最具影響力商界女性的前世今生

????1973年，貝蒂?弗里丹的《女性的奧秘》（The Feminine Mystique）一書已經問世10年，《Ms.》雜志發行了第一期刊物。美國勞工統計局（Bureau of Labor Statistics）的資料顯示，那年女性涌入職場，占到勞動人口的40%。擁有學齡子女的已婚女性多半從事著付薪工作。然而，《財富》（Fortune）雜志的溫德姆?羅伯遜在1973年4月的一篇文章中調查了大公司的用人情況，他對這種所謂的女性職場崛起產生了疑問：“她們究竟在哪里？”

????美國勞工統計局的資料顯示，只有3%的職場女性是“管理人員”。羅伯遜寫道：“在最為顯要的職位（也就是公司管理層）上很少看到女性的身影?！?/p>

????她們到底有多么罕見？《財富》將目光對準了工業企業1,000強和非工業企業50強榜單。在這1,300家公司中，有1,220家必須向美國證券交易委員會（SEC）提交報告，披露有關薪酬最高的三位高管和收入超過3萬美元（相當于如今的16萬美元左右）的所有主管的信息。在由此產生的6,500人中，只有11人是女性。在減去一位似乎并未過多參與公司管理的女性后，羅伯遜在一篇名為《大公司里職位最高的10名女性》（The Ten Highest-Ranking Women in Big Business）的文章中簡要介紹了剩余的10位女性。這篇文章顯示了40年來哪些已經改變，更為重要的是，哪些未曾改變。

????1973年，女性幾乎不可能晉升到領導職位。羅伯遜寫到，雖然這份榜單上的女性，包括《華盛頓郵報》（Washington Post）的凱瑟琳?格拉漢姆和芭比娃娃（Barbie）的創造者露絲?漢德勒，都是“很有才華、勤奮工作的高管”，但她們也都“受益于家庭關系、婚姻或者她們協助締造了她們現在管理的那家公司，只有兩人是例外?？偠灾?，她們中的大多數人不必處理至少兩個問題，而這兩個問題多年來已經阻礙了最有才干、最符合要求的女性。她們不是從公司里前途有限的職位干起，她們也不必面對歧視女性的公司等級制度?！?/p>

????諷刺的是，“這些女性顯然都不必工作，實際上，要是沒有家庭關系，她們中有些人根本不會去工作，或者不會擁有輝煌的事業”。時代明鏡公司（Times Mirror Co.）的多蘿西?錢德勒在她的個人簡介中寫道：“如果我不是諾曼?錢德勒太太，我就不會擁有我曾得到的那些機會?！?/p>

????但羅伯遜寫道：“她們每個人都在各自的公司里發揮了積極和重要的作用。這是個引人矚目的證據，證明其他的女性管理人才都被浪費掉了?！?/p>

????The year was 1973. Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique had been out for a decade; Ms.magazine had published its first issue. Women were pouring into the workforce, hitting 40% of the total working population that year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Over half of married women with school-age kids held a paying job. And yet, as Fortune'sWyndham Robertson surveyed the world of big business in an April 1973 story, he had a question about this supposed female surge: "Where in blazes are they?"

????A mere 3% of women in the workforce were "managers and administrators," according to the BLS, and, as Robertson wrote, "in jobs where visibility is greatest -- i.e. in corporate management -- women are seldom seen."

????How seldom seen? Fortune looked at its list of the 1,000 largest industrial companies, plus the 50 largest companies in six non-industrial businesses. From this list of 1,300 firms, 1,220 had to file proxies with the SEC that provided information on the top three paid officers, and any director earning over $30,000 (equivalent to just shy of $160,000 today). Of the 6,500 names generated that way, a mere 11 turned out to be women. After subtracting a woman who appeared not to be closely involved in running her company, Robertson profiled the others in a piece called "The Ten Highest-Ranking Women in Big Business" that is notable both for showing what has changed in 40 years and, as importantly, what has not.

????In 1973, it was almost impossible for a woman to work her way up the ranks to a leadership role. Robertson wrote that while the women on the list -- which included names such as the Washington Post's (WPO) Katharine Graham and Barbie creator Ruth Handler -- were "highly capable and hard-working executives," they also, with only two exceptions, "were helped along by a family connection, by marriage, or by the fact that they helped to create the organizations they now preside over. In short, most of them did not have to deal with at least two problems that have over the years held back even the most able and qualified women: They did not start out in their companies in jobs with limited futures, and they did not have to work their way through a corporate hierarchy that discriminated against them."

????The irony of this was that "none of these women, obviously, has to work, and in fact some of them wouldn't have -- or wouldn't have had careers -- without the family tie-in." Dorothy Chandler of the Times Mirror Co., reported in her profile that, "If I had not been Mrs. Norman Chandler, I would not have had the opportunities I've had."

????But, as Robinson wrote, "Each of them plays an effective and important role within her corporation -- an impressive bit of evidence that other female executive talent is going to waste."