Please be prepared to review the following: Prepare this from your perspective. We will use the meeting to debate and set Q3 but bring what you think should be your top priorities. This is not a "to do list" but where you need to focus. These priorities must guide you throughout the quarter. There will be lots of "to do's" beneath each.
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Historical Review - create a report card - grade yourself on your top priorities that we set in Q2
Do we carry any of Q2 priorities forward that we did not complete in Q2 or need to continue as a priority
Set the top three Priorities for Q3
First of all, there seems to be something unmistakably "female management" about this meeting request. Second, what a pain in the ass. I mean, what the fuck am I supposed to say?? "I give myself an A, because I did pretty well considering that your support team, DIDN'T, and the outside reps are SHITE!" (Yes, I know that I fucked some, SOME, as in a FEW, things up. Most notably my biggest fuckup was to assume that telling people things in person or over the phone counts as communication). Third, FUUUCK!
I have a pretty good boss. I like her. I would definitely have a crush on her if she were much younger and I were younger. But right now I can't even stand the sight of her.
Speaking of female management, I am told that in large companies, female bosses are great to have, unless you are female yourself. The women bosses tend to be nitpicking control freaks to women, but they don't try that shit with men. With men they are more accomodating and understanding. Also known as "fair". I can't say that this is true or not, though. I can't ask anyone here about that because the only women here currently that might have ever been in that situation are the Marketing Women, and I'm not about to ask them. I suspect that it would be quite different in smaller companies, especially female-owned ones. Any comments on this?
UPDATE: For everyone's edification, the "female management" adjective refers to the communication-driven, soul-searching corporate crap that female managers are supposed to excel at. No, the exercise isn't futile, unless all we do is talk, talk, talk without actually saying or doing anything.
Please explain the term "female management" for my edification.
I have worked for women, and I have had women work for me. Maybe it's my line of work, but I've never seen a difference. I've been treated with kid gloves by men of a certain age because they either refuse to accept that I can be intelligent with breasts or they think I will burst into tears if I am reprimanded. Women (again, of a certain age, usually first-wave feminists) tend to expect more of a woman subordinate because we are "representing" the entire sex. I don't buy into that bullshit. Some women are detail/communication oriented, some are not. Same with men.
What you say makes sense to me; it's what I would have thought if I didn't have people telling me otherwise, leading me to question things. Men and women are individually different, but corporations don't really take individuals into account. The larger the company is, the more they rely on finding people in profiles, rather than just finding people. Maybe I should have mentioned profiles or archetypes rather than women and men. The questions would then be, "Does the female management profile/archetype tend to treat female subordinates unfairly more often than male ones?" and "Does this archetype do better at corporate communication than a male equivalent?"
They say that women tend towards marketing more than software development because women are better communicators. That may be true on a person level, but at the corporate level? I am not so sure. Can you tell when a press release is written by a man and when it is written by a woman? Me neither.