HR FOCUS
MEN OPTIMISE, WOMEN MAXIMISE
Women now hold around 32% of managerial, directorial and senior official roles in the UK, so it is worth checking your marketing and selling model to see if it is hitting the target says Jane Gallagher, Marketing Consultant, The Business Communicator.
Men and women are different. And, if you can contain your scorn at this obvious statement for just one minute, I will tell you why this simple truth is likely to change the face of procurement in FM.
As increasing numbers of women make FM a career choice, they are entering the sector with a professional agenda and their eyes set very firmly on the top jobs. The past five years alone have seen the growth of special interest groups (SIGs) aimed at, if not orientated towards, women. The irony is that as many men as women attend; a self- evident truth perhaps? Or a sign that a different approach has its merits regardless of gender.
There are any number of gender- specific clichés: women want everyone to benefit while men focus on self-interest; men are more competitive; women more altruistic; women are about long- term needs, while men look at satisfying immediate needs. I make no judgement about their value or veracity. Online confidence guru Decision-Making Confidence tells us that: women use other people’s opinions to help make their own decision. Men use other people’s decisions to help them form their own opinion. Women like to know why other people made that choice; men like to know if other people are happy with their choice.
A study, published in the International Journal of Business Governance and Ethics, revealed that male directors are apt to use rules and regulations when making decisions, while female directors
60 | TOMORROW’S FM
are prepared to challenge the norm and are inclined to make decisions that take account of the interests of multiple stakeholders. Women are also more likely to use cooperation, collaboration and consensus- building in their decisions.
“MEN TEND TO DO BETTER WITH
PROCESSING TASKS WHILE WOMEN ARE STRONGER IN ASSIMILATING AND INTEGRATING
DISPARATE PIECES OF INFORMATION.”
Women are more inquisitive and see other possible solutions. At board level where directors are compelled to act in the best interest of the corporation while factoring in the views of multiple stakeholders, this quality alone can make women very effective corporate directors.
How Women Decide in The Harvard Business Review is well worth a read if you have a few minutes to spare. In it, the researchers tell how Deloitte lost more than one bid because it had not occurred to them to alter their presentation when women made up a noticeable proportion of the procurement panel.
WHY THE DIFFERENCE? The University of California found
that it is the respective quantities of grey and white matter in our brains. Grey matter shapes information processing centres. White matter the connections between those centres. Men have approximately 6½ times more grey matter than women, while women have nearly 10 times more white matter. Which basically means that men tend to do better with processing tasks while women are stronger in assimilating and integrating disparate pieces of information. Because of their different cognitive strengths men optimise solutions, women maximise them.
It is important to bear in mind that male and female styles are tendencies not absolutes. However, typically a man will be mission and task-oriented, a woman discovery- oriented. Having determined that the solution is black trousers, a man will go to a store, pick out a pair and be home in half an hour. A women may start out with the same black trousers solution, but will change as she decides that what she really needs is a smart outfit. Women seek creative solutions, are receptive to new ideas and adjust their solution accordingly.
Outsourcing, contract management and tenders are the life-blood of FM. Effective bidding is, consequently, business critical. If you are not optimising your business development, marketing and selling to ‘speak’ to your customer, you are not only missing a trick, but possibly their business as well. Makes you think, doesn’t it?
www.thebusinesscommunicator.co.uk twitter.com/TomorrowsFM
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