Dear Aunty B,
I tried to assist a junior female colleague in need and it backfired terribly.
She works in another unit and has asked me on occasion to have a few coffees with her and give her some advice about negotiating some difficult situations with her boss. She also told me that she was thinking of going to the UK to work as she has an “in” there.
Anyway, I told her to make a plan based around where she wants to be in five years time. I also asked her if she was planning on having children and she said yes. She told me that there is a guy she really likes and has just started dating. So I told her that as she is 35 years old, she should consider not going to the UK. Instead, I told her to work with her current boss to smooth out the problems which are not that different to any other problems you have in a large organisation and work on her relationship with the bloke who actually sounds really nice.
She then reported me to her boss as an inappropriate mentor saying she asked me for work advice and I told her to get married and have kids AND stay in her current job which was abusing my mentoring role for my own end, ie. the company’s end.
Aunty, I was not mentoring her, just having coffee. And I felt so hurt. I have had so many women rail against older women because they never told them to plan for kids (it can take a decade to set up for kids!!) and then the poor things have left it too late and then spent years regretting it! The other thing Aunty is if she had told me she wanted an international career and didn’t give two hoots about kids and settling down I would have steered her in a different direction.
I have always felt it was a bit of a duty to help women in the workplace, being a successful woman in my 50s. Now I feel so astonished and hurt that my good intentions backfired I never want to offer my help again! I do know she is hyper sensitive and I have tried to dismiss her as a one off. I also thought that I should make it very clear next time that I am not “mentoring”, just having coffee. But then I just think why bother risking it again when I got it so wrong and I should keep my mouth shut.
Hurt,
Perth
Dear Hurt,
Oh, you poor thing. Look, I am sure every woman who reads SmartCompany would love to go out for coffee with you and hear your sound advice. You don’t sound to me like you were being bias at all, just sensible.
Look, I am sure you have snogged the wrong guy, taken a bad job, bought a dress you never wore and regretted an email you sent in haste. But that didn’t stop you having great sex, working in a terrific job, buying far too many dresses that you love to wear and still sending emails in haste. What I am trying to say is, forget it. I am sure you have helped many women over the years so why change a very positive thing you are doing in your life because one woman didn’t have the ability to filter out what she didn’t want to hear?
Sounds like she is off to the UK anyway. And rest assured, while she didn’t like your advice, she will think about it for years to come.
Be smart,
Aunty B
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