{gif from Ms Queen Bee}
Last night, I was reading an article by Fortune about the former CFO of the collapsed bank Lehman Brothers, Erin Callan. The feature talked about the sex appeal of the former CFO, Erin Callan and how that threw a lot of people in the bank off. For example:
She was charismatic and flirty. Indeed, Callan’s sex appeal accelerated both her rise (“She looks good on TV!”) and then her fall (“She’s a media hound!”). She was one CFO whose hemline was more likely to occasion comment than, say, her management of working capital.
That line really stands out to me. The assumption is that her hemline was short and therefore, she could not be taken seriously as a CFO, but to be honest, what is considered short? It is all relative.
Here is another telling paragraph from the Fortune feature:
Callan was flying high, but also starting to draw criticism inside Lehman. Many colleagues disapproved of her ever more provocative wardrobe. She favored elegant brands, such as Chanel and Chloé, but the skirts were short and the tops tight. Callan seemed hungry for attention. Word got around that she had had cosmetic surgery to enhance her figure. And friends say her husband, a fellow investment banker she had married in 2001, couldn’t compete with Callan’s career or clients for her attention. The couple divorced in 2007.
This is the part that cements my thinking that most ambitious women will struggle in this male-dominated world. If she was a man and she was divorced, most people would be inclined to think, the wife was being starved of attention or being eclipsed by her husband.
You may be wondering why did I put a gif of Beyonce as the image to accompany this post. Bee like many other ambitious and successful women is consistently gutted online for being too sexy, flashy ad infinitum. I do not think that showing skin means you are less serious about work, but obviously working in a corporate male-dominated environment means that a woman’s look has to be demure to an extent, because that is what is expected, whereas in Bee’s industry, sexiness matters the most.
I am getting the impression that Ms Callan was looked down upon for dressing sexy, because this in fact may have intimidated other colleagues (male and female). By adding a layer of feminine appeal to her workwear, she was a sort of corporate Boudicca, revolting against the idea that she has to be a cookie-cutter corporate girl.
