Managing Product Development

After reading Where Are the Women — And Their Names?, I tried to leave this comment on the FC blog, but was unable to, so I’ll post it here:

I hope the trend is for people to make choices that fit for them. My daughters have my husband’s name. We only have trouble traveling when I want to use my frequent flyer miles for them. For some reason, airlines make it incomprehensively difficult for a person to use miles for someone with another last name. You’d think with all the divorces and recreated families, they’d have caught on by now.

I’m of the opinion that feminism is really for everyone. The more one sex placates the other (at home, in the workplace, wherever), the less society as a whole can use the talents of that sex.

A trap that too many execs (women and men) seem to fall into is: work more hours and get more done. People don’t work more hours and get more done. They work stupider and make more work for other people. I blogged a bit about this a while ago: here. My hope is that feminism (peoplelism??) will help everyone make choices that fit for them, depending on their circumstances.

For me, it’s not about names, it’s about being able to hire the more suitable person — no matter what he or she looks like. It’s about creating an environment in which people perform their best work — without requiring people give up their personal lives. And it’s about releasing products (whatever those look like) that fit the customers’ needs.

Because I work for myself, I frequently miss things like Secretary’s Day or Boss’s Day. This year I almost missed Take Our Daughters And Sons To Work day. When the Ms. Foundation started Take Our Daughters to Work day, many colleagues poo-poohed it. “Who needs such a thing?” But a funny thing happened. Girls started thinking they could participate in any number of ways at work.

My daughters don’t see a limit on their careers just because they’re female. They may choose to set limits because they see what Mark and I do, juggling the demands of two full-time parents who travel. But they get to make that choice. No one will make it for them.

I’m still not sure this day is enough, but I’m not sure what else to suggest. People — all people — need to know that they can find a way to contribute to work and gain satisfaction from good work in a way that fits for them.