Are women tougher to work with?

John Mason

i would have agreed with that a few years ago - if you ever need a solicitor, make sure its female, they are bulldogs.

the place i work in now is horrendous because of the called men (tbh there isnt a really one amongst them). all they do is bitch, moan, and are full of negativity.

they are lazy and think everything is beneath them. one of informed me last week, he doesnt believe in filing!!

LittleBook

supermouse wrote: »

the nasty ones rule the roost, our male boss doesn’t get a look in. They are very negative people, have no confidence, are very b*tchy and love trying to make others feel bad - office bullies really.

A German friend of mine who works in HR says they have an expression for this type of situation .... "the fish stinks from the head".

I've found that the quality of a working environment has less to do with the gender of the team than with the management skills and personality (male or female) of the boss.

Bubblefett

I've worked for women, for men, and with women and men. In general I've found it all depends on the person and position. I've had my share of awful and kind male and female managers- all for different reasons. And the same with co workers.

That said, in my last job I worked in an office of just men, I was the only girl and it was horrible. The nature of the work was competitive and the atmosphere was a complete boys club. I hated every minute. I had my work sabotagued, accounts stolen and switched and more. And when I complained and said I wanted to file a formal complaint (to the male boss), he decided to tell the lads I'd complained and told me they said they hadn't done anything so it was all in my head. I ended up walking out shortly after.

gara

MissFlitworth wrote: »

I think I agree with Honey-ec that it's an industry specific thing

I agree and it also makes sense that people with similar personality traits would be drawn to similar professions. This would explain why I have found my female colleagues within my profession incredibly supportive, understanding and easy to work with. Whereas the women I worked with in jobs priors to graduating were largely unbearable and I tend to attribute this to having nothing in common with them and generally being on a different wavelength

Stepping Stone

I work in a male dominated industry and I really like it. There is no bitching or back stabbing and they are mainly laid back.

I am the only female in this section, but we have a small, mainly female section and they are a nightmare. They are so nasty. They are always bitching and Never, ever take responsibility for their own mistakes. They are so sexist too. It really annoys me to hear them constantly saying that men are stupid, are always wrong, are incapable of doing anything right, etc. They seem to think that being female makes them part of some club that I am part of too, so they can make these comments around me.

I never have much to say to them cos the conversation revolves around babies, clothes, celebrity gossip and diets (always bloody diets).

With the men, I can be me, which is great. We talk about normal stuff, have a bitch on a bad day and move on.

I think that I do prefer working with men. They see me as one of the team, and don't treat me any differently.

My worst boss was a female who was a lazy, gossipy cow. My best, a man who just judged me on what I could do, not what I looked like, etc.

Snoopy1

Ive worked with men before, and in April changed to a female team. My god how i regret it. The men were so laid back compared to this team.
I would never ever work for a female supervisor again. Her main role in work it seems is to put people down.
I hate working in an all female team, i wish id never thought the grass is greener.

LittleBook

kindling wrote: »

I am a man and I loathe working with women, they're obnoxious and feel that they have some better that thou right to act the bollocks simply cause they have boobs.

Genuinely believe that a woman can't do a man's job

Ah, the bitterness is strong in this one.

fatmammycat

supermouse wrote: »

Yes, i think its true. I live with 3 girls and 2 of us are on the pill, but over the course of about 9 months we've all synched - moods and all. Even our male housemate has a monthly low that he calls his period at the exact time we have

Probs too much info?! hahah

I think that's a myth actually.

Wibbs

kindling and Pa Dee post any more drivel like that and you'll be gone from the forum. Only warning

*EDIT* because of further thread derailment both Pa Dee and kindling have taken a couple of days break each. Their posts have been removed so the rest of us can get back to having a mature discussion.

meeeeh

I never noticed any difference. I always worked mostly with men, I grew up surrounded by men and my best two friends are male. So I usually prefer mixed or male company but as for work stuff I realy can't tell the difference.

seamus

Personally I've never seen any real difference. Worst boss I ever had was a woman, but that was just because she wasn't a nice person, nothing to do with her gender. Two of my bosses are women and I've no complaints.

I've dealt with a lot of management in different parts of the company though, and the only real tendency I've noticed is that the women tend to be more willing to play the game and work with the politics to get what they want, whereas the men tend to tell it straight more often or bulldoze their way into getting what they want.

The men are also more likely to do something risky without having 3 other people sign off on it, but that could definitely just be a feature of the management I work with.

Quorum

I work on a team of 13 women, there's only one I don't like. It's a very easygoing, non-bitchy place to work. There is a workplace "group" that I'm not part of. Do I care? Not a bit, this is my job, not a sorority. As long as people are easy to work with, I'm happy.

Dovakhin

I really don't think that annoying work behaviours divide out on gender lines. Some people (male or female) are irritating to work with, nothing to do with their gender.

At the moment, I'm working with one of the worst gossips I've ever met in my life (man) and some very serious, hard workers (women).

ComfyKnickers

I've worked with varying degrees of males and females all through my working career. One job in particular I ended up leaving after a good number of years because of the bitchiness of certain women. They would be your best friend one minute, the next they were ratting you out to the boss if you didn't get something done. When I handed in my notice (to move to a better, more well paid job), the girl who was the worst made my notice period a living hell to the point where I couldn't even work out my months notice and I ran out in tears after two weeks. I ended up threatening legal action for bullying if I didn't get a written apology from her and I pushed and pushed until I got it!! The new job I went to was a breath of fresh air, all of the girls were lovely and geniune and I couldn't believe it. I eventually put it down to the fact that quite a few of them were part-time, they were busy when they were in work and basically hadn't time for bitching and cat-fighting. They had full lives outside the office and didn't seem to let work rule their lives. This I think has a lot to do with how you act in work. The girl who was horrible to me lived by her job, her title, her status and how important she was.

As a female, I would actually much prefer to work with men - the majority of them are "what you see is what you get", I think you can have the craic with them, whereas with women, you are always thinking "what's she saying behind my back". Women are a lot more competitive in the workplace I think whereas I find fellas a lot more easygoing.

stinkle

ComfyKnickers wrote: »

They had full lives outside the office and didn't seem to let work rule their lives. This I think has a lot to do with how you act in work.
As a female, I would actually much prefer to work with men - the majority of them are "what you see is what you get", I think you can have the craic with them, whereas with women, you are always thinking "what's she saying behind my back". Women are a lot more competitive in the workplace I think whereas I find fellas a lot more easygoing.

I agree with all of this, especially the "having a life outside work". In my previous job, I was living in a different part of the country to my bf, and so most weekends I'd head off to visit him, or if he was in town we'd usually have plans. So I wasn't in the "Friday night post-work booze-up gang", plus the two people I worked closest with were both guys, one who had a young family and the other was gay and tended to socialise with his own mates. Both were great craic and we were a good team.

I was never really in the girly gang, which was awkward since the place was about 70% women. These women seriously had no lives outside of work, everything was work gossip with them and I personally felt judged on what I wore etc (work could be physically demanding at times, so I never "dressed up", wore heels or even make up unless I knew I wouln't be working up a sweat). Any job-related nights out I went on were actually hard work as "the girls" almost seemed to resent anyone who wasn't in their clique being there, and could be quite rude if you so much as tried to make conversation. And if you felt like taking about anything other than work/celebrities/x-factor/clothes/fake tan then you were quickly dropped and seen as weird. There was absolutely no craic to be had with any of these women, and they often wondered aloud why they were single/not approached on nights out!

It got terribly out of hand one time when a romance blossomed between two people in work and one of the other girls was put out by this and made an absolute show of herself in the process. Personally, I found it hard to take her seriously afterwards, not least because she and the girl she fell out with were "BFF" again not long after but the amount of bitching and backstabbing that had gone on in the meantime was unreal and very unprofessional.

If half the gossips and stirrers involved had anything going on in their own lives it wouldn't have been nearly as bad an environment to work in. It was also unfortunate that some of the "leaders" were well in with the male boss so the behaviour kinda went unchecked. A lot of others from my time there have left, but some of the contracts for the favourites have been renewed and the pattern continues

Catari Jaguar

One bad apple spoils the barrell. Just gotta keep that sort of a person contained. Regardless of gender.

sweeney1971

Sooner work with blokes any day than women, always bitchy and looking for trouble (im a woman)

Glendambo

I work in a female-dominated environment and I don't find it too bad. There are good and bad in each gender.

What does annoy the crap out of me is the unspoken rule that if there are promotions at any point a man has to get at least one of them because there are so few men and it might be seen as sexist to ignore them. This is regardless of their ability.

Equally there have been women who were promoted to positions they aren't able for due to how long they have worked here.

Depressing if you're the right side of 40.

michellie

I currently work with 7 men and don't miss the female bitchyness at all! Listening to friends going on about their workplaces and mine sounds ideal.

Thought there is still a lot of moaning and whinging but I blame pressure on management for that.

christina_x

women can be horrible to work with. im normally the nice one, today i wasnt xD

El_Dangeroso

Handsome Bob wrote: »

One funny thing I've observed though is that males are just as liable to bitch and gossip in the workplace as females are, but they've deluded themselves into thinking that what they do isn't bitching.

Exactly. I worked in a team where it was 7 men and two women. Me and the other girl got on great because we were both easy-going, the men on the other hand were so sniping and bitchy to each other. One person would leave the room to then have the others imitate them and other general horrible behaviour, thankfully me and the other girl were spared but I do think that the imbalance of gender is the biggest issue.

(Same goes for single gender secondary schools too)

Lu Tze

Forget about your own personal experience in the workplace and think of complaints from female friends/family about their workmates - which invariably are about female colleagues and managers. I am male and have no problem working with/for females, formed some efficient teams in various combinations.

eviltwin

I work in a area of social care staffed by women. There would be about 60 staffers in my building all female, I've been there for 2 years and I have never once had any issues that you wouldn't find in a mixed office. I don't know if that's something to do with the nature of the work we do but I find it a very calm, peaceful place to work, the women are very willing to help with any problems work related or personal and I love it.

On the other hand my husband works in a job staffed almost entirely by men and he feels like he is working with a bunch of toddlers most of the time.

Molecule

It'd be very interesting to see what areas people work in, and whether experiences differ depending on job type.

I've worked in a lot of places and have worked with both great people and a$$holes of both genders. The worst boss I ever had was a man - he seemed to make it his mission to destroy the lives of everyone who worked for him. However, I don't feel his gender had anything to do with that; he was just a disgusting human being.

My last two bosses have been women but apart from their gender and their occupation I would say they had almost nothing in common in terms of managerial style. However, both have been nothing but supportive and helpful to me. I work in an allied health profession and if I was to generalise I would say that it's the men (who are in the minority) who would tend to irk me more, as the old egos can get a bit inflated (this wouldn't be all of them...but it seems common in those in more lofty positions).

On the other hand I did once work in a place where all of the staff (over 30 people) were female. There was an awful lot of bitching and in-fighting going on but really it could be traced back to one or two people. Generally I would say a mix of both genders would be my preference in terms of co-workers. In terms of bosses, I don't care about gender as long as they're professional and not into micro-management.

Handsome Bob

El_Dangeroso wrote: »

Exactly. I worked in a team where it was 7 men and two women. Me and the other girl got on great because we were both easy-going, the men on the other hand were so sniping and bitchy to each other. One person would leave the room to then have the others imitate them and other general horrible behaviour, thankfully me and the other girl were spared but I do think that the imbalance of gender is the biggest issue.

(Same goes for single gender secondary schools too)

You've reminded me of something: one should never put much stock into an office friendship unless you've taken the friendship beyond the office. So always be careful of what you confide in a workmate, irrespective of gender.

El_Dangeroso

Handsome Bob wrote: »

You've reminded me of something: one should never put much stock into an office friendship unless you've taken the friendship beyond the office. So always be careful of what you confide in a workmate, irrespective of gender.

Absolutely, always keep ones cards close to one's chest. Save the bitching about work people for your real friends who neither know the people involved nor care!

Red Hand

El_Dangeroso wrote: »

Absolutely, always keep ones cards close to one's chest. Save the bitching about work people for your real friends who neither know the people involved nor care!

Or d'internet!:P

Male here and to be honest the worst bitching would have been carried out by women. However, men are just as likely to gossip in my experience.

Stheno

Molecule wrote: »

It'd be very interesting to see what areas people work in, and whether experiences differ depending on job type.

Good idea.

For all but six months, I've worked in IT for 15 years.
The female dominated environment was in those sixteen months.

It got me thinking tbh, to times when I needed help outside of work, and I've found all colleagues regardless of gender to be very sympathetic when a family death occured, or there was a serious issue.

Day to day, apart from the nosiness of women, I found little difference, I'd prefer to work with guys as that's my experience talking

Wompa1

Some women are much more difficult to work with than any men. From my experience. I've been working for 13 years, with mostly women. I've had female bosses and male bosses. My current place of work is 90% women

Retail and IT

Honey-ec

Ballbreaker female boss - Sales

Micromanaging male boss - Telco

Male boss from hell - Banking