How gender bias shows up between women at work

Learn how women can sometimes perpetuate gender bias—and how to overcome it.

Before You Start

Goal: Explore how women sometimes act on gender bias towards other women at work. Develop strategies to recognize these dynamics, avoid falling into them, and build solidarity with your women colleagues instead.

Watch: "What Works for Women at Work: Tug of War Bias." Members are encouraged to watch beforehand, but a quick recap at the meeting works too.

Meeting Agenda · Approx. 60 mins

  • Member Updates · 10 mins
  • Icebreaker · 10 mins
  • Key Takeaways · 5 mins
  • Activity: Navigating Tug of War Bias · 20 mins
  • One Action · 10 mins
  • Wrap-Up · 5 mins

👋 Member Updates · 10 mins

Go around your Circle and share personal updates. Keep them brief and focused on significant changes or important decisions since the last time you met. It's OK not to have one every month. If you have a One Action update from last time, share that too.

🧊 Icebreaker · 10 mins

Invite everyone in the group to share. Keep answers to one or two minutes per person.

  • Raise your hand if you ever feel like another woman has unfairly judged you at work.
  • Raise your hand if a woman has unfairly criticized your personal style, for instance, calling you abrasive or lacking confidence.

💡 Key Takeaways · 10 mins

Women are often excellent allies to one another. But they also at times act on internalized gender bias. Joan Williams calls this the "Tug of War," referring to judgments and criticism between working women. These harsher judgments aren't due to a character flaw in women; rather, they're a response to gender-biased workplaces that reward masculine-coded traits like assertiveness and single-minded focus on work.

  • Women sometimes apply harsher standards to one another because "that's what it takes to succeed here as a woman."
  • Women may perpetuate the double bind by judging one another's personal styles—labeling colleagues "too assertive" or "not assertive enough."
  • Women might judge each other's decisions about work and family because they're struggling to find the right balance themselves.
  • Resist the urge to judge other women. Like you, they feel the extra pressure created by gender bias and are doing the best they can.
  • Be willing to resolve conflict. If you're feeling judged by another woman at work, ask for a private conversation and approach it with curiosity rather than accusation.
  • Respect one another's experiences. Women from different generations sometimes judge each other harshly. Look for opportunities to understand and celebrate those differences instead.

🏋️ Activity: Navigating Tug of War Bias · 20 mins

Move through the steps at the pace that suits your Circle.

Step 1 — Select a scenario to role-play (10 mins, small groups)

Break into small groups of two or three. Each group selects one of the scenarios below and takes a few minutes to decide how to act it out, then role-play the scenario.

Scenario 1: Handling a hard conversation. Someone on your team dropped the ball, so you're tough on her in a meeting. Afterward, you hear her call you "difficult" when talking to another team member. Role-play a response.

Scenario 2: Choosing what's right for you. You've decided that you need to cut back your hours. A more senior colleague takes you aside and advises against it. "You'll regret it," she says. "I've seen over and over again how part-time tracks derail women's careers." Role-play a response.

Scenario 3: Pushing back against stereotypes. One of your female colleagues makes a critical comment about another woman on your team: "No wonder no one takes her seriously when her voice is so quiet." Role-play a response.

Step 2 — Discuss successful strategies (10 mins, full group)

Use the role-playing activity and your own experiences to discuss ways to navigate Tug of War bias. Consider: What strategies seemed to work well in the role-plays? What strategies have you used in related situations? How can you involve other women to help you navigate these situations?

✍️ Write It Down · 2 mins

Take a few minutes to connect the discussion to your own life.

Think about a relationship with a female coworker that could benefit from more solidarity. What could you do differently to help build trust and allyship with her?

🎯 One Action · 10 mins

Commit to one concrete action you'll take before your next Circle meeting. Go around the Circle and share (1 minute or less per member).

Identify a female coworker with whom you've experienced tension, or one you'd like to know better. Commit to asking her to coffee or lunch. Your goal is simply to deepen the relationship.

📅 Wrap-Up · 3 mins

Before you break, plan your next meeting and close on an energetic note. Go around your Circle one by one and finish the sentence:

Now I feel… (choose one word).

  • Set the day, time, and location
  • Choose the next topic or resource
  • Confirm who's leading the discussion
  • Decide how you'll stay in touch in between

Brought to you in partnership with . . . Joan C. Williams, Distinguished Professor of Law and Director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. She is co-author (with her daughter Rachel Dempsey) of What Works for Women at Work: Four Patterns Working Women Need to Know.