What can I do about this young woman I manage?

[Linedbook]

Actually she's not that young (40s), but she looks young, dresses young and behaves young- much as I hate the descriptor, she's girly and she sits crossed legged on her chair, as in like a child sitting on the floor

I was told by the (female) CEO that she'd be a problem, shes spend all her time flirting and fluttering her eyelashes. CEO is a very no-nonsense woman who abhors this behaviour and I'm not a fan myself. My predecessor was a man, who according to the CEO "fell for it".

Anyway he told me she's brilliant. CEO is not a fan. I have found her to be brilliant, hard working and full of great ideas. One of those people where you just have to say "it would be good if...." and it's done. She doesn't flirt with me, but is respectful, helpful and supportive.

She's also really good at people, which is where the flirting comes in, she can a absolutely pick the men who will be susceptible and get them to do anything. I'd guess she's done the same with me, the reason for her entirely different approach.

It is annoying though and my boss hates it.

So, do I try to manage her and make it stop, or leave her to get on with what she does so well?

Your CEO doesn’t have feminist principles. What she does have is internalised misogyny.

Yes, I'm coming to realise this. She's built her career on being "one of the lads".

about 14 years ago I started to manage a team and the guy who hired me raved on and on about the team leader (next step down from me) and how impressed I would be with her, she was so great, etc etc. She also traded on being girlish, and flirty. She could do good work, but did not work nearly as hard as she had all the senior men convinced she did. And it quickly became obvious that her team could not stand her, were not taken in, and had no time for her behavior. It was cringe making when we were at national meetings and she was in full flight - I heard numerous negative comments about her. My boss remained completely convinced she was the best thing since sliced bread. It really wasnt in her best interest to let it go as it hurt her reputation, but nothing I said was effective - she would just run off to him and he would tell her I was jealous, stupid etc etc (there were many other problems with him as it turned out). He eventually tried to promote her over my head, there was a revolt by other staff through the company who under estimated her skills (although she also was a good 10 years off being able to do the job he was trying to force for her) and she ended up leaving. He got fired soon after. All I could do is set limits where I could, let go what I could not influence and try to mitigate damage and protect the rest of the team. It was like a big, ugly, very slow motion train crash.

This

It's quite hard to define "flirting". Innuendo? Touching people unneccessarily? High pitched laugh? Overuse of people's names? Teasing?

I think it would be quite difficult to pinpoint and call out that kind of behaviour.

I think you need to wait until the person she's targeting complains, though? You can't really complain on their behalf if they don't mind.

When you put it like that it really does make you realise the impossible standards and narrow line women have to toe!

If you like her and she is good at her job, I would just try gently steer her in a direction that will impress the CEO. Tell her what the CEO expects of her and how she wants her act, she will probably do it because she likes pleasing people. The flirting might be just reflecting back other peoples behaviour, as a coping strategy.
Sitting crossed legged is much comfier and is only weird because other people don't do it.

Tell your new start that you are impressed with her people skills and clear emotional intelligence, tjat she is a godsend to you with how she gets stuff done, and that you enjoy watching her get people to do her favours as that is a really rare and impressive skill! All genuinely true, as you have said as much in your replies. I like to compliment people often- if i notice something positive then i say it. More people should do this.

However I would also ask her at some point, that she might do well to tone down the flirting in front of the CEO. Let her continue to do what is natural to her and gets results, but keep your CEO happy by having her think you put a stop to it.

Your CEO doesn’t get to tell her workers what their personality should be.

The woman’s getting her job done well. If CEO isn’t happy, tread carefully and say vague stuff like “I’m aware of the issue you mean but I’m finding her an excellent worker with good results, I doubt we could change her entire personality.”

Also, you have GOT to watch the Abby Flynn episode of 30Rock, if you don’t like links search on YouTube

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Sjnkd_Hzgwc

I flirt with a different department if I need to
I take the odd box of brownies or snacks to the department and you know "nice shirt, that new?, "made you a coffee" type thing and yes a bit of playing up on being female

Manager "FFS. We need X and that department definitely won't give us it"
I ring them and 5 mins later we have X
Manager < eye roll > "fine keep taking them cake"

So why did the CEO hire her then? The CEO has the power to sack her- i would if it were me and i'd make up a plausible reason- why isn't CEO doing this? A lot doesn't add up here. Unless the actual owner hired this bint, therefore I can understand your boss's frustration

The CEO probably wishes she had the ability to get on with everyone?

Why not just stick up for her and explain to CEO why she's so good at her role

Interesting thread.

I think one of the posts nailed it and now can't find it! The one about adult to adult communication style.

I'm concerned that the CEO attempted to sabotage this woman with you before you started to manage her. I think my therapist would say that this woman touches a wound in the CEO. This happened to me with a colleague once - I usually have a decent ability to get on with people but this person just truggered something in me and Im ashamed to say our working relationship ended up in tatters and she left. You don't want that to happen.

I'd be aiming to lower the temperature between them - I'd absolutely want to do personal PR for them and make the stuff they're doing well visible, but I wouldn't be (metaphorically) shoving her in the CEO's face either when she's not there. Better to look for opportunities to have her in the room with you and the CEO when she's not behaving this way perhaps.

I think it's too simplistic to say this poor woman can't win, and it's hard being a woman, and she sounds great.

Despite liking her, the OP has described her behaviour as sleazy and says if it were coming from a man she could be accused of sexual harassment. She says the woman makes physical comments.

The CEO is allowed to feel that employees should be ambassadors for their company's principles, and sleaziness isn't one of those.

It's not anti feminist to ask a woman to behave like a professional adult.

A professional should be able to take feedback on their behaviour and modulate it.

Its possible to be both brilliant AND have areas you need to tweak.

Your CEO's attitude towards a woman different from her is offending MY feminist principles!

She needs to be reminded of professional code of conduct. Manage her like you would any other person.
Typical mnet seeing a woman flirting as doing what needs to be done whereas any threads where a man does this and its straight to HR.

I’ve been thinking about what some posters have said, that if she was a man she would be accused of sexually harassing people.

I don’t think that’s necessarily true.

The behaviour OP has described is flirting, and I think she was described as “girlish” (I could be wrong and CBA to reread the whole thread). But she doesn’t seem to be predatory.

The closest male behaviour I can think of is being camp. Flirty, gregarious, boyish, fluttering eyelashes and touching people on the arm, over-use of peoples names. All stereotypes, but I think an equal analogy to what has been said of this woman.

I recognise that being camp is usually and historically associated with gay men, but there are plenty of camp straight men, and plenty of gay men who are not camp.

Imagine a man (these days) being told not to be camp at work, and his manager being asked to manager the behaviour out of him.

Yeah, I'd be uncomfortable with it too.

On the one hand, she gets things done, but if she's getting (some) things done by flirting and manipulating the male staff, it will only lead to awkward advances and HR visits.

I know the obvious retort would be that it's the men's fault for not taking the no when she gives it, but if she's constantly giving mixed signals, it will cause a lot of confusion in the future.

It's not just the ceo who may not like it.

Females on the external side may not like it if sone in meetings they are in?

It doesn't seem particularly professional.

Now if she works in PR then ignore that. Or say sales. And may not meet external clients. But I'd find it annoying. I'd probably find the equivalent "camp man" equally annoying at times, in a work context.

Yaaaaawn, more sexist nonsense as usual I see 🙄

I have a friend like this. It worked really well for her until we worked at a company where all the men fell for her. When she was younger men would chalk it up to normal behaviour for her age and didn't take it seriously, as she approached 40 the men thought it was more genuine and that they had a shot. She had people turning up at her house, sending her gross messages etc. They all thought they were special. She hated it and struggled at work because a skill that had propelled her previously was now attracting creepiness but she didn't know how else to win people over. I suggested a week long 'influence and persuasion' course that I had done which went through all the methods at people's disposal to find the right one for you. She went and found it hugely useful. She didn't transform over night and still can be quite flirty but sues it more carefully alongside other techniques. She did have to leave that company though because the men were too hooked by then.

I'm not saying this will definitely happen to your employee but a wider discussion on enhancing her influencing skills could be a useful bit of development for her and a way to get the (petty) CEO off your case?

The CEO sounds like she has major internalised misogyny, and the employee sounds like she is being inappropriate. It's not either/or. Just because workplaces have traditionally been full of male sexualised behaviour towards colleaguesand employees, there's no need to sink to their level. Apart from anything else, it weakens women's position when they complain about similar behaviour from men.