Description

Described as having "something approaching rock star status" by The New York Times, our guest Joan C. Williams is a Distinguished Professor of Law at UC Hastings College of Law.  She is a prominent member of the feminist community who has had her works published in the Harvard Business Review, the Huffington Post, Washington Post and the New York Times. She has authored or co-authored six books and we discuss her latest book White Working Class.  Joan Williams has been awarded the Families and Work Institute Work Life Legacy Award (2014), Hastings Visionary Award (2013), American Bar Foundation's Outstanding Scholar Award (2012), the Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award (2012), the ABA's Margaret Brent Award for Women Lawyers of Achievement (2006), the Distinguished Publication Award of the Association for Women in Psychology (2003), and the Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Award for Unbending Gender: Why Family and Work Conflict and What to Do About It (Oxford University Press, 2000). She founded the Center for Worklife Law as a way to help women find success in their jobs and joins us on the podcast today as she prepares for her upcoming book.

Work Life Law: http://worklifelaw.org/                    Hotline: 415-703-8276

Other Resources: pregnantatwork.com; biasinteruptor.org  

Background

• Silver Spoon
• Went to Yale, Harvard and MIT
• No early role models as a child; Admire Van Jones today
• Teaching employment Law at UC Hastings Law

Work Life Law

• Founded in the 90's
• Wanted to make world as good for women as it is for men
• Family discrimination

Howe Work Life Law Helps the Community

• Hotline to call attorney network
• com resource for expecting mothers/ students

Pregnant Women Discrimination

• Examples: Getting fired, denying accommodations, scrutinizing new mothers
• Family responsibilities and schedules

Schedule Stability

• Differing schedules and impact on family
• Students work vs. class schedules
• Workers with multiple just in time schedules
• Working with retailers to stabilize schedules

Authoring Books

• What Works for Women at Work: Patterns For Women in the Workplace
• Allow women to know what I didn't growing up
• Gender bias not diminishing; talking to successful women on how much bias they face

Fixing Gender Bias

• Proving competence for women/ reversing the trend
• Strategies to prove competence

Masculinity vs Femininity

• Tight rope for women
• Strong men are leaders; strong women are not team players
• Gender Judo: Doing something masculine in a feminine way

Women Who Supported Trump

• Economic anxiety among men and women
• Most middle class high wage jobs held by men
• Women depend on husbands blue collar jobs

Working Class

• Hillary Clinton was class clueless
• Black and White Working Class have similar values/ politics
• Republicans provide answers for job questions

Women Standing Together

• Maternal Wall/ Tug of War
• Conflict among women
• Strategic Distancing- symptom of gender bias

Fixing the Class Divide

• College educated need to stop stereotyping
• Elites focus more on economic prospects for non-college Americans
• Understand different cultural norms/ values, not insulting them

Wrap up