Women DO Ask for Raises—We Just Aren’t Getting Them

From In Style authored by Claire Wasserman:

“It’s commonly assumed—and accepted as fact—that women don’t ask for raises as often as men do and so they don’t get them. Sheryl Sandberg’s 2013 bestseller Lean In told us that (and got a lot of flak for it), as did 2007’s Women Don’t Ask, one of the most heralded books on negotiation, and even a sickeningly titled study out of Harvard in 2003: “Nice Girls Don’t Ask.”Well, new research out of Harvard has totally flipped the script: Women DO ask for salary increases as often as men do, it found. They’re just not getting them.”

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The Different Words We Use to Describe Male and Female Leaders

From Harvard Business Review authored by David G. Smith, Judith E. Rosenstein, and Margaret C. Nikolov:

“We like to think of ourselves as unbiased and objective in our employment decisions, but with two equal candidates, who are you going to promote? Someone who is described in their performance evaluations as analytical or someone who is described as compassionate? On the other end of the employment spectrum, if you’re downsizing and have to fire someone and the two people in jeopardy are very similar, who are you going to fire? Someone perceived as arrogant or someone perceived as inept? Leadership attributions in performance evaluations are powerful.

A unique and fascinating data set allowed us to explore the language used to describe individuals in subjective performance evaluations and provides evidence that, as we suspected, language in performance evaluations is applied differently to describe men and women. We analyzed a large-scale military dataset (over 4,000 participants and 81,000 evaluations) to examine objective and subjective performance measures that included a list of 89 positive and negative leadership attributes that were used to assess leader performance in a military leadership setting.

The military provides an interesting and significant setting to evaluate gender bias as it is a long-standing and traditionally male profession that has, over several decades, worked to eliminate formal gender segregation and discrimination. For performance evaluations specifically, the military has long been predicated on meritocratic ideals of fairness and justice providing equal opportunity regardless of demographics. The top-down enforcement of equal employment opportunity policies, hierarchical organization by military rank and not social status characteristics, and recent total gender integration in all occupations are hallmarks of meritocratic organizations where we might expect less gender bias in performance evaluations.

In our analysis we found no gender differences in objective measures (e.g., grades, fitness scores, class standing), which is consistent with prior research. However, the subjective evaluations provided a wealth of interesting findings.”

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Yes, Impostor Syndrome Is Real. Here’s How to Deal With It

From TIME authored by Abagail Abrams:

“Have you ever felt like you don’t belong? Like your friends or colleagues are going to discover you’re a fraud, and you don’t actually deserve your job and accomplishments?

If so, you’re in good company. These feelings are known as impostor syndrome, or what psychologists often call impostor phenomenon. An estimated 70% of people experience these impostor feelings at some point in their lives, according to a review article published in the International Journal of Behavioral Science. Impostor syndrome affects all kinds of people from all parts of life: women, men, medical students, marketing managers, actors and executives.”

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The Invisible Workload Of Motherhood Is Killing Me

From Scary Mommy authored by Erin Pepler:

“Ask any mom about the invisible workload of motherhood and she knows exactly what you’re talking about.

It’s the things we do for our families that are necessary but go completely unnoticed. The endless list of small tasks that would only ever draw attention if they didn’t happen. The mental weight of doing it all, remembering it all, feeling every emotion in your family and worrying, constantly.”

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To The Girl Who Hasn’t Been Herself Lately

From Bright Mind authored by Megan Sutton:

“Life gets tough. Life gets too much to handle sometimes, and those times make you stronger. However, right now, it seems like you have lost yourself.

It’s difficult when you catch yourself not being you. When you do something or act a certain way and just wonder, “what did I do to deserve this? Why is this happening? When will it get better?” The way you’re feeling is not so much that you’re unhappy, you just feel weird.

Your day will come. I promise you. This is just a phase.

The day you realize how much you have grown from this point in time will be your reward. It is so hard to see now, and I feel your pain.

Your light will return to you. Your pure bliss moments, they are seeking you. Your laughter where your tummy aches is in your reach.

Our moods change far too often for us as humans to understand why, but the encounters you make every day have this effect on us.”

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How to Get Over “Vacation Guilt” and Actually Enjoy Your Time Off

From the muse authored by Suzanne Gelb:

“Forty percent of Americans leave unused paid vacation time on the table every year. Why? People are afraid of being replaced or they’re afraid of their work piling up while they’re gone.

These fears are understandable, but most of the time, they’re not grounded in reality. They’re what psychologists like me call irrational fears. They may feel true, but generally, they’re not.

Here’s what is actually true: Taking a vacation is extremely good for you—and for your employer, too.”

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Research: Women Ask for Raises as Often as Men, but Are Less Likely to Get Them

From Harvard Business Review authored by Benjamin Artz, Amanda Goodall, and Andrew J. Oswald:

“It’s a concrete fact that women earn less than men do. The true gender pay-gap is not known with certainty, but, when comparing equally qualified people doing the same job, most estimates by labor economists put it at 10% – 20%.  The crucial question remains its cause. One common explanation is that women are less likely to negotiate their salaries. We’ve seen this in both bestselling business memoirs like Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In and in previous studies like the research-based Women Don’t Ask.

Gaining access to a more recent, and more detailed, dataset allowed us to investigate this question anew. What we found contradicts previous research. The bottom line of our study is that women do “ask” just as often as men. They just don’t “get.”

Even we were surprised by the results. We had expected to find less asking by the females. Instead, we found that, holding background factors constant, women ask for a raise just as often as men, but men are more likely to be successful. Women who asked obtained a raise 15% of the time, while men obtained a pay increase 20% of the time. While that may sound like a modest difference, over a lifetime it really adds up.”

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Five Bookkeeping Tips for Lawyers

Contribution from our SPONSOR ZipBooks authored by Jaren Nichols, Chief Operating Officer at ZipBooks. Jaren was previously a Product Manager at Google and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Is your business growing? Is it healthy? Without sound income statements, those can be uncomfortable questions. But I get it: I haven’t met a business owner yet who launched her business because she wanted to keep pristine accounting records.

At my company, ZipBooks, we’ve built modern accounting and reporting software that I actually love using! Once we released the product, I anointed myself our company’s bookkeeper. But small businesses tend to hurtle ahead — and even with ZipBooks, in the first few years I often found myself embarrassingly behind.

Fortunately, I’ve learned five steps to stay on top of your books and use your financial reports to know what’s going on—and how to help your business grow.

Be a business manager, not just an accountant

Powerful financial reports should be used for more than simply filing taxes. Should you invest more in marketing? Do you have high fixed costs or mostly marginal costs? How has your business changed over the last year?

Your financial reports reflect the health of your business. When done right, they also highlight aspects to change or areas to invest. I recommend first creating a meaningful chart of accounts (sales and expense categories). This is hard to change later, and a good set of accounts will give you rich insights to specific portions of your business. Next, create reports that help you highlight progress and compare against past months and quarters.

With a seamless system set up, your desire to use financial reports to manage effectively will naturally keep you up to date on your books.

Choose the right bank and credit accounts

Yes, you do need to open a business bank account to keep your personal and professional finances separate. You know that. But how many accounts should you have? Here are two questions—if the answers to both are yes, then consider opening a new account:

  • Cash received or spent goes through a new person, location, or process
  • Reports on each division are helpful for managing

For example, a consolidated report across 3 offices blurs rich, essential information. It’s far easier to create accurate, powerful reports if each office has its own checking account.

Anticipate trust accounting, IOLTA, or other complications

A client trust account requires a different bank account and requires specialized bookkeeping. Work with a CPA or trust accounting expert to check early if your business requires (or will require in the future) special expertise.

Reconcile monthly

When I’m behind, I frequently fear the catch-up work, so I procrastinate it even further!  It can turn into a vicious cycle that can be costly and time-consuming to get out of. Accounting is one thing you don’t want to delay: it can cost you real money.

About a year ago, I kicked off nearly identical advertising campaigns on two ad providers. Then, I neglected our bookkeeping. Focusing on other things, I didn’t circle back to update our reports for 8 weeks. I regularly checked the advertising expense on each platform, but after reconciling our sales, I learned that there was a clear winner (spoiler: Google ads worked better for us than  Facebook ads). And it was a clear winner after the second week.

If I’d kept on top of my books, I would have known that two weeks in — and saved myself six weeks worth of Facebook advertising expenses.

Build to scale

As a business owner, things don’t get less busy. When you’re starting or redoing something, plan for where your business will be in 6 – 12 months. Whether you identify reports to review regularly, find easy-to-use software, or outsource a professional bookkeeper, assume you’ll have less time than you do now.

At ZipBooks, we’ve built modern accounting software for business owners. With simple, powerful reporting you can check the overall health of your business or jump to the details with a simple click.

Our professional bookkeepers are experts with trust accounting and other specialized needs for lawyers. Feel free to reach out anytime with any accounting and reporting questions. Or, add your personal ZipBooks bookkeeper to your team through Girl Attorney and we’ll give you 10% off—forever.

 

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5 Kennedy-authored Supreme Court rulings that changed America

From CNN authored by Eric Levenson and  Emanuella Grinberg:

“Name a major political issue from the past few decades, and chances are that Justice Anthony Kennedy authored the landmark decision on it during his time on the Supreme Court.

Since his ascension to the court in 1988, Kennedy has authored some of the judicial body’s biggest rulings of the past few decades, for both conservative and liberal positions. Here’s a look at five of those decisions that deeply impacted the course of America’s political, cultural and social life.”

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How a Gift From Kate Spade Helped This Young Woman Succeed at Her First Big Job

From TIME authored by Alix Langone:

“Tassion Minor was gearing up for her upcoming summer internship in New York City when she realized she didn’t have many office-ready outfits in her closet at home in New Orleans.

“I was being exposed to different professional opportunities, many of which required me to dress in business attire, but at the time my wardrobe was lacking in that,” Minor, who was 19 at the time, said. “And money was also tight.”

But Kate Spade helped her change that. Thanks to the fashion designer, she had a small collection of designer clothes — colorful dresses, blazers and a statement-making red purse — by the time she started her internship at the pharmaceutical company Pfizer in New York. Spade, who committed suicide in her Manhattan apartment earlier this week, had donated to the PoweHERful foundation, a non-profit founded by journalist-turned-CEO Soledad O’Brienthat helps young women graduate from college through mentorship and financial assistance.”

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