Do the Women You Lead Receive Good or Really Great Career Advice?

I've just audited all the workshops, summits, seminars and webinars I've facilitated in 2023. I have done this because when I work with women, I ask them specific questions to frame up the leadership development content I share with them. Notably, I ask women about the types of career advice they have been given, and then work out if its good advice, or really great advice.

What is Your Best Career Advice?

One of the questions I ask women is, what is the best career advice you have ever received? 

And that's what I want to ask you to consider when you read this article: 

1. How much great career advice are women being given by their managers, mentors, coaches and other folks trying to help women advance their careers? 
2. Are you giving the best career advice to the women on your team? 

There are three points I want to make before I proceed:

1. Defining what great career advice looks like versus conventional career advice is essential.  
2. Women receive more conventional advice on careers than great career advice.
3. When I discuss career advice directed at women, I'm talking about the coaching, mentoring, training and conferences designed to help women advance their careers.   
   

Great Career Advice Looks Like This

No matter where it originates from, great career advice for women must ensure that they understand the importance of developing critical leadership skills and that she is KNOWN for having these skills. 

What are these leadership skills? They are the skills associated with growing a business, effectively leading yourself, others and organisations, having a strong, trusted professional brand and being a sophisticated networker. 

These skills fall into three categories - Business Intelligence (BQ), Emotional Intelligence (EQ), and Social Intelligence (SQ). 

The skills associated with BQ form more than 50% of the skills criteria for senior managers and beyond, so whilst there are three broad skills categories, it stands to reason that the skills related to BQ should form the lion's share of career advice provided to all people. 

But here's the rub. Women are simply not being given this advice in their coaching, mentoring, training, or other career development experiences. Look at this TED Talk by my colleague Susan Colantuono, which has informed and inspired me (and millions of others) on this topic.

What Women Are Told

Let's go back to my audit. Around 400 women attended one of my formal Advancing Women programs in 2023. I asked the women to record their best career advice and categorise their responses into BQ, EQ, or SQ. Here's what emerged from my audit.

• 70.5% of the advice related to EQ skills
• 25.5% of the advice related to SQ skills
• 4% of the advice related to BQ skills

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Sadly, one woman's response to my question about her best career advice, written on a post-it note, was 

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‍"Literally NONE that sticks out or is helpful. :( " 

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‍Crikey!

Why are women not receiving great advice? Well, there are many reasons, including rigid gender stereotypes, bias, a lack of knowledge about gender dynamics and a lack of inclusive leadership skills. 

Additional research I undertook in 2022 about women's workplace experience shows:

1. 53% of women do not receive mentoring or coaching of any kind
2. 66% of women rate their people leaders' coaching skills as poor or nonexistent
3. 90% of women say not receiving coaching, mentoring, or training has a moderate to material impact on their happiness and engagement at work
4. 40% of women are mildly to very dissatisfied with their career progression
5. 64% of women are mildly to very dissatisfied with their people leaders' approach to their career planning

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out the implications of this data. 

The impact for women is that they are NOT getting complete career advice and, as a result, may be precluded from advancing into roles with more responsibility because they either do not have the right skills or haven't been coached, mentored or trained on how to demonstrate their skills.

The implication for organisations is that their pipeline of talented women is hampered by poor advice, and as a result, closing the leadership gender gap in the organisation is an improbable event.

So I ask you again. Are you giving GREAT career advice to the women you lead, coach and mentor? Or are you giving them conventional advice? 

If you want to know more about how to provide GREAT career advice to the women in your organisation, then let's talk. 

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