Hi Everyone, Hope everyone is well and enjoyed your short time off after Spring Semester ended and this one began. This is the first time I'm blogging so I'm a little intimidated but I'll figure it out before this class ends....I hope.
At my company, we are looking to hire 3 to 4 new employees to replace contractors we are using presently. I work from my home in the Philly area and my employer is located in the San Francisco Bay area. Candidates were brought into the corporate office for face to face interviews but since I’m located on the East Coast I conduct phone interviews. Reading Chapters 5 & 6 helped me recognize my Eureka moment. On paper, a female candidate appeared to meet all of the qualifications I was looking for so I was anxious to speak with her. She said all of the right things and used the appropriate buzz words for my industry but there was something about the woman that nagged at me. I couldn’t put my finger on it until I read about verbal and nonverbal communication. I must have picked up something in her voice that didn’t hold true but also the piece that was missing was nonverbal communication. Our text mentions that nonverbal behaviors carry from 65% to 93% of the total meaning of communication so I was at a definite disadvantage by interviewing this woman over the phone. I recognize I needed to see and observe this woman to get a true picture of who she is. Funny thing is that this candidate was brought into our corporate office for interviews with the rest of the team and based on the face to face (not work experience) they did not feel that she would be appropriate for the position and fit in with the team. Most people on my team are females and as our text states “women are generally more skilled than men at interpreting others’ nonverbal communication” (153) so this makes me think that there is some truth to that. On a side note…I had the opportunity to do a face to face interview while in the corporate office and based on the candidate's body language and sloppy appearance I gave her the thumbs down. I now truely value the importance of recognizing nonverbal behavior and what it says about a person.
I grew up in the 60’s in a traditional Irish Catholic family with eight children, a stay at home mother, and working father. Remembering back…my mother did it all except work outside of the home. My father on the other hand was the only breadwinner. I recall him basically going to and coming from work. I still have the vivid picture of him walking in the front door after an hour commute from Philly, kissing my mother on the cheek, changing out of his suit, pouring my mother a glass of wine and a mixed drink for him and watching the news until dinner was on the table. When someone asks me how my relationship was with my father when I was a child I would have to say ‘What relationship?’ I should add a disclaimer though….as an adult I see things a little differently and understand the gender roles that were traditional for my parents’ generation. As a child, we don’t always see things clearly and from my prospective, my mother did it all. Move ahead twenty years and initially in my marriage I fell into the same pattern as my parents. I left college because I wanted to raise my children myself. I used to joke with my friends saying that if my kids were screwed up I wanted it to be my fault. I didn’t want the ‘out’ of blaming someone else. Since I wasn’t working, I felt that everything else was my responsibility but I do remember many moments when I was resentful of my husband’s assumption that his workload had to be heavier than mine. How draining could childcare be compared to dealing with a stressful commute into the city, eight stressful hours of work, only to have to turn around for a stressful return trip back home?
Life sometimes forces change though. As my children moved on to college and beyond, I had a career opportunity that would involve me traveling. It was amazing how our gender roles changed (sort of) at that point. I was on the road a few days each week and my husband managed to survive. Hummm. Imagine that. He has become quite self-sufficient to the point where I don’t even think about what to cook for dinner because he has it planned out and he will due laundry if the hamper is full. Don’t let me paint the picture too rosy though…he doesn’t clean the house. I refuse to come home on a Friday to a dirty house so we do have a woman come clean every other week. Thanks to a promotion, my travel schedule has decreased measurably and this caused a new adjustment for both of us. At times, I see my husband slipping back into the traditional masculine gender role but I pull him back. I tease him that there is no going back. Life sometimes helps to break the traditional gender roles but the parties involved need to see that there is not a sign of weakness but instead a sign of growth.
Jeffrey, It is sad that your friend and many others feel that bitch is an acceptable replacement for girlfriend and I commend you for drawing it to his attention. Your story brought to mind something very similar that grates on my nerves and it is two-fold. My brother-in-law refers to my sister as ‘woman’ when he is addressing her and my sister doesn’t even flinch. You might say that ‘woman’ is not a derogatory term but the way it is delivered is the issue. I don’t feel that it is my place to interfere in their relationship because they do have a good marriage (by what I can see). My concern though is what kind of example does that set for my 15 year old niece and my two step-nephews. This behavior to me continues the cycle of masculine control. Our text states that the “first feature of masculine speech is the effort to establish status and control” and I believe that this is what my brother-in-law is doing (130). There have been some occasions where I witnessed my niece disrespecting my sister and I feel that this is the result of the examples set by her parents. Devaluation and mistreatment of females is pervasive in Western culture and for a young female this could become internalized (179). As young girls matures and proceeds through the different phases of physical and emotional development, the negative treatment of females around them could affect how young girls interact with their peers and their own self-image. So a round of applause for you for trying to stop the cycle.
Looking forward to reading your thoughts this semester! You said that you were unsure but, this looks great!
ReplyDeleteEureka #2
ReplyDeleteAt my company, we are looking to hire 3 to 4 new employees to replace contractors we are using presently. I work from my home in the Philly area and my employer is located in the San Francisco Bay area. Candidates were brought into the corporate office for face to face interviews but since I’m located on the East Coast I conduct phone interviews. Reading Chapters 5 & 6 helped me recognize my Eureka moment. On paper, a female candidate appeared to meet all of the qualifications I was looking for so I was anxious to speak with her. She said all of the right things and used the appropriate buzz words for my industry but there was something about the woman that nagged at me. I couldn’t put my finger on it until I read about verbal and nonverbal communication. I must have picked up something in her voice that didn’t hold true but also the piece that was missing was nonverbal communication. Our text mentions that nonverbal behaviors carry from 65% to 93% of the total meaning of communication so I was at a definite disadvantage by interviewing this woman over the phone. I recognize I needed to see and observe this woman to get a true picture of who she is. Funny thing is that this candidate was brought into our corporate office for interviews with the rest of the team and based on the face to face (not work experience) they did not feel that she would be appropriate for the position and fit in with the team. Most people on my team are females and as our text states “women are generally more skilled than men at interpreting others’ nonverbal communication” (153) so this makes me think that there is some truth to that. On a side note…I had the opportunity to do a face to face interview while in the corporate office and based on the candidate's body language and sloppy appearance I gave her the thumbs down. I now truely value the importance of recognizing nonverbal behavior and what it says about a person.
Wk 2 – Response to Prof. McManimon’s post
ReplyDeleteI grew up in the 60’s in a traditional Irish Catholic family with eight children, a stay at home mother, and working father. Remembering back…my mother did it all except work outside of the home. My father on the other hand was the only breadwinner. I recall him basically going to and coming from work. I still have the vivid picture of him walking in the front door after an hour commute from Philly, kissing my mother on the cheek, changing out of his suit, pouring my mother a glass of wine and a mixed drink for him and watching the news until dinner was on the table. When someone asks me how my relationship was with my father when I was a child I would have to say ‘What relationship?’ I should add a disclaimer though….as an adult I see things a little differently and understand the gender roles that were traditional for my parents’ generation. As a child, we don’t always see things clearly and from my prospective, my mother did it all. Move ahead twenty years and initially in my marriage I fell into the same pattern as my parents. I left college because I wanted to raise my children myself. I used to joke with my friends saying that if my kids were screwed up I wanted it to be my fault. I didn’t want the ‘out’ of blaming someone else. Since I wasn’t working, I felt that everything else was my responsibility but I do remember many moments when I was resentful of my husband’s assumption that his workload had to be heavier than mine. How draining could childcare be compared to dealing with a stressful commute into the city, eight stressful hours of work, only to have to turn around for a stressful return trip back home?
Life sometimes forces change though. As my children moved on to college and beyond, I had a career opportunity that would involve me traveling. It was amazing how our gender roles changed (sort of) at that point. I was on the road a few days each week and my husband managed to survive. Hummm. Imagine that. He has become quite self-sufficient to the point where I don’t even think about what to cook for dinner because he has it planned out and he will due laundry if the hamper is full. Don’t let me paint the picture too rosy though…he doesn’t clean the house. I refuse to come home on a Friday to a dirty house so we do have a woman come clean every other week. Thanks to a promotion, my travel schedule has decreased measurably and this caused a new adjustment for both of us. At times, I see my husband slipping back into the traditional masculine gender role but I pull him back. I tease him that there is no going back.
Life sometimes helps to break the traditional gender roles but the parties involved need to see that there is not a sign of weakness but instead a sign of growth.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOL1 Wk 2 – Response to Jeffrey
ReplyDeleteJeffrey,
It is sad that your friend and many others feel that bitch is an acceptable replacement for girlfriend and I commend you for drawing it to his attention. Your story brought to mind something very similar that grates on my nerves and it is two-fold. My brother-in-law refers to my sister as ‘woman’ when he is addressing her and my sister doesn’t even flinch. You might say that ‘woman’ is not a derogatory term but the way it is delivered is the issue. I don’t feel that it is my place to interfere in their relationship because they do have a good marriage (by what I can see). My concern though is what kind of example does that set for my 15 year old niece and my two step-nephews. This behavior to me continues the cycle of masculine control. Our text states that the “first feature of masculine speech is the effort to establish status and control” and I believe that this is what my brother-in-law is doing (130). There have been some occasions where I witnessed my niece disrespecting my sister and I feel that this is the result of the examples set by her parents. Devaluation and mistreatment of females is pervasive in Western culture and for a young female this could become internalized (179). As young girls matures and proceeds through the different phases of physical and emotional development, the negative treatment of females around them could affect how young girls interact with their peers and their own self-image. So a round of applause for you for trying to stop the cycle.