Marie-Hélène Budworth

One of my sabbatical projects has been to figure out ‘where to now.’  This is not to imply that I have by any means exhausted my current program of research.  I just feel that I need to identify the space wherein I can make a significant contribution.  I need some focus in my work.  At present, I struggle to articulate my research in a quick 20 second overview.  This is a real drag at cocktail parties.  I start to describe my work and watch as my conversation partners eyes glaze over.  As with all things related to research, it sounds interesting until you get really close and then to most it is all theory and numbers.  So, part of my sabbatical plan is to become a better dinner part guest.  Lofty goals.  

If you picked up the Globe and Mail on Saturday you may have seen a piece by Leah Eichler wherein she included a quote from me regarding gender and leadership.  This does represent a theme in my research.  Specifically it is connected to the work that I do on modesty and career progression.  I find modesty interesting because it is such a strongly gendered behaviour so the consequences for behaving in ways that are modest differ between men and women.  In fact, modesty looks different for men relative to women.  It is an interesting thread but not one upon which to hinge my career.  However, at the core it does highlight my interest in gender issues in general.  This interest in largely founded in the fact that I am a woman.  Yep, I am putting it out there.  I am a girl and that fact influences my research choices.  In fact, I strongly believe that most research is really about the researcher.  We have so much freedom that we are almost certainly going to choose topics that resonate with us for some personal reason.

So, the other thread within my research is around psychological characteristics that support or hinder success.  Within that thread I almost always focus on characteristics that are malleable (i.e., can change through some form of learning).  In most of my work the psychological construct I have focussed on is self-efficacy.  How can we increase an individual’s confidence so that they can overcome barriers to success?  Are your eyes starting to glaze over?  This is where I typically lose people.  Perhaps you should grab yourself another martini?

This second thread is where I want to ‘hang my hat.’  Undoubtedly there is a great deal of overlap with gender as the factors that support or limit success differ by gender.  There is actually a link to diversity here as well as the obstacles one faces differ based on cultural and socioeconomic factors as well.  And I am interested in a range of related constructs – persistence, resilience, grit (I love this one.)  I am also interested in a range of outcomes – work performance, career satisfaction, ‘life’ success, happiness, and career progression.  My job this sabbatical has been to figure out two things: 1) is this interesting to others and 2) is it enough to support a sustained research program? I will let you know about the latter.  In the meantime, let me know whether it is interesting to you?

I have been reading How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran – a set of skills that I hope to master soon.  I picked the book up on a whim.  Chapters advertised it as the British version of Tina Fey’s Bossypants.  Well I thoroughly enjoyed Bossypants so I was all in.  In fact, I bought three copies – one for me and two for girlfriends who were having birthdays in August.  My Kindle says that I am 44% through the book and so far, I have come to believe that the comparison to Fey’s work seriously undersells this book.  How to be a Woman is a wonderful view of feminism that is relevant and useful for women in today’s world.  

The problem with feminism is that the word has come to mean something more than equal rights.  It has come to mean radical, militant, aggressive, and hairy.  Now these are not necessarily bad things but because radicalism is often viewed as extremism, anything viewed in that light is carried into a space that is not appetizing for mass consumption. Moran does a great job of arguing as to why modern women need to take back the word, own it, and live by it.  In her words, if you a) have a vagina and b) want to be in charge of it, you need to be a feminist.  Hilarious.  And true.  If you enjoy voting and are still a little ticked about the wage gap then feminism is for you.  Actually, you do not even need the vagina.  Some of my favourite feminists are men.  If you need to update your view on what the concept actually means, it is worth taking a look at Moran’s work.  

It is easy to forget that people are complex beings with complex lives.  As organizational researchers we spend a great deal of time focussed on how to enhance individual productivity.  When a person is not performing as they should, we often attribute the failure to some sort of deficit – lack of motivation, lack of ability, or lack of will.  In fact, the ability and the will might be strong but other factors might be draining psychological resources.  

There is a great deal of popular and scholarly writing on work-life balance.  It is not a space where I spent a lot of time researching but at times when my ‘real life’ interferes with my ability to get the work done, I do value the fact that there are folks out there acknowledging, researching, and validating the challenge of integrating one’s work self with one’s personal self.  I have been fortunate for most of my career in that work has not felt like ‘work.’  I love my research and my teaching responsibilities so most days the work is a nice ‘break’ or shift away from all of the other things that I do on a daily basis.  (I recognize that this is a luxury and that I am quite fortunate so please stop sending me nasty thoughts for gloating about it.) But, like everyone else, there are times when real life is consuming.  Given that my work is largely creative in nature, when my mind is occupied with other things, the real challenge becomes turning my thoughts back to the work.  Because of all of this, recently I have been really interested in the part of the work-life balance research that looks at psychological resources.  

For a long time researchers have looked at balance from the perspective of time.  How much time do I have to be at work and how much time do I get to do the other stuff (family, sport, friends, leisure etc.).  More recently, psychologists have spent more time looking at the cognitive resources allocated to each.  When I am at home with my family how much time do I spend thinking about work and vice versa.  Given that a large volume of the work that we do in North America at the moment is ‘knowledge-based’, work has become entirely portable.  You can be pushing your toddler on a swing while thinking about how to handle the 9am sales call.  Argh!  It is a sad state of affairs.  What is also means is that productivity is a complex function of cognitive resource allocation.  If things are troubling on the home front, there are less resources for work stuff.  Now, I recognize that most of you have likely experienced this first hand.  I just like having a psychological explanation for things.  It give me great comfort to be able to explain my success (or lack thereof!) in cognitive terms.  

So the obvious question is – what is to be done about it?  When you are experiencing significant cognitive distractions, how do you get yourself back on track?  I write – a Blog perhaps. 

I have to share a pet peeve with you.  This is not quite a rant, more of a caution.  Recently, I have become increasingly irritated with the ‘lists’ that are intended to help you improve yourself, your relationship with your boss, your relationship with your coworkers, your potential for success, or your life in general.  At least a dozen times a day I receive tweets with promises of the steps to follow to improve your situation at work or your career in general – “10 things to do to find a job”; “how to handle an irate boss in three steps”; “the 5 things that all leaders so.”  I find these lists irritating because they are misleading and short sighted.  If any of these complex issues could be solved in 3 steps, or 5 steps, or 10, we would all have the solution.  The tricky part to any situation or any individual career is that they are unique and, well, individual.  What worked for me, will not work for you.  It is as simple as that.

Lists are great in situations that are predictable and where the elements in the environment work the same each and every time.  For example, a step by step guide to baking a muffin is ideal.  I can use it, you can use and we can both be successful.  I have a friend who a few years ago committed himself to ’12 steps to hunk-dom.’  (This is not relate closely to my main point, but is a really funny aside so bear with me.)  He developed a well considered workout and diet plan.  We will never know if his 12 steps would have worked as he had a great deal of trouble following through.  But I digress.  

Life is complex.  As a social science researcher I spend a great deal of time trying to uncover trends or patterns in human behaviour.  And there are certainly predictable patterns that can be uncovered… when I expose people to the exact same experiences.  Slight variations in any part of the environment change the way in which people behave and the potential outcomes.  Even within the same circumstances there are small numbers of people who consistently behave differently – in a predictable way.  The bottom line is that a ‘how to’ list is not useful in the context of complicated situations such as the workplace.   

The message here is that all of the advice that we receive needs to be filtered through our own lens.  It is great to hear about what worked for others and it can certainly give us something to consider but the solution to our own circumstances is dependent on our individual history and our personal environment.