Probably all of us have heard the expression “It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.” This is particularly true in the workplace, where the status is “rigged” against women, according to author Linda Smith.
As one of the top five female litigators in the United States, Smith’s career has been built in part on her unique straightforwardness in the courtroom. When it comes to being direct, Smith doesn’t hold back.
Now, with her new book, “Smashing Glass and Kicking Ass: Lessons from the Meanest Woman Alive,” she makes the case that women in the workplace, as never before, must fight to succeed. To do that, women must learn to lead in new ways, including using language that will get attention. “Every woman is entitled to set her own path for her career, just like men do,” Smith says. “It’s not a privilege; you deserve it.”
Her mission, Smith says, is to empower women in all fields to harness their own unique abilities. Smith shares her unique experiences as well as her perceptions about the need for women to be empowered in the workplace today. “I’ll share with you what I’ve learned about how to succeed—and prove to you that having a pair of ovaries far surpasses ‘growing a pair,’” she writes. How’s that for straightforward?
Tough talk is an important part of the techniques Smith sets forth in her crusade to help women succeed in business. She believes that women in today’s marketplace are stalled in their potential career advancement. Only 6.4 percent of the Fortune 500 companies have female CEOs—and that is a new record, she says.
Smith has successfully set her own records. She has led teams of lawyers against international antitrust cases, including leading a team of lawyers that beat Intel in a multibillion-dollar global case. She defended Exxon in a case that falsely questioned the company’s Alaskan cleanup efforts. For her efforts, she has been called the “Meanest Woman Alive, Bitch and Bad Ass,” she writes. “I’m all of them,” she says. “My enemies run for cover when they hear my high heels coming their way, but my friends have no better ally.”
The reason for this book about her experience is to show that she didn’t become successful despite being a woman. Instead, she became successful because of it.
The author synthesizes her experiences into five guidelines:
• A clear understanding of women’s emotional intelligence.
• An “eyes wide open” discussion of the need to slay two demons. First, the external demon of traditional gender stereotyping. Second, the demon that lives inside us, holding on to those stereotypes.
• How to augment the best female traits with the best male ones.
• Proven techniques for dealing with specific challenges.
• How to lead as a woman, in an enlightened way.
Only during the past 10 years have many of the ideas that limited women in the workplace started to change. Smith attributes much of this to emotional intelligence and the realization that promoting women to senior positions makes companies more money.
Smith points out that women generally rate higher than men in 11 out of 12 of the Emotional Intelligence matrices. These are not simply “soft” skills; they include taking initiative and getting results.
The ability for women to tap into Emotional Intelligence makes them akin to “superpowers,” although Smith hesitates to use this term, as it fails to capture the combination of women’s superior assets and the ability to use them. “Kick-assets,” as she call them, are the true superpowers of women, she says.
It is rare to find a woman in business who has not been confronted on two fronts: the putative topic and the right to speak. Smith uses the terms “manterruptions” and “mansplaining” to describe how women are often confronted. She gives examples of such interactions taking place recently in the U.S. Senate. Smith also draws on high-level cases she has litigated. She has, for example, “called out” Michael Dell and points out “speaking truth to power is showing courage.” Later, another lawyer said to her, “No one has ever talked to Michael that way.”
There is still a power imbalance between male bosses and female subordinates, Smith says.
“We live in a society where men still dominate and control the workplace,” Smith says.
Progress isn’t always tidy; often it’s messy. Still, Smith doesn’t mince words in encouraging each of us to build skills to take on the challenges. She gives hard-core advice on how to improve what’s wrong with business and how you can troubleshoot those problems for permanent change.