Insights of Darling, you can’t do both 

and other noise to ignore on your way up

“Darling you can’t do both and other noise to ignore on your way up” is a book written by two successful women in the advertising industry; written by women for women.  Authors Janet Kestin and Nancy Vonk tell the story of how they succeeded in the business world. However, the success they reached was not easy to accomplish because they experienced different issues such as poor self-esteem, gender bias in the working place and balancing their lives while having a family among other things.

Both authors describe not only their path but other successful women's careers they met through their working life. They mention how they struggled through issues that women faced, and how they overcome them mostly because they were breaking the rules without knowing it. These women are now leaders of their own business; but back in time, they worked for an agency named Ogilvy & Mather. The biggest success that they accomplished was a Dove campaign called “Litmus”. They won many awards and were considered as the "ad women of the year".

Janet Kestin and Nancy Vonk.
Retrieved from Infopresse.com

This book shows an interesting point of view of how women are treated in workplaces sometimes because of the bias present in those places, they do not know how to reach their potential.

One impressing story in this book is when they were in an event and one of their mentors answered a question that a young woman addressed to him at the end of the Q and A session. The young woman asked: “Why do you think there are not more women in the creative director’s position? He replied: “Because they are crap, women won’t commit to what it takes to do the job”. The author describes that that moment made her “sickeningly aware of the real impact of sexism”. Gender bias was a real issue and they just wanted to raise their voices against that.

Another important point is that a lot of women stop working with the same passion if they believe they will be off when they decide to have a family and babies. Because they believe that their jobs will not be there for them when they return. Balancing life with family and babies is something that holds back too many women. They believe that they cannot have time for anything else, not networking events or time to meet people. However, they demonstrate with the stories of successful women in the industry that they can do both the successful career and taking care of their family.

One takeaway is women in business need to take risks, not be afraid of making mistakes, ignore all of the stigmas that can hold them back in their careers, learn from their errors, have the security of feeling ready to perform a senior role or being part of a board, be confident and natural, and overall believe that as women they have the same rights than men have.

Another takeaway is by saying that women have the same rights that men have, this means they will earn the same amount of money if they perform the same tasks and if they have the same responsibilities. Additionally, they can request raises or promotions if they believe that their work is valuable enough to get it.

Finally, having a family does not mean that women will lose their expertise and assertiveness that made them good at their jobs. Indeed, as the authors mention in the book most women start to increase their work quality. They start to be more careful and effective because they want to finish their tasks and go home to have quality time with their families. They can perfectly align their personal activities and work interests.

Being a woman in business means bringing your ideas and showing your worth, fight for them respectfully, being mindful and assertive, and demonstrate that they are capable of professionally accomplishing their goals.

Reference:

Kestin, J., Vonk N. (2014). Darling, you can’t do both and other noise to ignore on your way up. First Edition. HarperCollins Publishers Ltd. (pp. 304). Toronto, Ontario, Canada.