To think ambitious women are more sharp elbowed than ambitious men?

[ambravale]

I’ve been to various careets events and assessment days. I’ve noticed that fellow women, especially the most ambitious are the worst at being genuine. I’ve met some horrible, snotty, sharp elbowed women who try so hard to impress whilst you can tell it’s all fake. When you chat to them they’re self centred, bordering rude and dismissive, with an air of arrogance.

Meanwhile, the ambitious men of course don’t hide their light under a bushel, they seem far more genuine and less catty.

Has anyone else noticed this?

No

No

When you chat to them they’re self centred, bordering rude and dismissive, with an air of arrogance

Almost exclusively men in my experience

Women's behaviour is interpreted differently AND they have to be much better than men to progress as much.

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well they appear "less catty" because this is a word exclusively reserved for women - usually used by people who don't like women very much.

In my experience men generally overestimate their abilities and their importance. No one notices it because it is the norm.

This is not my experience of the women climbing the ladder in my institution, they are mostly pretty nice with the odd exception. They are not catty - I can't think of a catty one (the only one I really dislike is very passive aggressive which is much cleverer and hard to detect).The men can be a bit dismissive and tend to favour other men like themselves (white, middle-class, older, went to good schools). This does not ring true to me, but am probably not in same field.

No.

Women are perceived differently. they're also often very aware that they're unlikely to be treated fairly so maybe overcompensating and/or nervous. Also, because the odds are against women, many are very conscious that in a room with 50 men and 50 women, half the men might succeed but at best, you're going to get 5 or so women who do so. So the competition is fierce because first they have to be better than all 50 of the men, then they also have to be better than 45 of the women.

The men, on the other hand, know that really, if only half succeed, they're really only competing with the 49 other men. So they are more relaxed because basically, they only have to be slightly above average...

funny how no-one ever calls men sharp-elbowed.

Research has proven that when men and women act EXACTLY the same, the women are seen as too ambitious, unfriendly, bossy, cold etc. while the men are seen as appropriately ambitious good guys.

It's part of unconscious bias which is well studied. Men and women see women who act the same as men as being unlikeable because unconsciously there is jarring with how we unconsciously think women should be.

I find men are more likely to look over my shoulder to make sure they aren't missing out on networking with someone more important.