Sometimes "Playing the Game" Means Doing Less

June 4, 2019

I watched bemused the other day as two senior male leaders at one of my client companies made a presentation to the president and me. Their presentation had clearly been slapped together, with no real preparation or overarching flow to their argument. The president, however, got their point, and plans were made to continue their project. It was good enough.

Now, I’m not going to preach about “good enough” being “good enough.” In my book, “excellence” is the only standard to live by. But if you are working in a fast-paced male-dominated environment, it helps to remember that “excellence” sometimes lives in the promise of your words, not their packaging.

Remember that the “male power game” is about positioning oneself “up”—about striving to be perceived as the best, the smartest, etc. According to world-renowned linguist Dr. Deborah Tannen of Georgetown University, boys learn early on—on the playground—to verbally spar with other boys about who is the best. This does’t go away when they grow up. The ability to make a strong and convincing claim, in the moment, goes a long way in a male environment.

So if you are a woman trying to prove yourself in the workplace by getting every detail just right, you may be doing more than you need to. Or rather, you may be spending a lot of time on things that won’t really advance you. There was once a female executive in the company I mentioned above who spent countless hours in the office getting the formatting on agendas just right and drafting long explanatory emails to clients. She also wouldn’t present her ideas unless she had prepared a buttoned-up presentation. Ultimately, she was frustrated that her ideas weren’t being adopted by the company. This may have been because she spent her time polishing things up in her office rather than talking—and sparring—with her colleagues, and using every opportunity in front of a senior executive to make her case.

Was her behavior “wrong?” No. In fact, she was very impressive. But she wasn’t playing the “male power game” the way it was meant to be played. And for now, that’s the game that is played in the workplace. So if you really want to get ahead, it’s time to put your inhibitions aside and get into the game.