AIBU to be disappointed that a man made this assumption?

[Soullesstrader]

I work on a freelance basis in an industry that is generally forward thinking and innovative, but still largely male dominated at the senior level. I am at a senior level myself.

Today I was talking to a man at work - similar age, similar experience (I know his, he doesn't know mine), similar level. We were discussing what my next role might be and he started talking to me about how to find roles at a much more junior level - we're talking about jobs paying half my salary and requiring a quarter of my experience.

I can only assume that based on my gender and the fact I'm a single mother (he does know this about me as I told him) he had assumed he was far more senior than me.

AIBU to be shocked and really disappointed?

And no, I didn't say anything. I just smiled politely in the knowledge he will soon discover his mistake.

I am in love with this 16 year old and her response to being told to, "make a Sandwich".

She did, but she skied to the South Pole, took a picture and said,"Tonight (it never gets dark this time of year) I skied back to the Pole again... to take this photo for all those men who commented “Make me a sandwich” on my TEDX Talk. I made you a sandwich (ham & cheese), now ski 37 days and 600km to the South Pole and you can eat it xx "

womenintheworld.com/2018/01/24/record-setting-polar-explorer-16-hits-back-at-men-who-said-she-belonged-in-the-kitchen/

Sunday I smiled in the absence of a suitable come back, but knowing he would find out eventually. It wasn't completely PA!

Shasta your points aren't really relevant to my OP but the problem is why women aren't being promoted. Who are the decision makers and what do they base their decision on? There are more women than men at lower levels but somehow they aren't getting into more senior roles. Is it really that they aren't as good as the men?

Name change fail!

Well if you were 'caught offguard" then that's good in a way as it shows it hasn't happened that often. Now go and show him the error of his ways! Why was he trying to be helpful!? How come he felt the need to talk about your next project?

There are more women than men at lower levels but somehow they aren't getting into more senior roles

I am sure that's an incredibly complex answer with lots of reasons / causes / attitudes.

Hours
Expectations of work / life balance
Childcare
Confidence in applying
Not being taken seriously for senior role
Not being given opportunities
Partner working in an industry that expects full time work and is not family friendly.
Plus many other reasons.

Just a side point- there is a bit of snobbery in the tone of this thread about more junior roles. Many people seem to be horrified that they might be mistaken for a lowly receptionist or secretary. The people who do these jobs have feelings too and have pride in their role - and the businesses couldn't function without them. I've come across people in senior roles who treat everyone in the company with equal respect regardless of their role but I've also come across those who see secretaries etc as a bit beneath them. I do get the point about sexism but I don't like the snobbery.

The general negativity towards other women that comes out of a number of posts in this thread is quite shocking. As PP said, there’s a lot of internalised misogyny.

I work for a company that has quite a bit of sexism to battle through. It’s often assumed that I am more junior than a male counterpart (I’m the most senior and highly paid person on my project). It was also assumed that as I was fairly ambitious, that I didn’t want kids and I used to get hurtful comments about it that I’d have to brush off.

Since getting pregnant, I’ve been treated as irrelevant by more than one person (male and female) in that several people who frequently contacted me will no longer consult me for my professional opinion. More recently, several people have gone over my head to discuss an issue with someone else even when I working on the matter at hand. It’s been a real eye-opener.

It is utterly disappointing but a fact that sexism still pervades the workplace and the attitudes of many men (and women).

I work in an industry which is neither forward thinking nor innovative and I get this all the fucking time. I am in a senior client facing role and there is a certain type of middle aged man who will not believe a single word I say about anything technical, and who will regularly assume that any one of my male junior colleagues who they have spoken to over the phone is in fact my boss.

It is partly a result of my age but it is also absolutely about sexism. Of the support staff who interact with my clients I am only ever assumed to be junior to the men. It is absolutely soul destroying.

Then it gets worse when one of those colleagues has got drawn into a conversation with said clients and unknowingly told them something that's incorrect, because some of these people just feel more comfortable believing a man who's been in my industry for all of 5 minutes over a woman with nearly a decade of experience. I end up souring the relationship by explaining to them very patiently that they've got the wrong end of the stick. By the end of all that I don't get the business because they've also been talking to one of my very affable male competitors who makes them feel comfortable and who doing business with doesn't require any reevaluation of how they see the world.

Of course the whole thing turns into an endless circle of sexism and underrepresentation. Because there are almost no women doing my job, those of us who get into it have to work twice as hard for worse results, and so we leave or are pushed out, so there continue to be no women doing this job. And then occasionally someone pops up and says "oh, well we'd love to hire a woman but there just aren't any with the experience at this level."

I hope I don't sound snobby. I've worked my way through junior roles, right from the bottom. There's nothing wrong with being in those jobs, but I worked hard to progress.

I don't want to sound like I have a chip on my shoulder but I have seen countless men (and a couple of women) whose teams have complained about their work progress to the top with the advantage of the right accent, right kind of school/background and strong network behind them. I have known some men who don't fit that profile struggle too. It's not alway about gender but in this instance I'm sure it was.

What I find sad is that some posters refuse to accept that not all work places are prejudiced and not all women will be victims of sexism. I know a few women who have bypassed other men without any issue and have never felt that being a woman and a mother was bringing them down. Sometimes a comment is just that, a comment without any insult intending.

You can't make it sound like every women is discriminated in senior roles in this country, it's just not true. Some companies truly couldn't care less of the gender.

I don't think posters are suggesting all work places are sexist though Shasta but evidence shows that it is often an issue.

I also don't think the man I was speaking to meant to insult me at all. But he made comments based on an assumption about me that I feel was based on me being female and a mother.

What I find sad is Shasta's continual derail attempts.

Do you have a regional accent OP?

In my own experience I am judged on that rather a lot too.

Im a hotel general manager for a large brand in my 30's - ive been mistaken for a receptionist countless times.

Challenging this behaviour is dependant on the situation. For a guest i would be calm and maybe laught it off. For a hotel contractor whose completed shoddy work I have rained down hellfire.

Fox I don't have a really strong accent. I'm definitely not tall though and without derailing my own thread would welcome the thoughts of others on what impact height has on people's perceptions of you.

PramWanker
Do you expect me to be sorry because my posts don't fit in with your line of thoughts and I don't agree with you?

At Uni, I worked for a Barrister who was at the very top of the game, Head of Chambers, International Arbitrator - you name any high status, high profile, highly paid legal thing and he probably did it . He would make tea for me. I simply did his typing for him - very part time around my Uni lectures, I had no status at all. If he could treat me with respect, then any man in any role can treat any woman in any role with respect.

And, yet, that's not what happens.

Not all at Shasta, I don't expect you to do anything other than continue with your increasingly pathetic derail attempts. It's been clear for several posts now what your game is.

Slightly different circumstances but you might be interested in this thread:

Anna Isaac
@Annaisaac
When a man on the train expresses surprise that a ‘young lady’ is reading the business section of the Telegraph and the FT. He starts explaining that Davos happens every year. What CBI and ECB stands for. I try to politely move on... he asks: ‘So what is it you do?’ 😬

Her profile:

Anna Isaac
@Annaisaac
Economics correspondent @Telegraph. Got a tip? [email protected]

There are lots of examples on the thread:

mobile.twitter.com/Annaisaac/status/956915086060326912

Yes, really. Not everything is sexist. You can try to twist everything to make it look that way, but in real life it really isn't.

In my experience (and I'm knocking 50), it really, really is.

yup, it is

I find a loud snort and a “oh bless, aren’t you adorable!” (where ”adorable” is polite-speak for “a fucking idiot”) gets the message across.

I’ve witnessed grey-haired female consultants be “mistaken” for medical students. I’ve been “mistaken” for a secretary, while performing an invasive procedure. I’ve been told to “shut up love and let the doctor talk”, when the doctor was my male medical student and I was the senior doctor in the department. In all of these cases we had all introduced ourselves clearly as doctors. A certain type of man will just not hear you because the concept of a senior woman is like a talking fish to them.

Read that Rebecca Solnit essay. Some man explained HER BOOK to her, and despite her repeatedly saying “yes I know that’s my book I wrote it” he continued telling her all about it until somebody else intervened. These men do not hear plain English if it does not fit in with what they are expecting.

I think you are both being unreasonable. How the heck can you have a discussion about your possible future roles when he doesn't know about your current one and you don't tell him? Surely explaining the current situation is a precursor to this discussion. He might have made the (quite reasonable?) assumption that by opening the topic with him you were seeking the counsel of a senior or more experienced colleague. He might have done exactly the same thing with a male colleague. At what level of seniority of role would you open discussions with a female colleague whose background you did not know? Could you make erroneous assumptions?

YOu should have put him back in his box there and then and highlighted you are far more senior and experienced than the roles he was suggesting.

Something similar happened to me many years ago , he was older I was young , he had no knowledge of me and my role ( no children, not a single mum, just young ) gave me loads of unsolicited advice on bettering my place within the company whilst having coffee prior to a business conference , 10 mins later he was rather red faced to realise I was not only his boss but owner of the company.