The normal self

I saw a missed call from a local number. There was a voicemail from older kid’s school. I love my kids’ school staff that they make sure that there is nothing to be alarmed off as a first prompt and then they get to the point of their call. The voicemail explained that nothing to be alarmed off, it was just that during this weekend they would like us to get our kid practice the song for the school performance that will be on Monday. What performance? Monday?! How did I not keep track of such a big event at school? Agreed that I am not in the loop of so many activities that are happening in the school and around the kids’ lives. I went to ask the kid, whom I found was so absorbed into her screen with her brother watching from the side – the usual scene. When asked about this, she explained that she is signing a song in the performance on Monday. Fine, I get that. It was there in the voice mail. So, I geared up to put in my last minute effort and I asked the girl to move away from whatever she was doing that we need to practice the song first. Both kids immediately told me that she is fine with the song, yet, the girl was interested in singing that song one more time as she seemed to like it. So, she googled for her song, which kind of started to puzzle me. She brought up a song in karaoke style on Youtube and started singing. First thing I noticed was that she was pretty relaxed and merely reading the lyrics. She usually sings very well. I was going to talk to her about singing it like singing, but then I noticed that the song was a bit odd, em, not like something one would expect an eight year old singing. The kids clarified for me that it is Katy Perry’s song, at which point my brain began to get sharp. I sat down and asked the girl to explain about the event, the song and her involvement a bit more. She said that she is going to sing as a solo singer and this is the song she has chosen for herself. It is Katy Perry’s song and apparently she has been practicing. Her brother confirmed that she has indeed been practicing it. I looked up for the lyrics and wanted to listen to the song before I can approve of it, that is, if I had a say at all in this matter. I brought up her old favourite from Frozen movie, which she used to sing really very well. Her face lit up a little, smiled fondly remembering the song, but then she looked at me and said, “No”! She went back to practicing the song of her current choice. I tried a few times but then I moved away. My only worry was other kids bullying her. I remember last time when she sang the Frozen song, a girl bullied her saying that she was shouting (for singing in high pitch), which made Avni stop singing that song. It was  another reason that I wanted her to sing the same song to bring her confidence back.

Here is Avni singing Frozen song!

She seemed to have moved on to the likes of Katy Perry! I didn’t do much research on the song of her current choice, as I was sure that there may be many things that may not fit in with my liking. I remembered that it is all about her choice and making her feel that. Hence decided not to intervene any further. The school event got moved to another day, Avni didn’t practice hard using the extra days gained, but I wasn’t particularly concerned about her performance. There were “kiss me” kind of words I heard. When I listened a little bit more, there were “wanna be a victim, ready for abduction” kind of lyrics that began to make me feel uncomfortable. The more I listened, there were even, “stun me with your laser” kind of words. I decided that it is good for me to completely stay away from it, which I did.

On the day of the event, I went to school hall straight from work. Missed her singing just by a few minutes. Got to see the video recording. I was informed that the crowd loved her.

Here is her singing!

As all my focus was about her confidence, not getting bullied and her not getting upset if it didn’t go well, I was very pleased with the result. She was sitting there quite calm, pleased with her performance and happy. I was happy. When I listened to the recording, I was happy to see her confidence, her singing and the crowd liking her. Balan was all teary about his little girl up on the stage singing to a crowd so lovely. She did do well.

I was interested in listening to the original song or wanted to look up on the lyrics, which I did later. See below for the lyrics:

“E.T.”

I was recently asked a question in one of the interviews, “how do you deal with things in a men dominated profession, as there aren’t many women scrum masters I have seen. You are the second woman scrum master I have come across. I am asking you the same question I asked her”.

The later part was to cover one’s back, claiming that “I am asking the same question I asked another person”. I smiled. It did catch me off-guard, as I was gobsmacked to say the least. I pondered over in my head, while I was filling the gaps with a few words, carefully. One question that stayed in my head was that what question did you ask your male scrum masters about this “issue” you are facing? Why do *I* have to explain? What do male scrum masters explain?

Another issue the scrum master role suffers is that “developer/scrum master” or “technical background scrum master”. Typically managers have promoted developers to act as scrum masters as after all it only requires running the daily stand up and then preparing some reports. It is also helpful if they can “get” what the impediments are as after all it is the “scrum master’s job” to resolve the impediments. There are several branching issues I can dwell on in this. For the sake of focus, let us focus on who gets picked for that “promotion”. How many times a woman developer gets picked to act as a scrum master, unless the manager sees this as a “stationary maintainer” role? There gets defined when a woman becomes a scrum master – stationary maintainer, food organiser, and more importantly meeting room organiser. (There was an advert I saw for a technical scrum master with technical skills listed in bullet points with the top point being “knows how to book meeting rooms”!).

There was a guy who came to me and asked me how do I feel about working in a techy place, which is quite unusual for women, he said! I told him this is such a boring place compared to the rocket science place I used to work before. He must have thought that I was referring to my special manicure place! (I don’t do manicure. Hope my manager doesn’t send me back home for not keeping up with the standards!)

In meetings I see I get constantly talked over. Either I talk along too and then eventually it would be me who has to shut the mouth and then earn the label of being “aggressive” or shut up as someone starts talking over and then earn the label of being “lack of confidence”.

In one occasion we were in a scrum masters’ meeting. A newly recruited scrum master  and the scrum master who was involved in the hiring process were discussing about another ongoing hire. I was never included in the loop of the process nor in the discussions. I got to overhear sometimes like this. What I gathered from their discussion was that the person they wanted to hire is now declining this offer over another offer at another place. In the interest of joining in (leaning in) the conversation and to feed my curiosity, I asked whether they could find out the reason why the candidate is deciding so. The newly joined scrum master, who has not even bothered to know my name or anything about me, (obviously I must be a scrum master to be sitting in that room, unless he assumed that I was there to take “minutes of the meeting”) turned towards me and started explaining, “delivery manager role is one level up (gesturing with his hand above his head). Delivery managers usually do this.. that…..”. I am sometimes shockingly sharp in understanding where he is coming from, yet, politely smiled at him and said, “is that the role offered to him in the other place?”. The icing on this cake was that he is new to the scrum mastery himself, poor chap. May be he is finding out himself what a delivery manager role is and he is being kind to explain that to me? May be he thought that I am new to the scrum mastery as well as him, hence explaining the org structure to me?  I self-talk to myself that it is not my job to fix holes in the heads.

In the interest of equality and inclusion: It came up in my linkedin newsfeed when a woman professional was advising girls to take it as a compliment when men message the girls about how pretty they are. There have also been advises to these girls on how to behave professionally on linkedin kind of professional sites such as not to bring up such issues. I don’t see any advise being handed out to those men on how to behave professionally and not to message girls in the first place. I don’t see this person advising men on when there is a NO, it is NO. It is beyond my comprehension how it is even any of her business!

I was not going to post any of it, as I fear, as I already have so many factors stocked up against me in getting a job, remaining successfully in jobs and successfully influencing the strategies to make Agile work… I fear for my survival. I do. Just wait and see how my “hireability” goes down once people find out how *I* “feel” about this “issue”. I silence myself. I keep going. I do my job. Yet it is what they see (me as) in their visible spectrum  is what bothers them. I continue to do my job. I keep my focus.

Then I come across some well meaning folks trying to speak for the under representation of women in this profession. A picture is worth thousand words they say!

A link to a linkedin post that addresses some relevant issues:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-one-silicon-valley-engineer-benefitted-from-tacit-faye-keegan?trk=hp-feed-article-title-like

When the work culture is not defined by those who do not have a life outside work or by those who have someone at home taking care of it, then there may be a hope that things may begin to change. When the brocutlre begins to change as family-friendly one, may be, things might begin to look better.  Albeit so many family-friendly policies sported by the companies and the HR, unfortunately they do not often extend their helping hands when “soft” things happen, such as when marking women as “under-performing” as apparently someone has to be marked in that category and that someone randomly chosen happened to be women! Not to mention some elaborate rumour-spreadings about women being “emotional” in order to kill someone’s career just because that someone rejected some advances!

Can you please stop defining me by my gender? I will let you know when my biological composition becomes an issue, such as when I have forgotten to bring the needful things on my period day that I may have to hit the shops immediately, no matter how back-to-back meetings booked in my calendar.

There!

Thank you.

The world would have you believe that it is a better place now, far better than how it was before. Especially with the letter from one of the richest and the most powerful men in the world to his daughter, who is in team with the LeanIn lady  both of whom promise to make the world even better, especially for the girls. Apologies for not being able to take it with all the hopes it offers.  All I want to tell you is that, keep some cynic side hidden somewhere inside you so that you don’t feel betrayed when the reality hits you in your face. Believe me, it will.

I wrote you a letter myself sometime ago after reading a letter from a mother, whose life was vastly different from her growing daughter’s. Ours too are very different lives, slightly different from the differences noted in the other letter that I was inspired to put it down on my blog. You might comment that it was mostly about me rather than anything to do with you. True. You were small at that time, in my defense. You still are, in my opinion. Yet you recently disagreed with me on the subject of theology and our takes on it, demanding that you be regarded as a separate individual  who is capable of holding own theological views! Goodness me, I thought. You are growing. There are no two ways about it. You will hold your own views and opinions. There are no two ways about it either. Just would like to share some thoughts from my own learning so that you are informed to watch out for realities.

You don’t have to be all that cynic either as you know from your mother’s life that anything is possible. Some may come with some hardship, but then that will shape you up too. The world is ruled by those who are privileged. The men at the very apex of that privilege heap of all the categories and differences that one can come up with. You will soon see how your brother’s life will have more advantages, the ones you wish for yourself are easily handed to him while you have to constantly prove yourself to get anywhere near those. Your mother had a taste of it at her own home, which perhaps prepared her in line with the real world outside. Your mother did have a better life than her own mother at her own  home. You, now, have a better life in your own home. Sure. Yet the bottom line was the same in the world outside. It is still the same.  It will be the same too when you step out into the real world to make a life of your own, sadly. There are some well meaning leaders like those I have mentioned at the very top of this letter. Yet, it is a complex issue to address. It is not an easy one to solve.

You are clever. Yet you will be questioned if you said anything “technical” that you have to prove yourself everytime. You do not like the competition mentality. You will be labelled as “not competent enough”. You don’t necessarily lead in a crowd. You will be labelled as “you lack confidence”. Yet boys around you can happily become “architects” for their ability to work “on their own”. Boys who bully will be called as great leaders. You and your girl friends will be called bossy if you said anything other than “thank you”, “sorry” and “please” as after all you are expected to be polite, nice, and never to disagree!

You will be paid less. You will be promoted less. You will not always get the good roles. You will not always get the roles for the right reasons. You have to have plenty of experience of doing the same job for years to be hired at the junior level. You might think that doesn’t make sense. How do you get the experience then, and why can’t you be given a senior role if you have experience. You cannot ask those questions yet. You will be called political, if you did. You will get even less opportunities when you talked about it.  While men with “potential” will tell you “how it is done”.

If you showed any interest in progressing further, by default you will be assumed of offering sexual advances to the boss. Your boss may mark you “underperforming” if you don’t allow the sexual advances. In his defence, it was your fault. HR will ask for evidences, dates, times and witnesses. Even if you are able to get all those, yet it will be your words against his. You must know, his words will weigh higher. If you are lucky enough to be asked to tell your side of the story, that is.  Most of the time no one will ask your side of the story.  Most women will just go silently. You will watch it in dismay.

The team members will not accept you, if you joined in a lead role and they will look for a male counterpart to report to. They will call the male manager a good manager. They will look down on you for coming to work, while the children, according to them, are not eating cooked food at home. They will make a point to defy everything you try / say just so that they can prove that you are not fit to be in that lead role. You will watch in dismay.

You will be forever some sort of administrator/secretary, no matter high the role is. You will be the “bitch” of your boss, if you know how to fix things. Yet, a man in the same role will be a decision maker and will be called that he knows how to run the company at enterprise level, “end to end”. He can deliver, they will say, if he fixed things. And many more. You will watch the world in dismay.

You are pretty. You will be expected to display it. You will be considered a misfit, if you don’t. You will be expected to improve it. You may ask why. Good question is all I can say. You will be constantly told that there are mistakes and areas that need improving in your appearance. There are products that can dramatically improve you. For every inch, for every shade, there are confusing number of products that promise to make you look “better”. You will also be reminded that you “still” look “beautiful”. You will wonder at the irony of it all. You will be constantly told how you are not good enough in so many ways. You will be constantly told to work on your self esteem “despite” the “shortcomings” of you both physically and intellectually. You will be expected to look for mistakes in you and you will be a constant apologiser. Don’t.

You will be expected to be the house maintainer. You will be expected to apologise for the “mess” in the house. You will be expected to organise your fridge and the events in your life, which includes your husband’s and your children’s. Your husband will have his own life with his mates. You will be expected to organise your life, which includes his life btw, around his life. You will be confused about the irony. You will be expected to apologise for everything about you. You will be expected to keep the man of the house at a respectable place in the society. You will be expected to apologise for the mess in the house. Don’t.

Don’t ever apologise. Don’t ever explain. Just stare. Grow some arrogance. You may be labelled rude. You will be labelled something or the other. Chose the label that you are comfortable with. All you can do is, choose the labels. You cannot avoid them. You brother can. You will be angry. You will be called you are taking it personal. You may be baffled how can it not be personal when it is hitting you personally. Men will say they can stay not taking things personal. How can they take personal when nothing has happened to them, you may ask. I have no answer for that. Learn this. It is about them. Men at work place and both men and women at social surroundings. They will constantly question you, label you, expect you to explain, expect you to follow what they insist that you should do. Just stare at them. It is about them. They are talking about them. Walk away. Now you know how it is not personal anymore. Men don’t know this skill. They will never have to come across this skill. Doesn’t matter. Ignore them. You can walkway now and truly take on the world. Your world. The world you choose for yourself.

The art of choosing is guided by what is around you. Sheena says it in her lovely talk what it is all about. Yet you choose. It is your choice. It is your decision. Not anybody else’s. No one can force their decision on you. No one can imagine they can be allowed to put their choice on you. Not that lovely friend who appears to have the best interest or the fierce mother of yours who appears to be taking away your freedom. You decide.  Your choice.  You will be peace with it. Just be aware that there will be things that are beyond your choice and yet you have to make peace with it.  That is the world waiting for you. Toughen up. Your brother may not need to. You do. Some of your friends might choose to stay out of the working life believing that they can avoid having to face the tough world. They will realise that there is no escape. The “socialsing” will bring it all that back to them. They may master the art of surviving in that environment. You will master the art of surviving in your environment. Don’t just survive. Live. To live, you need to face the reality and learn to blur it out. Your brother may not have to know all these. He may need to learn different  things. His life may be different. He might need different set of tough skills. Yours will be different. That is the bottom line.

I have been posting on linkedin pulse.

I need some help with proof reading / editing. Please message me if you can help. The most recent ones badly need that help. Most recent at the top. Ta.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/de-jargoning-agile—customer-premalatha-5948171108355174400

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/de-jargoning-agile—customer-premalatha

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20141113100339-15671125-de-jargoning-agile-user-story-take-2

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20141108092703-15671125-de-jargoning-agile-a-small-attempt-user-story