THE PENALTIES OF TIME OUT

As our data has revealed, women off-ramp for surprisingly short periods of time—on average, 2.2 years. However, even these relatively short career interruptions engender heavy financial penalties. Our data shows that, on average, women lose 18 percent of their earning power when they take an off-ramp (see figure 2-11). In the banking/finance sector, penalties are especially draconian. In these fields, women’s earning power dips 28 percent when they take time out.As one might expect, the longer the period of time that’s spent out, the more severe the penalty becomes. Women lose a staggering 37 percent of their earning power when they spend three or more years out of the workforce.

Our findings in this area of financial penalties attached to time out jibe with the scholarly research. Columbia University economist Jane Waldfogel has analyzed the pattern of female earnings over their life span.When women enter the workforce in their early and mid-twenties, they earn nearly as much as men. For a few years, they continue to almost keep pace with men in terms of wages. At ages twenty-five to twenty-nine, women earn 87 percent of the male wage. However, when women hit their prime child-raising years (ages thirty to forty), many off-ramp for a short period of time—with disastrous consequences on the financial front. Largely because of these career interruptions, by the time they reach the forty-to-forty-four age group, women earn a mere 71 percent of the male wage.15 All of which underscores the importance of producing a continuous, cumulative employment history in the decade of one’s thirties. The words of MIT economist Lester Thurow underscore this reality: “The 30s are the prime years for establishing a successful career. These are the years when hard work has the maximum payoff. Women who leave the job market during those years may find that they never catch up.”16 One final point on the price attached to time out. Penalties are not limited to individuals. Companies also must deal with significant consequences when valued employees off-ramp. The financial costs associated with high rates of turnover are examined in some detail in chapter 4, but one particularly dramatic finding is worth flagging right here: only 5 percent of highly qualified women attempting to on-ramp want to go back to the company they once worked for. Indeed, in business, banking, and finance, none of the women surveyed (0 percent) want to return to their previous employer. In retrospect, the vast majority of offramped women feel that they were not supported in those last months or weeks on the job—that their request for a flexible work arrangement or a more meaty assignment was deflected or turned down. Some were made to feel that “they were letting the side down” when they struggled with their decision to quit. The fact that these bad feelings linger should be a wake-up call for companies. If employers expect to tap into this labor pool of women returning after a time out, they need to understand that the “terms of disengagement” matter.

DOWNSIZING AMBITION

It turns out that reduced earning power is not the only penalty attached to taking time out. Women also end up downsizing their ambitions, losing sight of their aspirations, and losing faith in their dreams. One newly on-ramped woman described her changed attitude by saying, “It took me three years to find this much-less-good job, and during that time, I had to accept that I had lost traction in my career. It was a bitter pill. I felt the unfairness of it. I had been out for only twenty months. But it was a fact nonetheless. So I’ve redefined what I can expect for myself.” Another woman, who participated in the same focus group, described her old self—before an off-ramp—as this “soaring, thrusting person.” That person doesn’t exist anymore. In her words, “reality bites.” Off-ramps and on-ramps make the career highway extremely slippery.

Our survey data shows that highly qualified women are significantly less ambitious than their male peers. Almost half of the men (48 percent) surveyed consider themselves very ambitious, as compared with one-third of women (35 percent). In the business sector the gap is even wider—63 percent of men describe themselves as very ambitious, compared with 45 percent of women. However, our data also shows that at young ages, there isn’t much of a gap between men and women in terms of ambition. But there is a distinct drop-off in female ambition as women head through their thirties. Young, highly qualified women are more likely than older women to see themselves as extremely or very ambitious (39 percent versus 31 percent). In the business sector, for example, 53 percent of younger women describe themselves as being very ambitious, while only 37 percent of older women are comfortable with this label (see figure 2-13).

In her book Necessary Dreams, published in 2004, psychiatrist Anna Fels argued convincingly that ambition stands on two legs—mastery and recognition.17 To hold on to their dreams women must attain the necessary credentials and experience, but they must also have their achievements and potential recognized in the larger world. The latter is often missing in female careers. Particularly in the wake of an off-ramp, employers and bosses tend to be skeptical about a woman’s worth. A downsizing cycle emerges: a woman’s confidence and ambition stalls; she is perceived as less committed; she no longer gets the good jobs or the plum assignments; and this serves to lower her ambition yet further (see figure 2-14).

Other research in the field reveals complex ways in which ambition is a gendered issue. A 2003 study by the Families and Work Institute (FWI) found that men aspire to higher positions than women—19 percent of male executives would like to have the top job (CEO or managing partner), compared with 9 percent of women.18 The FWI study also confirmed the fact that women are more likely than men to downsize their ambition as they move through their thirties—4 percent of women become less ambitious, as compared with 21 percent of men.19

Of particular interest is a 2004 study by ISR (International Survey Research), a global HR research and consulting firm, which reveals that men and women are driven by very different factors.When asked what motivates them at work, male executives highlight power and money, while female executives highlight connection and quality. The two top drivers for men are career advancement (20 percent) and financial rewards (10 percent), while the two top drivers for women are relationships at work (14 percent) and delivering a quality product/service to customers/clients (10 percent). In this study, career advancement and financial rewards did not even make it into the top four picks by women.20 As we will see in chapter 3, our survey data on extreme jobs tends to confirm the fact that men and women respond to different incentives. For example, 41 percent of young men in high-impact jobs see compensation as a top motivator; this compares with 26 percent of young women.

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