追求职业发展的女性：从伏案工作中抬起头来，多参加社交

    如今，女性比以往任何时候都更加努力地工作。2011年的一项皮尤调查（Pew Survey）发现，女性每周工作的时间接近60个小时，除了带薪工作外，她们还要负责家务，照看孩子。女性高管通常也会花同样多的时间用于工作。而在竞争尤为激烈的行业，每周工作60至70个小时已逐渐成为常态。

    对于大多数女性而言，这既是好消息，也是坏消息。一方面，过去20年间，女性在职场的进步可谓突飞猛进——女性的劳动力参与率翻了一番，正在进入职场的年轻女性的受教育程度普遍高于男性。但另一方面，虽然女性在职场中取得了进步，但在公司高层的影响力仍极其微弱——仅有14.6%的高管职位由女性担任。

    这些统计数据掩盖了一个更加现实的问题：女性往往用在做事情上的时间更多，用于社交的时间更少。而这并不是小问题。在如今的市场，社交能力已成为职业生涯成功与否的关键。

    热衷社交有时候会被看作是过于渴望向上爬的一种表现，不少职业女性因此对它敬而远之。而对于女性领导者来说，她们需要在业绩上表现得与男性旗鼓相当或更加出色，因此很多女领导想当然地认为自己没有时间去应酬。

    但如今，决定领导力高下的，已不仅仅是你在电脑前花费的时间，还越来越多地包括你的社交能力，你如何吸收外部的看法，以及你如何引领团队前进等。社交要花时间，但它很重要。

    职场上男性都能理解这种观念。商务旅行、体育运动、行业会议或下班后的社交聚会等，虽然被恰当地理解为男性之间培养友谊的方式，但同时也是积累职业资本的重要方法。所以，女性反感男性俱乐部或仅限男士的高尔夫旅行，是有道理的。

    职场女性还会面临另外一项挑战。对于许多女性而言，令人困惑的工作和生活平衡具有至高无上的重要性。她们忙于公事和家事，但又不希望减少用在家人或个人兴趣上的时间。这造成的结果是，社交活动被搁置。在社交网络中同样如此：一项对不同性别使用社交网络情况的调查发现，更多女性使用Facebook、Tumbler、Instagram和Twitter。在Pinterest的用户中，女性占绝大多数。相反，更多男性会使用在线职业社交网站LinkedIn。

    女性正在错过良机。社交活动不仅可以增加在公司内部和外部的商业机会，而且可以为女性创造空间，通过人格特质软化专业界限，为女性更有效地掌握职场主动权扫清道路。女性还可以通过社交活动，找到在办公室内难得一见的榜样和商业领袖。最重要的是，社会联系和职业社交会让我们的工作更有趣，更持久。

    另外，忽视社交会对女性职业造成不利影响。麦肯锡公司（McKinsey & Company）的乔安娜•巴斯表示，女性缺乏接触非正式网络的机会，是她们职业发展的结构性障碍。与缺少导师或适当的指导与培训一样，它会影响职业发展。

    Women are working harder than ever. A 2011 Pew Survey found that women are working nearly 60 hours a week when you combine paid employment, household chores and childcare. Female executives often have to put that much into their job every week. In extremely competitive industries, the 60 to 70-hour work week is increasingly the norm.

    For most women, the story is both good news and bad news. On the one hand, women’s advancements in the workplace have skyrocketed in the past 20 years—their participation in the labor force has doubled, and now young women are entering the workforce better educated than their male counterparts. On the other hand, despite such progress, women are poorly represented at the top levels of companies – only 14.6% of executive officer level positions are held by women.

    These statistics obscure a more practical issue: women spend more time doing and less time networking. And this is no small matter. In today’s market, networking has become the lifeblood of a fruitful professional life.

    Sometimes it is dismissed as the unseemly activity of overly ambitious professionals ascending the ladder of careerism. With the demand on women to perform at an equal or better level than their male counterparts, female leaders sometime assume they don’t have the time for social engagement.

    But leadership today is increasingly defined not just by how many hours you spend at your computer, but your ability to connect to others, how you incorporate outside perspectives, and how you navigate groups. Networking takes time, but it matters.

    Men in the workplace understand this. The business trip, the sports outing, the industry conferences, or the social after-work gatherings have always been viewed – correctly – not just as male bonding, but as an essential part of building professional capital. That is why women were right to rebel against the all-male clubs or the boys-only golf trips.

    Female professionals also face a different challenge. For many, the elusive work-life balance is paramount. They are busy at work and at home and don’t want to take more time away from their families or personal interests. As a result, networking gets put on the back burner. This appears to be true even in social networking: a study on use of social networking sites by gender found that more women than men use Facebook , Tumbler, Instagram and Twitter TWTR 7.45% . And women overwhelmingly dominate Pinterest. By contrast, more men than women use LinkedIn LNKD 0.06% ,the designated online professional networking site.

    Women are missing an opportunity. Networking not only expands business opportunities within company walls and externally. It creates that space where professional boundaries are softened by personality, often paving the way for women to be more effective in driving initiatives forward in the workplace. It allows women to find role models and business leads not available inside their office. Most important, social connection and professional engagement is what makes our jobs interesting and enduring.

    Failing to network, on the other hand, can be damaging to your career. Joanna Barsh of McKinsey & Company says that women’s lack of access to informal networks is a structural obstacle to their career advancement, comparable in impact to lacking a mentor, or appropriate coaching and training.