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Flirty Women Get Fewer Promotions

The summary: Study shows that women who are flirty in the office get fewer promotions and make less money.

I cant really comment on the study itself, as I dont know the details of it. I do however know about the male mind, and it is a horrible, horrible place.

Disclaimer: The following comments are in no way representative of the y chromosome, and merely reflect an older line of thinking in western male thought.

Women flirt at the office because they believe it will give them an edge over others in the workplace. Show a little leg here and you get to work on the bigger projects, a little cleavage there and you get a promotion. Unfortunately it would seem that flirty women dont have a clear understanding of the thought process of the men above them.

Both joining a social circle and joining a company have one aspect in common: you will be evaluated on how much the people around you like you. But in a job setting, this will be more formal, and there will also be a second item to be evaluated: how much can you help the group achieve its goal? Both of these things are crucial to success for the company, or any group with a well-defined goal.

Theres a sort of sliding scale at work here when youre dealing with jobs that require technical skills. Unlikable people that are very technically proficient wont get as many jobs as people that are more likeable but who have slightly less of a technical background. The ideal candidate would be both very likable and technically proficient, but those people are few and far between. In other words, your employer is looking for someone with at least a 6 in technical skills, and a high interpersonal skills rating. A 6 technical, 10 interpersonal will get more jobs than a 10 technical 1 interpersonal. It should be noted that the priorities, shift depending on the job. I dont know of too many unfriendly customer service people, and there are plenty of antisocial programmers out there.

So, if you're more likeable and you have the skills, youll get the job, so why not show a little skin? Well, flirty women are seen as less intelligent. Yes, the company may hire you, but all of the flirting you did in the interview dropped you from a 9 technical to a 6 technical while giving you a 9 interpersonal. So now the company has hired someone whom they think can do the job, but theyre going to give you less pay because theyre not entirely sure youre going to produce work they like.

Now its promotion time. Youve been working really hard, youve been flirting all over the place, and you think you have the promotion in the bag. Unfortunately you have no experience in the area you want to be promoted to. This generally isnt a problem. If you have high technical skills, you can probably learn all of the skills for the new job. Unfortunately youre only a 6 technical, and they would prefer an 8. This is really tough. Anywhere where your technical skills cant be accurately measured, its going to be lowered because of your flirting.

So what should you do? Keep things professional. Dont flirt to get ahead, use your skills. I wont even go into why youve pissed off feminists everywhere with your flirting...

posted by SumThing @ 11:06 PM