Libby Purves
DO WOMEN lack killer corporate ambition? Is it against our nature to beat our breasts and become top gorilla? Do more men than women become CEOs because, frankly, women aren’t bothered and prefer a balanced life?
Even in a post-Thatcher age, with Theresa May briskly telling alpha-males where they get off, it’s a dangerous question. Say almost anything on the subject and a politically-correct panic explodes.
One such panic has just tipped the chairman of the ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi, Kevin Roberts, out of his office and onto ‘gardening leave’.
Honestly. You’d think the advertising business, of all trades, would be willing to play with all kinds of different ideas. Yet the idea that women lack so-called ‘vertical ambition’ (getting to the top rungs of the ladder) seems not to be one of them.
Indeed, this powerful agency has just shot itself in its expensively shod feet. Bang-slam-ouch! Mr Roberts made a few mildly controversial remarks (in an interview with Australian publication Business Insider) about why he thinks gender bias is pretty much ‘all over’.
He meant in his line of work, not universally: he carefully admitted that in financial services, there are ‘ problems left, right and centre’.
But in Saatchis, he reckoned, the fact women are a minority in senior management might be due to a different kind of ambition: a mindset which — though not universal — is observably more common in women.
This ‘circular ambition’, as he called it, is based on the feeling that it’s more fun chucking ideas around on the shopfloor than labouring in the boardroom among the strategists and bean-counters.
Rather than ‘vertical ambition’ — striving for the very top (which typically brings bigger pay packets and longer hours) — those with circular ambition seek a decent work-life balance and the happiness that competence and experience brings.
You see that often in media: I could show you hugely talented broadcasting producers and performers who shudder at the very idea of top management.
A few are men, though men — ahem! — seem naturally keener on status for its own sake. One example of a man shunning promotion is David Attenborough; he could have been directorgeneral of the BBC but went back to programme making.
Still, in this era of charged political-correctness, Mr Roberts — although talking sense — was unwise to poke this particular hornet’s nest of women leaders and glass ceilings.
Maurice Levy, the head of Saatchi’s parent group, Publicis, instantly flew into a PC panic squeaking: ‘It is for the gravity of these statements that Kevin Roberts has been asked to take a leave of absence from Publicis Groupe.’
Suspended! Board considering ‘further action’! Gravity! He has sinned, says Mr Levy, against ‘a work environment that is inclusive of all talent’.
NO, HE hasn’t sinned. He just pointed out that talent flowers differently and that sometimes women strive for happiness rather than for more power. He told of talented, creative women he had wanted to promote. ‘ When we are ready to make them a creative director . . . we fail in two out of three of those choices because the executive involved said: “I don’t want to manage a piece of business and people, I want to keep doing the work.” ’
They seem, he observes, to be saying: ‘Guys, you’re missing the point. I’m way happier than you . . . we are not judging ourselves by those standards that you idiotic dinosaur-like men judge yourself by’.
Those who want the very highest positions at Saatchi seemingly can get there: the presi- dent of their New York office is Andrea Diquez, and on Radio 4’s Today programme yesterday, the spokesman defending Publicis’s decision to suspend Roberts was their global chief creative officer — Kate Stanners. She admitted the reason for the brutal suspension of the chairman was ‘internal anger’ among some female staff.
Well, yes, we women get touchy about generalisations — and Roberts did seem to lump all females together. And maybe some women (who secretly had no desire to be top brass) felt that they should at least pretend to be affronted.
We are supposed to worship at the shrine of Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook, who, in her 2013 book, ordered women to ‘lean in’ — ie. to hurl themselves at every promotion and grasp for power even while embarking on starting families.
But lots of women don’t want to ‘lean in’ and smash glass ceilings. They want to stick with the fulfilling job they do well, which also allows them a social life, a secondary career sideline, or a chance to see their families more. Or all three.
It is a modern heresy to say power isn’t everything: but some people just want to do the work they’re doing, feel they have enough creative freedom and respect, and don’t want to manage others from far above. And a lot of these people are women.
But ambition for a happy balance is not just limited to women. On yesterday’s Today programme, Ms Stanners observed that some ‘millennials’ were showing ‘circular ambition’, too, prioritising a balanced life over headlong promotion.
So young men are learning there’s nothing lowly or girly in sticking to what you enjoy and not yearning to be the boss.
That said, obviously there’s nothing wrong with ambition. Someone has to take ultimate responsibility, and nurture and understand the feelings and ideas of those below.
Doing this is a particular talent, just as inventing ad campaigns or interviewing gorillas on TV is a particular talent.
When top leadership talent is evident in either gender, it should be given a chance. Sometimes it isn’t, and women have been scorned and discouraged.
But it does no good to bully and sideline people with ‘incorrect’ ideas, as the Publicis board did. Nobody’s accusing Mr Roberts of not wanting to promote women, and his experience of ‘circular not upward’ ambition is interesting and illuminating.
Work is part of our lives, and our lives are our own to manage and direct. If ‘leaning in’ doesn’t suit us, we don’t have to. There should be equal esteem, if not equal money, for people who stick to what they do best.
Women or men, mothers or mavericks, young or older, we can be loyal footsoldiers, or multi-career mavericks, or just keener on sanity breaks whether to sail round the world or breastfeed a baby.
YEARS ago, leaving the BBC staff for a life of freelance and contract work, I knew that I did not want to be a manager or controller, not ever. I liked writing and reporting — and accepted the insecurity.
Life is a voyage: if you’re temperamentally suited to being a Jack Tar, or a bosun (or indeed a pirate) there is no shame in not wanting to be an admiral.
Remember The Peter Principle? This states that people get promoted to their level of incompetence — based on their performance in a current role rather than their abilities on the intended role.
Any workplace has such managers: unhappy and snappish and panicky, missing the old life when they knew the job and enjoyed it. Some of these out-of-depth leaders are women whose thankless working hours and responsibilities were things they never really wanted but felt compelled to pitch for by St Sheryl of Facebook.
Sadly, in an age of twitter mob outrage, the Saatchi chairman was too frank. But the fact is, he’s not the one blaming women for not being ambitious: he was rather lamenting it.
If anyone’s pointing the finger, it’s the lean-in Sherylites.