International Women-know-your-worth Day
Last week one of my colleagues invited me to attend a simcha (family celebration) he was making. I was seated at a table with several of his relatives – and this being a strictly Orthodox affair, the event was segregated seating so everyone around me was female. One of his cousins asked me how I knew the host, so I explained that we worked at the same organisation.
“That’s nice,” she smiled. “Are you a receptionist?”
“No,” I replied, “I work in the upstairs office.”
“Ah,” she said knowingly, “you’re a secretary.”
Without wishing for one minute to diminish the important work carried out by legions of receptionists and ‘secretaries’ (does that even still exist as a job title?!) across the land, as it happens, that’s not my job. But this is not the first time – very much not the first time – that I’ve got into conversation with both women and men from the Charedi (strictly Orthodox) community and they’ve immediately assumed, on learning that I work, that I must be in a junior position. And it grates on my nerves.
There is still very much an assumption in the Charedi world that while a woman may need to work for financial reasons, she’s not really supposed to enjoy it enough to progress, and certainly not, G-d forbid, refer to it as a career. If she has a talent or a calling and somehow finds herself in a position of seniority, she must be sure to tell everyone that she took it up only because of a sense of duty to the community, but that of course she puts her husband and children before everything else and this isn’t really what gives her ‘sipuk’ – a sense of satisfaction – in life.
I’ve spent the past 17 years establishing my career, but I wasn’t raised with any particular professional expectations. It was financial necessity that initially nudged me towards the world of work and I was fortunate that my academic results eased my entry into that world despite my having no particular training in any field. To my surprise, I found that I gained a huge amount of satisfaction from my professional life – the buzz I get when I publish a well-received newspaper article, or complete a complicated project with good results - is comparable to the feeling I got in school when the teacher handed out the exam papers and I learned I’d done really well. Before I started working, I thought that buzz was gone forever and I missed it, nerdy as that makes me… For much as I love my family, I certainly never get that feeling when I ‘achieve’ sight of the bottom of my laundry basket or put dinner on the table each day. These are things that I need to do, because my roles and responsibilities in life include sharing in looking after my family, whom I love, and they are part and parcel of daily routine. But why do they have to be the ultimate focus of my existence? And why is there still that expectation that a religious woman should invest these domestic tasks with some kind of supreme spiritual value? It’s telling that once people have got over their surprise that no, I’m not a secretary, and yes, I do work full time, all they want to know is when I manage to cook supper and do the laundry.
All this may sound very much like whingeing for no purpose – and while a good old rant or vent is admittedly therapeutic, I do have an important point to make. The old-fashioned attitude that still exists in some parts of the community, that a woman’s prime value is to be found behind the scenes, in the domestic realm, means that girls are growing up with an inherent inclination to devalue their skills and abilities. When young women, post-seminary, enter the world of work with a view to it being a kind of pre-marital holding pen, with very little thought given to career aspirations or proper professional training, they are cavalierly dismissing their potential worth outside of being a wife and mother. And down the line, when Charedi men in the workplace assume that the only woman present in a meeting will be the one to make the coffee, or take the minutes, or print out the papers, they are perpetuating this viewpoint.
After a disastrous false start in a Charedi high school, my daughters attend/attended a modern Orthodox school where their career aspirations are nurtured and encouraged, and they are never made to feel that any doors in life are closed to them. You can be sure that they would vigorously shout down any suggestion that their main goal should be to change nappies or cook a fabulous meal – unless, of course that’s genuinely what they want it to be. And while I fervently hope that they will one day experience the joy that is motherhood, they will also learn that it can be difficult, painful, and especially during the early years, rather repetitive and boring. I hope that they won’t feel like three months out of every 12 must be completely absorbed by the intricacies of ‘making Pesach’, and that they will be able to feel the satisfaction of a professional job well done and the delight of giving back to society outside the four walls of their own homes, in a way that best suits their unique talents and abilities.
So, in response to the young woman who asked if I was the secretary at my organisation – well, no, these days I’m actually the Chief Operating Officer and I worked extremely hard to get here. I put in a minimum 37-hour work week, can be found most evenings and many weekends in front of my laptop, and attend regular out of hours meetings and events – and yes, my family still eat and wear clean clothes (most of the time). And it gives me tremendous personal and professional satisfaction.
In the run up to International Women’s Day 2018, my ‘bracha’ (blessing) to you, is that you be granted the opportunities to know your own value, not only as the Eishes Chayil who provides her family with food and keeps the house nicely, but who ‘senses that her trade is profitable’ in every sense of the word and in every sphere in which she finds herself.
“That’s nice,” she smiled. “Are you a receptionist?”
“No,” I replied, “I work in the upstairs office.”
“Ah,” she said knowingly, “you’re a secretary.”
Without wishing for one minute to diminish the important work carried out by legions of receptionists and ‘secretaries’ (does that even still exist as a job title?!) across the land, as it happens, that’s not my job. But this is not the first time – very much not the first time – that I’ve got into conversation with both women and men from the Charedi (strictly Orthodox) community and they’ve immediately assumed, on learning that I work, that I must be in a junior position. And it grates on my nerves.
There is still very much an assumption in the Charedi world that while a woman may need to work for financial reasons, she’s not really supposed to enjoy it enough to progress, and certainly not, G-d forbid, refer to it as a career. If she has a talent or a calling and somehow finds herself in a position of seniority, she must be sure to tell everyone that she took it up only because of a sense of duty to the community, but that of course she puts her husband and children before everything else and this isn’t really what gives her ‘sipuk’ – a sense of satisfaction – in life.
I’ve spent the past 17 years establishing my career, but I wasn’t raised with any particular professional expectations. It was financial necessity that initially nudged me towards the world of work and I was fortunate that my academic results eased my entry into that world despite my having no particular training in any field. To my surprise, I found that I gained a huge amount of satisfaction from my professional life – the buzz I get when I publish a well-received newspaper article, or complete a complicated project with good results - is comparable to the feeling I got in school when the teacher handed out the exam papers and I learned I’d done really well. Before I started working, I thought that buzz was gone forever and I missed it, nerdy as that makes me… For much as I love my family, I certainly never get that feeling when I ‘achieve’ sight of the bottom of my laundry basket or put dinner on the table each day. These are things that I need to do, because my roles and responsibilities in life include sharing in looking after my family, whom I love, and they are part and parcel of daily routine. But why do they have to be the ultimate focus of my existence? And why is there still that expectation that a religious woman should invest these domestic tasks with some kind of supreme spiritual value? It’s telling that once people have got over their surprise that no, I’m not a secretary, and yes, I do work full time, all they want to know is when I manage to cook supper and do the laundry.
All this may sound very much like whingeing for no purpose – and while a good old rant or vent is admittedly therapeutic, I do have an important point to make. The old-fashioned attitude that still exists in some parts of the community, that a woman’s prime value is to be found behind the scenes, in the domestic realm, means that girls are growing up with an inherent inclination to devalue their skills and abilities. When young women, post-seminary, enter the world of work with a view to it being a kind of pre-marital holding pen, with very little thought given to career aspirations or proper professional training, they are cavalierly dismissing their potential worth outside of being a wife and mother. And down the line, when Charedi men in the workplace assume that the only woman present in a meeting will be the one to make the coffee, or take the minutes, or print out the papers, they are perpetuating this viewpoint.
After a disastrous false start in a Charedi high school, my daughters attend/attended a modern Orthodox school where their career aspirations are nurtured and encouraged, and they are never made to feel that any doors in life are closed to them. You can be sure that they would vigorously shout down any suggestion that their main goal should be to change nappies or cook a fabulous meal – unless, of course that’s genuinely what they want it to be. And while I fervently hope that they will one day experience the joy that is motherhood, they will also learn that it can be difficult, painful, and especially during the early years, rather repetitive and boring. I hope that they won’t feel like three months out of every 12 must be completely absorbed by the intricacies of ‘making Pesach’, and that they will be able to feel the satisfaction of a professional job well done and the delight of giving back to society outside the four walls of their own homes, in a way that best suits their unique talents and abilities.
So, in response to the young woman who asked if I was the secretary at my organisation – well, no, these days I’m actually the Chief Operating Officer and I worked extremely hard to get here. I put in a minimum 37-hour work week, can be found most evenings and many weekends in front of my laptop, and attend regular out of hours meetings and events – and yes, my family still eat and wear clean clothes (most of the time). And it gives me tremendous personal and professional satisfaction.
In the run up to International Women’s Day 2018, my ‘bracha’ (blessing) to you, is that you be granted the opportunities to know your own value, not only as the Eishes Chayil who provides her family with food and keeps the house nicely, but who ‘senses that her trade is profitable’ in every sense of the word and in every sphere in which she finds herself.
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