Equal Opportunity to Seminars 4

[Stl63]

My department consists of a dozen engineers. Three women. Six senior engineers, all male. Three newbies, all male. And the rest of us are middle class, including the three women. Two of the women have more experience years than I.
Our manager recently decided to have four persons attend a seminar. Without my prompting, he asked me to attend, along with three of the senior engineers.
I am concerned that my selection will alienate me from the other middle class, especially the women who have more years of experience.
Do I decline to attend, passing by an opportunity, or accept and take whatever negative vibes follow? I know that one of the other senior engineers declined for this reason, he being good friends with two of the women.

 

[csd72]

That is just plain silly, following your logic everyone would turn down the opportunity and no-one would go.

Take the opportunity to get some training and share the notes and the experience with all the other workers. At one of my previous employers they had a policy that if you went to a seminar you then did a lunch time presentation on what you learnt in the next week. You could suggest this to the managers.

If the other workers get jealous then they are too petty to value their opinion anyway.

I imagine that the management will ask a different person next time e.t.c.

 

[MintJulep]

If something this trivial will result in your "friends" ostracizing you then they really weren't very good friends in the first place.

 

[TheTick]

Youngest (most attractive?) female employee gets asked to come along w/ boss. Subordinates backing out.

How would Mrs. Boss feel about this?

 

[JAE]

Mrs. Boss would give Mr. Boss a seminar of his own. And it would be difficult for Mr. Boss to survive.

But he'd get his pdh's: [red]P[/red]ut [red]D[/red]ent in [red]H[/red]ead

 

[lz5pl]

I would suggest you to go on the seminar and take the very best from this opportunity. Your boss may have dozen of reasons to choose you - for example you may be not the most experienced, but most prospective (I mean in professional point of view, contrary to the TheTick's opinion).
Sometimes I face similar problem whom to choose and the best choice is not necessarily the most experienced person. For example in my previous company even some rumors started because I went on two trainings together with one quite attractive young woman from my department. Actually my decision was based on completely professional reasons and now, after almost 10 years I can see that I have been right - she works now for ABB and she is one of the best in profession in our country.
So if your boss have chosen you - just go and don't worry!

------------------------
It may be like this in theory and practice, but in real life it is completely different.
The favourite sentence of my army sergeant

 

[jmw]

Hold on, my math is just catching up; 12 engineers, 6 senior male, 3 newbies, male "And the rest of us are middle class, including the three women."

Including the three women?
They must all be women since:
6(senior) + 3(newbies) = 9,
12(total) - 9 = 3 = women = middle class = 2 experienced + 1 less so (you)

He sends 1/3 to a seminar. That is expensive, especially if it is some distance and requires an overnight stay, it is still expensive even if it is local.

Think about his options for the make-up of this team...
Forget the newbies, they probably won't contribute much at the seminar nor learn much that is useful and if he sends newbies everyone would squawk.
Obviously if he is sending some seniors and he may send a lesser number of middles to gain experience.
Often it is the most senior engineer who goes on his own and then comes back tasked to pass on what he has learned that is relevant.

Sending more must show that this is a significant seminar.

I can't help feeling that if he sent all males or all seniors or seniors and newbies that you would have a concern and possibly justifiably. Suppose he sent 3 seniors and one of the other two middles? i.e. not you, what would be your worries then? That you were not performing well enough? that the boss doesn't like you? That you are not going to improve as fast as you'd like?

If he sent 3 seniors and a more experienced middle, what would you say then?

CSD72 is right, this is just plain silly.

I feel sorry for your boss.
If we assume the purest of motives and the best intentions, he now (if he knows what a fuss these decisions will cause) has to worry about how each and every decision he makes is going to be examined for signs of sexism, ageism, cronyism, nepotism, sadism or some other kind of "ism".

Worry about whether or not your attending fulfils the engineering objectives but mostly, whether it will assist your development as an engineer.

Now unless there are some other signs or behaviour patterns in the workplace you haven't revealed, you are worrying unnecessarily.

More importantly, if you create a fuss (for no apparently good reason) and don't go, you really are creating problems for yourself because the safe option is never to consider any opportunities for you that are likely to offend you. In the extreme, worry about downsizing or that over time you will be by-passed by more aggressive or assertive engineers.


JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[mechengdude]

Stop fretting and go to the seminar. If you turn it down you may not be asked again.

 

[zdas04]

Keep in mind that most companies send the person they can most easily do without to seminars. Having someone attend a seminar is a pretty low return proposition so you chum the water hopping that sooner or later someone will come back with something more useful than an STD or a hangover. You really shouldn't feel too special about being selected.

I came home from a seminar yesterday. The session I taught was the last half hour of the first day, 20 of the 150 people who registered for the course were still there when I started, the rest were in the bar I guess.

David

 

[TenPenny]

There are two things to learn here:
1 - when your company offers you a chance for education/furthering your career, take it. If you don't, with no valid reason, you likely won't have that chance again.
2 - Don't worry about your colleagues and 'other middle class'; if everyone did that, we'd all be in a race to be average. How much is accomplished if everyone strives to be average, and not stand out from the crowd?

 

[svanels]

Not going to the seminar is stupid.
About the seniority of the other females, are they eager to learn other things, networking and comparing their selves to other professionals?

Some people don't want to go to training, conferences or seminars because they run the danger of being exposed. Others their wife/spouse would not approve it (but they need another excuse).

From every exposure you could learn:
How to do things right, but also what to avoid.

If your company sends you to a seminar, they spend money, if you are disposable, they wouldn't do it. Unless you are in place where the money grows on the trees....

 

[SomptingGuy]

"My department consists of a dozen engineers. Three women. Six senior engineers, all male. Three newbies, all male. And the rest of us are middle class, including the three women"

Does that add up to more than 12 or do you consider yourself one of the newbies?

If so the manager is taking 3 experienced guys and one newbie. Nothing wrong with that.

- Steve

 

[csd72]

zdas04 makes a very good point. They probably sat down and looked at workload and deadlines prior to deciding who to send. Personal preferences probably had no place in the decision.

 

[jmw]

Work pressure usually is the excuse to send no one at all and to say "No." to anyone who expresses an interest in going. The excuse is used even if it isn't true simply to avoid the expense and disruption to the workload.

Sending four people to go signals that the manager thinks this seminar is important for some reason.
Note that he didn't just "allow" people to go, he is telling four people they should go.
He probably has some very good reasons for this.

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[ischgl99]

If any of my guys declined to attend a seminar, especially for a reason like this, it is unlikely they would be chosen for the next one or approved if they asked to attend something.

Go, enjoy yourself and you might learn something that will help your career. And use this as an opportunity to offer the lunch and learn for those that did not attend it, might help push you up the ladder more quickly.

 

[Stl63]

Thanks, some of your posts were useless, and others much help. For the record I 'll clear it up, their are four newbies, four middle class, and five senior engineers. Three women are correct, I was not one of them. So 13 engineers. Not that this makes much difference, but I should have known enigineers couldn't resist thought without mathmatics.

"Saving the World One Beam at a Time"

 

[jmw]

Well, nice of you to respond, Stl63, I won't hazard a guess as to the useless responses but:
".....but I should have known enigineers couldn't resist thought without mathmatics."

Well, you did say originally:
"My department consists of a dozen engineers. Three women. Six senior engineers, all male. Three newbies, all male. And the rest of us are middle class, including the three women. Two of the women have more experience years than I."

Under that scenario you are a woman because you say you are middle class.

Compare to what you say now and even allowing that 13 is a bakers dozen, there are now only 5 senior engineers and 4 middles, not three and four newbies, not three.

Now if the seniors are all male and the newbies also then the three women are middles and you only account for three middles and say you are one.

Now if you write these things out like puzzle page from a newspaper then obviously there will be confusion.

Of course engineers like numbers, they're not the only ones to try and assess your problem based on the data you provide.

But it's OK, we'll understand, you're not a woman, are you?
Or are you not an engineer? (the confusion over numbers suggests a problem either with suitability for being an engineer or with HR who have recently demoted one, sex changed two and caused binary fission in a third.)

If male, then not Australian. ("three are bush-hogs and one's glamour maggot and who gives a stuff anyway").

I'm confused.
I'm probably also useless (my wife says so) but I defend my interpretation.
I guess the anomalous "including" is the only clue that you have messed up the presentation but OK, I didn't pick up on this when everything else (the numbers, from "an engineer") hung together and was especially consistent with the nature of the concern...

BUT the answers the same.... go to the d**m seminar or whatever and let the others sort it out.
If you don't, the only person to suffer is you.







JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[ChrisConley]

Why aren't you worried about offending the three senior engineers (male) who aren't going (6 senior, all male, three going)?

Why aren't you worried about offending the wives, cousins, and children of the co-workers that are going as well?

Who cares.

 

[jmw]

ChrisComley, St163 is worried about offending some one of the lady engineers at work, but:
"Thanks, some of your posts were useless,...."
... not so worried about offending the engineers here.
I guess the anonymity helps, you don't have that at work... usually.

JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[csd72]

jmw,

Yes that comment didnt escape my attention either. And then I noticed that he has posted 4 times and made no replies to other peoples posts. I would forgive this if they were a newby, but by their own words they are not.

I dont think I should waste my time helping someone like that.