This Is Woman's Work with Nicole Kalil - 136 / Mean Girls with Caroline Adams Miller

Episode Date: May 3, 2023

I often challenge men to be open, curious, to truly LISTEN, to not be so defensive… and now it’s our turn. Friends, buckle up, because we’re going full throttle on the bullshit that WOMEN do. The second I met Caroline Adams Miller, I just KNEW she needed to be our guest for this conversation. Caroline is a well-respected expert, whose scientific approach to change fosters lasting success in organizations and individuals. She has a Masters of Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University. The author of eight books, including Getting Grit, Creating Your Best Life, and My Name is Caroline, Caroline’s work has been featured worldwide and she’s here today to help me, not just to have the discussion, but to provide that scientific, research-backed data so we’re not just talking “in theory” about the things that aren’t working for us, but providing concrete evidence of it. Are you just a grown up Mean Girl? Are you going silent on the women in your life? What might you be doing that’s comfortable and convenient for you, but isn’t in support of other women?  It’s time for us to be open and curious. It’s time for us to check ourselves. And, because this conversation is so good and so necessary, we’ve made it a two-part episode. Meet us here next week for Part 2 of this conversation. To learn more about Caroline you can visit her website at www.carolinemiller.com or follow her on IG @carolineadamsmiller and @cultivatingeliteorganizations or on Twitter @carolinemcoach To learn more about what we are up to outside of this podcast, visit us at NicoleKalil.com.

This is a public service announcement asking you to buckle up if you're in your car, clip in if you're on your bike, grab onto the heaviest piece of furniture if you're getting things done around the house, whatever you need to do, because you are about to be blown away. I am Nicole Kalil, and I bet you can tell just by the title of this podcast that I consider myself an advocate for women. I believe firmly that the notion of woman's work being restricted to the home and child raising is a thing of the past. I believe women, men, and any gender identity should decide for themselves what lights them up, what feels true and right for them, and how they want to show up, be seen, and do work in this world. And for some

women, that does mean choosing to work inside the home and focus fully on raising children. And I respect that choice just as much as I respect the choice to not get married, not have children, be career focused, or the choice to do all of that or none of that. It's your life. You're the only person who gets to, who has to live it. So I support, coach, encourage, ask questions, advocate, and sometimes just lose my shit and go full rant on this belief that I have. Women's equality, equity, rights, and choice are the hills I'm willing to die on. I often say, because it's true, that I don't advocate for women at the expense of men or other genders. Having said that, I acknowledge that some of our episodes being so pro-women might come across as anti-men. I have to trust

that my regular listeners know my intentions and I have to be willing to check in with myself if and when I may over-rotate. Last week's episode was about debunking a few of the success theories, business models, and one-size-fits fits all approaches to life and work. And since we still live in a time where most of those approaches have been created by and for men, I ultimately challenged some of the more masculine ways of doing things. I'll say it again for the people who need to hear it. I am not anti-men or even anti-masculine. The message I'm trying to send is that we've over-rotated to the masculine and we are all out of balance. There is value in the feminine for all genders and we aren't serving women when the popular and trending messages are not inclusive of them.

I don't think I over-rotated last week. You may or may not agree, but I will acknowledge that my focus was on women and the feminine. And I challenged or maybe attacked some of those more masculine ways of doing things that frankly just drive me nuts. So in order to be fair and create balance on today's episode of This Is Woman's Work, I'm going to challenge the feminine. I'm going to challenge women. And I love women. I advocate for women. I believe so strongly in the value, strengths, and power of women. I truly do think that we'll be the ones to change the world. And sometimes we just suck. There are things that we do that make me crazy. There are patterns and approaches I see us doing in life and in business

that are not and will not serve us. And it's time to call them out and challenge them too, just like we do with the masculine. This may be a tough one, but I've often challenged men to be open, to be curious, to truly listen, and to not be so defensive. So now it's our turn. Friends, buckle up because we're going full throttle on challenging some of the more feminine, one-size-fits-all bullshit that we all do. My intention was to do this alone, but then I was introduced to Caroline Miller by our mutual connection, Erica Rooney, and I knew she needed to be our guest for this conversation. And I did something I've never done before.

I set this up as a two-part episode because once she and I got to talking, we couldn't stop. And I knew we'd never fit this into one 30-minute show. So here's part one of our two-part discussion. First, let me introduce her. Caroline Adams Miller is a well-respected expert on goals and grit, whose scientific, that word is going to be important, whose scientific approach to change fosters lasting success in organizations and individuals. individuals, leaders, and companies learn and integrate the science of goal accomplishment. Caroline has a master's of applied positive psychology from the University of Pennsylvania and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University. So she's a smart cookie.

She is the author of eight books, which blasts my mind because doing one was really hard, including Getting Grit, Creating Your Best Life, and My Name is Caroline. which blasts my mind because doing one was really hard, including getting grit, creating your best life, and my name is Caroline. Caroline's work has been featured worldwide, and she's here today to help me not just have the discussion, but to provide that scientific research-backed data, so we're not just guessing or talking in theory about these things that aren't working for us, but providing some concrete evidence of it. Caroline, thank you for joining me today. I'm excited for this conversation. Me too. Boy, did you set that one up. I am a martial artist. I am ready to roll. My black belt is itching. Here we go. Here we go. All right. Let's dive in. Okay. So I wanted to start by asking, because I have a list,

obviously, what are a few of the biggest things you're seeing that women are doing that just don't work or that are harmful to us and other women or ultimately that you think just need to stop? Oh boy, am I glad this is a two-parter. I mean, I won't be able to go through my list of things that really bothered me and that I've looked into the research on, but, you know, standing out most prominently is mean girls never age out. They just get older. And so I think this idea that we become wiser, older, sisterhood is all embracing is crap. I continue to see women undermining other women, particularly successful, ambitious, proud, standout women. And so that's one thing. I'm sick to death of women getting on the podcast

and panels and talking about how they support other women, how they mentor them, how they sponsor them, how they're allies, when in fact, behind the scenes, I'm told by people who know that this is not a fact, that they are not actually doing this. So that's another thing, saying that you are part of a sisterhood that embraces and supports. I also hate the fact that we're not allowed to talk about this very difficult issue of women undermining other women. And I think the less we are allowed to or want to hear about it, the less likely we are to fix it. And for me, the house is on fire. For me, the statistics show that women are surging backwards in key areas. So I think we have to open our ears and stop being such delicate cabergé eggs, thinking we can only talk about

patriarchy hurting us. We have to talk about the issue of women undermining other women. So we have to open our ears, close our mouths and listen and be open to change. I also hate the fact that we continue to believe in scarcity theory, that there's only one seat at the table. Yes, there's biological wiring to this, and we can go into that later. But the fact of the matter is in many situations, there are more than one, two, three seats at the table, but we continue to act as if there are not. And because we act as if there are not, we continue to be sure that there are very few seats at the table. I also think we have to go beyond having a seat at the table. We have to speak up and be heard for God's sake. We have

to stop allowing other women to get interrupted on and on without doing anything to fix that. And there's research on what happens when we as women witness other women being shushed, silenced, mansplained, and then do nothing about it. I also think like you, I've been speaking out for years about the fact that too often we are given these bromides and advice on how to succeed, how to be humble, how to do this, how to do that. And once I dove into the research, I realized that it was research that worked for white men and nobody else. And we have to stop buying into this advice without scrutinizing it, without asking questions. How do you know this is true? Where's the research that shows it works for more than one kind of person? There are so many high school musicals in their spring season right now that are doing Mean Girls

as their show. Now, have you ever, ever heard of a show that was about men undermining other men who were successful, that were on high school stages, opening at the Kennedy Center, television series, on Broadway. No. I mean, we continue to put forward the idea that that's just the way women are, and we're doing it culturally in our shows, in the way we talk, in what we watch in terms of Real Housewives, we are feeding the machine that is taking us down. I couldn't agree more. And I'm kind of in that stage with my nine year old daughter where I'm like paying attention to what she's watching. And like, there are some of it that that makes me nauseous. Like, I'm like, how do I tell her she can't watch that without

telling her she can't watch that and her rebelling and then really wanting to watch it because there is so much crap out there. And I know, like, again, everybody gets to decide for themselves, but I refuse to watch the, you know, Real Housewives, the Bachelorettes, the, all the stuff that I'm like, okay, I get that it's entertaining, but it's entertaining in a way that makes women look like idiots. It makes us look catty. It sends the message. There's this one guy that we should all go for that, you know, that one seat at the table, that one opportunity, we're all fighting the backstabbing, the gossiping, the green eyed monsters, the comparison, the, and I'm like, I mean, it's enough to not fall into that trap on let's call it like just social media or life or at work. Why the actual fuck do we choose to watch this stuff on a

regular basis? Okay. If you're listening and you watch that stuff, God love you. I'm going to challenge you to think about what the value is. So, okay. Rant over. I want to circle back. The first thing I wrote down that you said was about mean girls. You kind of said this, but I want to reiterate. Are women really mean to other women, or does that actually stop in childhood? Is there research data that supports this idea of, okay, not mean girls, but mean adult grown women? Absolutely. There's all kinds of research. It's, it's a linguistic, it's religious. Um, I'll just give you some examples that I actually was going back and forth with Angela Gopworth and Adam Grant.

It's two people I know from my work at Penn and teaching and work in executive education and just kind of challenging what I'm looking at and saying, first of all, where's the research? Secondly, why are we continuing to do things this way, give out this advice? So there's research on something called kicking and climbing, but it's just eye-opening and upsetting.

And in mostly male-dominated professions, particularly where women say this key phrase, I don't identify as a woman. I'm more like a man. Women who are weakly identified with their gender, particularly when they're in a profession, a field that is mostly male dominated, when you look up and see who has the power here, banking, law, all kinds of industries, finance, in particular finance. I coach a lot of women in finance and it's just a whole other conversation. Anyway, so what you see is kicking and climbing. You do not see women climbing and lifting. And it's just another conversation. Anyway, so what you see is kicking and climbing,

you do not see women climbing and lifting. And so the kicking and climbing occurs where they look up these women who say I'm more like a man than a woman, I don't like being being around women. And what they do is instead of mentoring other women, they kick them. And so one of the biggest mistakes that companies make is always assigning a female mentor, if in fact there is a mentoring program, a female mentor to an up and coming other woman in some kind of, let's just take law, for example. I think law is where this research started. Because what happens is there's no shepherding. Now, we're speaking in generalities here. There are exceptions to everything. But what you don't see is that these women are guiding them, are speaking up for them,

are sponsoring them, are opening doors to them, pulling them onto boards. What you see is kicking. Where you see something called climbing and lifting is in professions or countries, Scandinavian countries, where women look up and they see that women are the prime minister. Women have the power. Women are making they see that women are the prime minister, women have the power, women are making the laws, women are the judges, women are the ones who are the managing partners of these firms, women are the head of the bank. And what you find is that there is more of something called climbing and lifting. So yes, there is research, particularly in the professional arena,

on the fact that there are mean girls in some professions are worse than others. So that's just one example. We have in religions, we have things like honor killing. So I'm looking across, I spent six years looking at research that was bio-social, cultural, linguistic, religious, historical, psychological. I just one by one said, if I'm going to talk about this issue, I better have my ducks in a row because everyone is an N of one. Everyone has an opinion. Everybody says, oh, I can't believe that happened because it didn't happen to me. Or something I always hear, which is my best friends are women. I couldn't do it without my women friends.

All of that's irrelevant. You have to actually sit down and look at what is the research. So let's just look at religion. In many religions, too many to even contemplate, women who speak up, women who go against the patriarchal grain, and who actually dare to have their own opinion, get their hair cut, not wear a burqa, etc., etc., what you see are honor killings that are actually spearheaded by some of the adult women in that religion. So you see women being mean girls, essentially to their own tribes, their own professions, in villages, in families, in cults.

Take a look at, I was just kind of transfixed by NXIVM, Heath Ranieri having women, Alison Mack and other women feeding him young women to abuse. I mean, I started to see this trend of men at the head of these groups with women, Ghislaine Maxwell, feeding them young women to abuse. So mean girls, well, that's too extreme. But where was the protection? Where was the mentoring? Where was the taking care of them? And then one last thing I'll say is look at Andrew Cuomo, governor of New York. So when some young women who were sexually harassed by him filed these lawsuits or just initially filed complaints, I remember reading a New York Times article describing the situation with these young vulnerable women, new, low in power,

in the office. And what the New York Times had in quotes was the mean girl around Andrew Cuomo just devalued these women, made fun of them, essentially excommunicated them, stopped talking to them. And culturally, that is the oldest form of punishment that exists. And women are really damn good at it, is shunning other women. And the reason why it is so painful for women to be shunned, to be made fun of, to be thrown out of the tribe is because as women, we have oxytocin that is secreted when we are nursing, you know, our youth, when we're taking care of other women, it's called the tend and befriend reflex. So other women instinctively know that the worst thing you can do to another woman is to be a mean girl who shuns and throws another woman or girl

out of a tribe. So when the New York Times did this whole thing on Andrew Cuomo's office, and I saw that Melissa DeRosa, his head of staff, who'd gotten an award, she'd gotten an award from the state of New York for, you know, the main woman of the year of the National Organization of Women, was like, what the hell is going on here? And furthermore, why are there no comments in the section in the New York Times, or even comment on an article challenging the use of the word mean girls. None. I went and looked.

We accept this as normal. We accept it as normal. We expect it. And we never warn young girls to expect incoming fire for the rest of their lives. We take incoming fire for the rest of our lives.

And the unspoken rule is, I took it. You should take it too. We're not taking care of our lives. And the unspoken rule is I took it. You should take it too. We're not taking care of our own. Or even it didn't happen to me. So I can't believe it happened to you. And it's like, dude, congratulations, I guess that it didn't happen to you. But this, you know, the overwhelming evidence of when it is happening. And I just watched surviving R. Kelly and I was blown away by these women standing in front of the courthouse free R. Kelly. And I'm like, oh my goodness. I mean, there is video. Couldn't be any clearer evidence. And I just, I don't understand that. You also mentioned religion.

And I often think of in Christianity, the women are either the virgin or the whore. It's like there's this, and there is no way you can convince me that Mary Magdalene was a whore. There is no historical evidence that, I mean, if anything, the historical evidence proves the contrary. This was an educated, privileged woman. Anyway, sorry. Well, if we're going to talk about religion, I have to throw out there this very popular series on Hulu, Under the Banner of Heaven, that brilliant, brilliant work by the guy who wrote Into Thin Air. I forget his name all of a sudden, but it was about the birth of Mormonism. And it started with Joseph Smith choosing to take these underage 13, 14 year old neighbors, daughters,

wives, daughters as his wives. And the number one spelling magnet in Utah is be sweet. And that's about women choosing not to be confrontational, choosing not to have an opinion, but basically the men are, what's it called? The priesthood holders. So we continue to have these religions that create this unreal kind of image of women being sweet, compliant, not speaking up, et cetera, et cetera, which only feeds the beast of a woman who's ambitious and proud and successful being the, essentially the antichrist. And it comes from both men and women. So it is, it is something, if we don't do something about it, we're all going to continue to pull our punches and hide our successes. And what good is

that for the next generation of women? Right. So that was going to be one of my questions is that, or kind of the talking points is that women are supporting the patriarchy oftentimes, and as much as men are, and a patriarchy isn't men, it's the system, It's the beliefs. It's the language that keeps men in positions of dominance and privilege. So I think women can be participants in the patriarchy just as much as men. And I think men can fight against the patriarchy just as much as women. It's just an interesting dichotomy. But what I want to do is take it from some of these big things that I don't know if it's just me, but it feels so big and so complex. And I go, I'm one person. What's the difference I can make? So what, if we take it down to maybe the individual or personal level, what are some

ways that we're not supporting women or that we need to reconsider or some ways that we could be better supporting the women in our day-to-day lives? Yeah, great question. And this is where I took myself as I went from, and I'll tell you the story later about why this finally just the tipping point came and I hit pause and said, I have to do something about this. I think there are two things that women and girls could do starting very young. One is the minute another woman or female gets a piece of good news or has a success or even has a big idea, instead of changing the subject, instead of being tepid, instead of kind of having a deprecating kind of conversation where you make fun of it, or you're even actively destructive of that idea or that good news, be two things, curious and

enthusiastic. This is an evidence-based approach that Shelly Gable at the University of California, Santa Barbara, has discovered that is key. And the research that I, that just changed my life is called what happens between friends when things go right. And so if we could start being curious and enthusiastic, now it's going to be hard. You have to train yourself. It has to become habitual that when you hear another woman's good news, you're excited. You're curious. You say, tell me more, even if it's killing you inside, because you want that to happen for you. And you think, wow, she got a piece of pie. So I can't get a piece of pie. Men think, oh, he got a piece of pie. Where's my pie? I'm going to go get me some pie. We just assume that her win is our loss. So I think we can be curious and enthusiastic. And there's a lot of research on what happens when we actually do that. The second

is when somebody posts something on, actually I can think of three things, post something on LinkedIn about their success, immediately hit like and share it with somebody else. Spread that news because we get found as women most often on social media. Our work gets found, our thoughts get found, our wares get found, our businesses get found through social media. And too often what happens is women go deadly silent when they see another woman's success. So many women have told me that they put something on Facebook about their children going to space camp. They'll get 150 likes and just, oh, you know, claps and congratulations. And if they put, you know, my podcast was just carried on an international airline. This is a true story, by the way, an international airline. And this woman happened

to be head of a huge organization of women entrepreneurs. Everyone went silent and no one congratulated her, but her kids went to space camp and not just that all kinds of applause. So think of the ways in which women begin to play small. And we play small. And this again, is research. We play small because not because we don't have confidence. It's because we don't know who has our bone. And we're afraid of being thrown out of the tribe all the time. Because we are thrown out of the tribe all the time. So those are two things. The minute you hear another woman or girl, good news or big idea, immediately be curious and enthusiastic. The second is if you see somebody who's been successful somewhere online, hit like and tell that story. And, you know, there's even, well, I could go on and on., it so speaks to my personal experience, this women go silent. What is that? Do you have any understanding of why that happens? Are we socialized that way? Because that has been my experience. When I, example, launched my book, I had mentally prepared myself for getting one star and two star reviews.

I knew it wasn't going to be for everybody. And like I was, what I was not prepared for was the lack of reviews. I know how many of my books have been sold up to this point. And it, and again, that not everybody's read it right away or whatever, but like, I know how many people listen to this podcast. I see the downloads. I have directly asked people to write reviews that I know haven't. I have asked people on this show, please take five seconds, five freaking seconds. If you're listening to this free content that we spend hours and I spend so much money putting out there. If it's writing value, even if it's not write a review and I mean, don't write a false review, right? What's true for

you. I can take the one stars and the two stars and the, you don't like me. And it's, um, the going silent. It's like, I'll just say personally, a very painful experience. I said on a episode that launched recently, our podcast is in the top 2% of all podcasts globally. I know. Amazing. Thank you. Curious, enthusiastic right there. But I had like maybe four or five people reach out and was like, Oh my God, amazing. So exciting. So proud of you. And that felt really good, but four or five people. So Caroline, what the fuck is this going silent thing that we do? I know. Well, I'll just throw in one of my stories, and I've got dozens too, but it breaks my heart that something that huge happened to you. And I'm sure family members didn't say anything.

Close friends said nothing. Because quite often, it's some of the people closest to us who go silent the fastest. There was an article about me in Swimmer Magazine. I'm a master swimmer. And it was featured on the front of Swimmer Magazine. It was in the table of contents. And it was about how I overcame bulimia 40 years ago. And I'm still in recovery and advocating for us to talk more about it so that we can stop

losing female elite athletes or even average athletes at such a young age to such a devastating disorder. And I just came from swim practice and I have to tell you in the last two months, and I know lots of people read it, two people said something and they all get it, right? So isn't that interesting? I've just learned to expect it. So why do women do it? It's called stereotype threat. You are violating the norms of being a woman. Little girls grow up hearing stories about other women being selfless, taking care of others, being the heads of nonprofits, being affiliative. Little boys grow up hearing stories of goal setting, of aggression, of winning. And so the minute a woman dares to step out and get attention, be proud, succeed, she has now unconsciously or consciously

violated the norms of being a woman. And the unspoken phrase to go along with this is, how dare she? How dare she? And who does she think she is? And to go along with this is, how dare she? How dare she? And who does she think she is? And so a piece of this is called bio-social theory. This is what we're socialized to believe is that women don't go after big things. And God forbid if they do. I remember reading about Hillary Clinton after she lost the election to Donald Trump. There was a big article in New York or Atlantic, and basically it said she had gone around before

running for the office. And this is not, I don't care what you think about either one of the candidates. I just don't. What I care about is what she was told by the historians, the psychologists, and everybody she interviewed, what should I expect in running for the most powerful job in the world? And they all said that she would be despised and reviled and made fun of and dehumanized and devalued and turned into some evil. What was the word? Screeching or whatever was used to, you know, her voice. Why? Because she was daring to go after power. This is something that women are consciously and unconsciously acculturated not to do.

And if you do, you're in trouble. So what happened? She lost. We all know that. What happened? All these women flocked to her side. Oh, I'm so sorry. How can I help you? I wish I'd voted for you. I didn't think

it would be this close. So this is what women do really, really well. This tend and befriend when women are hurting, when they, you know, had surgery and this casserole brigade starts or something bad happens, your boyfriend, you know, you lose your boyfriend, women just glom onto you and they tend to you and they befriend you because that is our wiring. But what's missing, what's missing is the opposite. We do not have wiring for believe and achieve. We do not have wiring or role modeling to glom onto women when they are believing in themselves and achieving. And so all this research on competence and imposter syndrome, the truth of the matter really is, even though there's some truth to that research, is that we women know that if we succeed at

something, we're going to be left out in the cold. And that is a painful place to be because of the oxytocin that forces through our body. It is anti-chemical to us to put ourselves in that situation. So we don't know where there's a soft place to fall. And we need to be in strategically formed mastermind groups. That is the only solution I've been able to find after years of looking at the research. But that's what we do. Shelley Gable also did research on what happens in the workplace when people have success. And not just friends,

what happens between friends when things go right. In the workplace, she found the most common response is from women to other women, and that is to go silent. And that's just some of the research. Trust me, there's a lot,

and I actively footnoted my most recent book about it. but that's painful for me to hear about you. That's really painful because you have so many followers. You have made such a difference and you should be drowning in applause and enthusiasm. And the fact that you're not just proves our point, right? Well, and I will also say that I do my best to applaud, to share, to, and I haven't always done that. I was, you know, in the early stages

of my career, the woman who said I'm more like a man. And it took me a while to recognize the part I was playing. And even women that I don't like personally, or I don't like if somebody does something big, I'm going to acknowledge the big thing they did, the risk they took. And I think that that's so important. But what you said really resonated with me. Yes, women show up for each other during the tough times and the hard things. And that's a beautiful thing. And what if we showed up equally as much for when women are chasing big dreams and taking big risks and doing really incredible things? I love what you said. Men say, oh, there's pie. How do I get my pie? Like ladies, let's go get more pie. Let's be curious and enthusiastic. It is a pie fest around here.

And lean in. When you see a woman who's successful, when you see a woman who has what you want, move towards her, not away from her. Move towards her, not away from her. On that mic drop moment, I'm going to cut in and close out part one of this two-part episode.

I always try to keep our episodes to around 30 minutes or less because I know as women, time is the commodity you never seem to have enough of. So go do the things on your to-do list. Go get shit done. Go conquer the world, create life, raise humans, provide for and nurture your people, return the calls, go on the date, plan your wedding or work your business plan. Go do whatever it is that you do. And while I may not know the specifics of your life, I know that you have a lot on your plate and I'm cheering for you, rooting for you and loving on you while you do it. I'm also going to challenge you to do a little less of it because I promise the wheels won't fall off and you might actually create time to rest or do something you really

love. And while you're doing what you do, I'm going to ask that you think about this first part of our conversation today. What hit you the hardest? What might've even bothered you or pissed you off? Because I find that sometimes when I hear a truth that I really need to hear, my first reaction is to want to reject it. I'm going to ask you to sit with it and ask yourself, what might I be doing that isn't serving me? And what might I be doing that isn't in support of other women? And meet us here next week for part two of this conversation. If you can't wait till next week to find and follow Caroline Adams Miller, trust me, I get it. And you

can go to her website, carolinemiller.com, which you can find in show notes along with other ways to find her. Now let's begin. Be curious and enthusiastic. No more going silent on each other because women supporting women, well, for fuck's sake, that is absolutely, ultimately, and positively woman's work.