Women@Work
in Higher Ed

Today we’re replaying Episode 23, Mentors & Allies: How to be Machiavellian Without Being a Machiavellian, based on Stacey Vanek Smith’s book “Machiavelli for Women.”

Gender discrimination is real. The gendered wage gap is real. The mommy tax is real.

It’s bad for straight white women.

It’s much worse for women with brown and black skin; for lesbians and queer, bi, and trans women; for women whose first langauge is not English; for women who are entering professions as the first in their families or social circles and don’t have allies to support them.

So let’s take a lesson from Machiavelli: look the monster in the face, and determine our best course of action given the lay of the land. Let’s strategize. Not to be brutal, but to lift each other up. 

And let’s take some cues from the book Machiavelli for Women by Stacey Vanek Smith. She identifies four archetypes of nasty female colleagues, and I suggest actionable strategies you can practice this week to protect yourself and the women around you from these types, by being a mentor and an ally.