Episode 114: My Answer is No (If That's OK with You)

“You really can only say no when you have a clear sense of your priorities. ”

— Nanette Gartrell

Photo by EvgeniiAnd/iStock / Getty Images

A lot of women have trouble saying no to requests at work and in the rest of life. We don't want to let people down, and many of us enjoy helping others. But too many women are withering under the weight of tasks and favors they've taken on because they couldn't bring themselves to say no. In this show I talk to psychiatrist and author Nanette Gartrell about how to set boundaries with bosses and colleagues without damaging your relationships.

Nanette Gartrell

Her book is My Answer is NO...If That's Okay With You.

You can also read a transcript of the show.

Bonus Episode: Unpacking Sexual Harassment

“Documenting it is really, really important, if even just for your own sanity, keeping careful notes and records of what happens.”

— Jennifer Berdahl

Jennifer Berdahl

Before the revelations about Harvey Weinstein, Bill O'Reilly, Roger Ailes and Donald Trump, Jennifer Berdhahl and I sat down to talk about sexual harassment. Jennifer is a professor at the University of British Columbia who studies harassment and power in organizations. In this show we look at what motivates sexual harassment, why anti-harassment trainings don't work, and what we can do about all of it.

Further reading: Tolerating Sexual Harassment - A Personal Reckoning is Jennifer's tale of her own harassment in academia.

The original show's page contains a lot more links to articles. You can read a transcript of the show here. 

Episode 113: What's in a Name

“It’s part of how we’re formed as a society – people assume we’re male unless told otherwise. And that’s interesting and also worrying. ”

— Alev Scott

“Prior to this I had an assumed authority. People seemed to think I was capable of the job they had paid me to do and I guess I’d taken that for granted, because when I was working as Nicole that was often not the case.”

— Martin Schneider

Nicole Hallberg and Martin Schneider

Plenty of us work remotely, known to clients or collaborators by name only. In this show we meet Alev Scott. She's a writer and commentator whose first name means she is often assumed to be a man. We talk about how she deals with that, as well as her distaste for female titles - especially 'Ms.'

I also talk to Martin Schneider and Nicole Hallberg, whom you may have read about earlier this year when their story blew up on Twitter. They swapped names and identities for a week at the office. The results were...revealing. 

Thanks to radio producer Danielle Fox for taping my interview with Nicole and Martin.

Further reading: Alev Scott's FT piece on ambiguous names.

Nicole Hallberg's Medium post on the identity-swapping experiment she and Martin conducted at their office, and a longer piece for Vox in which each writes their side of the story. 

You can also read a transcript of the show. 

Episode 112: Your Weight, Your Worth

“One of the stereotypes is that if you’re overweight you’re lazy, or you’re not smart, or you’re slow. And I have learned to actively prove people wrong. ”

— Christine

Photo by Marie33/iStock / Getty Images

Theresa Thames

Finding a weight-loss DVD in your mailbox, wondering why you didn't get that promotion, or just being told you need to lose weight 'for your health' - these are some of the things today's guests have experienced in the workplace. Amy, Christine and Theresa are or have been overweight, and each has felt judged for it while on the job. They are not alone. In this show, we look at how much being overweight affects a woman's career.  

Further reading: The Stigma of Obesity (University of Connecticut Study)

Obesity Affects Job Prospects for Women (University of Manchester Study)

The Hidden Discrimination Against Being Fat at Work (Fast Company)

You can also read a transcript of the show.

Episode 111: Hiring Hell

“They are looking for more and more out of each individual person that they hire. And this is their way to manage the risk.”

— Allison Hemming

Photo: Zipline Obstacle Course 2 by My Photo Journeys, used with Creative Commons License.

Looking for a job has always been stressful, but the process resembles an obstacle course now more than ever. The time it takes for candidates to get hired has gone up in recent years, according to this study by Glassdoor. A major reason is the many levels of screening job hunters have to go through. But at what point does the interview process become unprofessional, or even inhumane? 

In this show we meet two recent job seekers, Rachel Schallom and Kristen Shattuck, who bring us stories from the trenches, and one recruiter, Allison Hemming of The Hired Guns, who offers some perspective from the company's side of things. 

Further reading: Here's Rachel's piece on how the journalism industry can improve its hiring practices.

You can also read a transcript of the show.

Episode 110: Stress and the Benefits of Being Outside

“I love that we don’t really tend to think of nature as being kind of gender neutralizing or equalizing, and it can be.”

— Florence Williams

florence williams

In this show I talk to science writer Florence Williams, author of The Nature Fix, about how spending time outside can help lower our stress levels and allow us to gain perspective on daily problems. Most of us live and work in urban environments, spending hours a day in front of a screen. Nothing could be less natural. In this show we talk about how spending time outdoors can improve our lives in multiple ways, and how women can benefit even more than men.

You can also read a transcript of the show.