from this season, from how they gained their team’s trust as a first-time manager to how they’re now thinking about retirement. They also share how they’ve been doing since they left the show and HBR.
How to Push for Policy Changes at Your Company
November 21, 2022 17:21 - 53 minutes - 51 MBWant to modernize a program or enact a policy that would benefit women in your workplace, but don’t know where to begin? Learn how to build a grassroots initiative, no matter your job title. Two experts in systemic, organizational change explain the many different roles critical to sustaining a movement. They also share tried-and-true ways to keep everyone invested in the cause, aligned, and on track.
Working While Managing Your Child’s Mental Health
November 14, 2022 21:24 - 41 minutes - 40.4 MBTending to a child’s mental health challenge is a critical job that deserves support from employers. Many parents, however, aren’t getting the understanding, flexibility, and paid time off they need. What can we do to make work more manageable for parents struggling to keep their children safe and well while trying to keep up at work? The executive director of a children’s mental health advocacy group shares ideas and advice.
When Your Partner Isn’t Giving You the Support You Need
November 07, 2022 17:55 - 48 minutes - 46.2 MBThe people we love have a great influence on our professional success. But when’s the last time you and your partner checked in about each other’s priorities and needs? Jennifer Petriglieri, an expert on dual-career couples, advises one woman on how to get out of the relationship traps she and her husband have fallen into as the parents of young children, and offers practical tips for how she can have more productive conversations with her partner to realize her career ambitions.
Respect for Any Body Size
October 31, 2022 20:38 - 43 minutes - 41.3 MBTwo women who have studied weight bias at work help us understand the ways larger-bodied employees are stigmatized, as well as our role in reducing the stigma and creating a positive body culture.
Have You Started Thinking About Retirement?
October 24, 2022 23:17 - 51 minutes - 48.4 MBOnce you’re ready to retire, you’ll need a plan for how to spend your time. And once your job title is gone, you’ll need to figure out who you are now, not to mention what brings you joy. Finding purpose and a new identity are key to living a healthy, happy post-work life. Women who have very recently retired describe what they’ve been up to (it sounds rewarding!), as well as the unexpected emotions that the transition has brought up. They also reflect on the questions they asked themselves (...
The Ups and Downs of Being a First-Time Manager
October 17, 2022 19:46 - 45 minutes - 43.3 MBWhen managing other people for the first time, what should we expect, and how can we prepare? Three new managers describe their growing pains, reflect on what they find most rewarding, and talk through their latest challenges — with an assist from Amy B’s managerial wisdom. You’ll come away with a better idea of what becoming a boss means and confident that you can do it too.
Getting Along (Live in Boston)
October 10, 2022 20:27 - 46 minutes - 42.6 MBTo cap off our Getting Along series, Amy Gallo shares advice, in front of a live audience, on how to deal with all different types of “difficult” coworkers — from the tormentor to the know-it-all.
Getting Along with an Insecure, Know-It-All Pessimist
October 03, 2022 14:00 - 34 minutes - 33.9 MBHow do you bring about positive change — or just keep a workplace functional — when the person in charge won’t listen? Amy Gallo recommends tactics to try and phrases to use.
Getting Along with a Biased Tormentor
September 26, 2022 14:00 - 36 minutes - 35.1 MBHow do you interact with a senior person who should be mentoring you but is instead giving you every reason not to trust them? Amy G recommends tactics to try and phrases to use.
Getting Along with a Political Operator
September 19, 2022 14:00 - 42 minutes - 41.2 MBHow do you stay in the loop when someone keeps kicking you out? Amy G recommends tactics to try and phrases to use.
Getting Along with a Passive-Aggressive Gossip
September 12, 2022 16:59 - 33 minutes - 31.2 MBHow do you work with someone who’s encroaching on your job, bad-mouthing you, and refusing to acknowledge there’s any tension or problem? Amy G recommends tactics to try and phrases to use.
Introducing Getting Along
September 05, 2022 14:00 - 2 minutes - 2.2 MBNo one should have to put up with rude, unprofessional, or hostile behavior from a colleague. You can counteract and even preempt it by using certain tactics and phrases. Amy Gallo will teach you which ones, plus how and when to deploy them, through coaching sessions with real women dealing with different types of difficult people.
Emily’s Taking a Break from Nine-to-Five
June 01, 2022 17:25 - 8 minutes - 8.01 MBOur free-spirited, entrepreneurial co-host is applying advice from all our episodes on side gigs, freelancing, starting a small business — and quitting — to her own life. Emily reflects on her decision to leave her design job at HBR to fully focus on a long-time creative passion, as well as how she's thinking about her career going forward.
When a Relationship with a Colleague Goes Sour
May 16, 2022 21:59 - 34 minutes - 31.5 MBHow do you address a falling-out with a teammate when they either won’t acknowledge you or just lash out? Amy Gallo brings her conflict management expertise to a coaching session for a woman whose project manager and former work friend went from helpful to hostile. The approaches that come out of the conversation are ones that anyone facing tension in a work relationship can use to find a way forward.
The Essentials: Delegating Effectively
April 25, 2022 19:29 - 45 minutes - 42.2 MBLet’s be real: You can’t do everything yourself. Delegating to others helps you manage your workload and helps your colleagues who take on the tasks, decisions, and responsibilities to learn and grow. That doesn’t mean it’s always easy to do though. A leadership coach shares practices that will ensure the work gets done and will leave you and the person you delegated to feeling good about the experience.
The Essentials: Managing Up
April 18, 2022 17:43 - 40 minutes - 37.8 MBHaving a healthy, mutually beneficial relationship with your boss doesn’t require accommodating their every quirk, demand, and weakness. We discuss respectful, constructive ways to meet in the middle, set boundaries, and help them achieve their goals while making your competence known.
The Essentials: Persuading People
April 11, 2022 20:27 - 32 minutes - 32.2 MBWe all need to sell others on our ideas and offerings. Oftentimes that requires planning, perspective taking, and patience. A social psychologist highlights principles and tactics that’ll help you preempt colleagues or clients from doubting your expertise and get them to start or stop doing something.
The Essentials: Retaining Talent
April 04, 2022 21:54 - 35 minutes - 34.7 MBAdvice from a manager at Google whose full-time job is finding solutions to the problems that make employees want to quit. She shares what to say and do when a valuable team member seems to have one foot out the door. We also discuss the types of proactive conversations about career paths and compensation that managers should have with their people to keep them from being poached.
Stacey Abrams and Lara Hodgson on Starting and Scaling a Small Business
February 21, 2022 14:00 - 40 minutes - 37.7 MBEntrepreneurs Stacey Abrams and Lara Hodgson share hard-won lessons from starting and running three companies together. They reflect on what makes their long-term partnership work and how they manage self-doubt and guilt. They also give tips for networking, hiring and retaining employees, learning the ins and outs of finance, and developing an exit strategy.
Forging Ahead — or Plowing Through
December 16, 2021 21:14 - 46 minutes - 44.1 MBA satisfying career requires that we make thoughtful decisions, through self-reflection and strategic planning. But sometimes (like in 2021) plowing through our jobs day after day is the only thing that feels manageable. A reunion with three guests starts a conversation about the tension between wanting to fulfill our potential and needing to conserve what’s left of our energy.
Keep the Challenges of Freelancing in Check
December 06, 2021 18:02 - 34 minutes - 33 MBWhat are the psychological and social skills freelancers need to achieve the self-made career they envisioned? Two researchers break down the common existential and interpersonal challenges that come with working in the gig economy. They share routines and practices that help independent workers keep themselves motivated, productive, and developing professionally.
What’s Changed About How We Show Up at Work
November 29, 2021 21:18 - 25 minutes - 24.5 MBWhich feelings (and shoes) are work-appropriate these days? An expert on authenticity joins us to share impressions of how professional behavior and dress are changing, plus advice for deciding how transparent and comfortable to be.
Becoming a Leader When Everything Is Shifting
November 22, 2021 19:54 - 40 minutes - 37.8 MBHow can you be seen as a leader, especially when you’re not even “seeing” the people you work with? We revisit an interview with two leadership development experts — essential listening for any woman who’s ready to step up — and share an update on how their advice applies in the context of remote and hybrid work.