She Said, He Repeated
Imagine contributing an idea at a meeting and having it ignored until a man presents the idea as his own, at which point the group takes it seriously. Half of all female architects do not have to imagine having an idea stolen because they have experienced it, an AIA/The Center for WorkLife Law study found. In comparison, less than one-third of male architects surveyed reported an idea-theft. For women, it is such a common occurrence across professions that they have come up with terms for it like “bro-propriation” and “he-peating.”
While the terms are amusing, the root cause and its impacts are not. It is a symptom of the usually unconscious bias resulting in women being considered less competent than men. This can lead to confirmation bias: “We see what we expect to see, so if we were not expecting a great idea to come from a woman, we are less likely to pay attention when it does, leaving the opportunity open for someone else to pick it up and repeat it,” the AIA/The Center for WorkLife Law study authors write.
Not getting credit for ideas can slow career advancement, and not being heard can be alienating. Microaggressions such as these can cause women to leave their firms or even the profession, taking their ideas with them. But there are steps that both firm leaders and other employees can take to correct for these biases.
Leaders can make a point of accurately attributing ideas in real time during meetings, researcher Sean Martin writes. To offset related biases, Martin says, leaders should also actively solicit and amplify women’s ideas, and make sure they give them equal weight at meetings. In addition, both leaders and allies can model good credit-sharing behavior, Amy Gallo writes.
Allies can also call attention to parroted ideas by responding with statements like, “Great idea, but it sounds like you didn’t hear when [female colleague’s name] said the same thing a few minutes earlier.” The idea-thief usually unconsciously processed the idea before repeating it, so he might need the ally to follow up with him after the meeting to help clear up his confusion and make him aware of the biases displayed by his behavior.
Because of deeply ingrained stereotypes, like women work for the common good while men are ambitious, women must often walk a tightrope between advocating for themselves and being considered unlikeable or aggressive. This can make it tricky for women, especially junior women, to claim credit for themselves without facing backlash. Gallo suggests waiting to respond until any anger has subsided, and remembering that the idea-theft is often unconscious rather than malicious. A private conversation might be safer than a public confrontation.
Addressing the chronic problem of men claiming credit for women’s ideas is not the responsibility of the wronged, however. To make a more equitable workplace where everyone’s ideas are heard and appropriately credited, we must all play our part.
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Sources:
“The Notorious Victoria Woodhull Addresses Congress,” 1871 (Library of Congress).
Joan C. Williams, JD, Rachel M. Korn, PhD, Rachel Maas, MPH, “The Elephant in the (Well-Designed) Room: An Investigation into Bias in the Architecture Profession,” AIA/The Center for WorkLife Law, 2021: 41 – 42 and 172 -173.
DongWon Oh, Elinor A. Buck, and Alexander Todorov, “Revealing Hidden Gender Biases in Competence Impressions of Faces.” Psychological Science, Volume 30, Issue 1, January 2019: 65–79.
Sean R. Martin, “Research: Men Get Credit for Voicing Ideas, but Not Problems. Women Don't Get Credit for Either,” Harvard Business Review, November 2, 2017.
Amy Gallo, “How to Respond When Someone Takes Credit for Your Work,” Harvard Business Review, April 29, 2015.