A LinkedIn submit by advertising and marketing specialist Pragya has reignited debate round gender bias and the “motherhood penalty” in hiring, particularly in senior roles. Detailing her expertise throughout a 14-minute telephonic interview for a CMO place with a client model, she wrote that just about all of the questions centred round her household, none on her {qualifications} or achievements.
For the primary 11 minutes, she was requested to summarise her 11-year profession. However what adopted, she claimed, was a barrage of non-public questions from the corporate’s promoter: “Who’s in my household? What number of children do I’ve? What’s their age? Which college does the elder one go to? Who takes care of them once I’m away? What does my husband do? How’s his startup doing? And the way would I commute to the workplace?”
“There have been no questions on income I dealt with, companies I grew, industries I labored in, my achievements, my failures, or the difficult initiatives I’ve delivered,” she wrote.
The subsequent day, she acquired a one-word replace from HR: “Rejected.”
“I didn’t need that job both, however consider the ladies who don’t have a selection.”
Whereas she made it clear that she wasn’t reliant on the job, her submit referred to as consideration to a bigger sample: “This submit shouldn’t be about my accolades, it’s concerning the #Discrimination or #MaternityTax that girls are inclined to pay at workplaces, simply because they reproduce.”
The submit went viral inside hours, drawing responses from working professionals, founders, and hiring managers—lots of them girls who’ve confronted related bias.
“The motherhood penalty could be very actual”
One person commented, “That is each heartbreaking and infuriating. The motherhood penalty could be very actual, and it reveals up in methods which are so normalised that it’s nearly anticipated.”
One other person famous the sharp distinction in expectations from women and men: “It’s humorous how fathers are by no means requested the identical questions.”
Some additionally identified the irony in how private life levels are handled as liabilities. “It’s not solely invasive and intrusive but additionally goes on to indicate how stereotyping nonetheless pervades by means of organisations,” one commenter stated.
“I’ve been on each side, founder and rejected mom”
In one other remark, one person recalled being rejected throughout last interviews as a result of she had a 2-month-old child. “It deeply damage. I carried that grudge for years,” she wrote. Now a founder herself, she confessed that she typically finds herself asking related questions: “It’s not bias. It’s the fact of how a lot juggling a brand new mom has to do.”
Nonetheless, she emphasised the necessity for long-term options: “I dream of a time the place we do not have to decide on between constructing an organization and constructing a household, with guilt on both facet.”
“Most CXO roles I’ve interviewed for are held by males”
Pragya concluded her submit by noting that almost all senior roles she has utilized for, throughout each startups and legacy companies, are nonetheless dominated by males. “Whereas I’ve no bias in opposition to male professionals, it seems that this specific position may even be stuffed by a male candidate,” she added.
