Beware of Superwoman Syndrome
Work-life Satisfaction Boosts Productivity for Women Scientists
Beware of unrealistic expectations: being 200 percent available at work, a domestic goddess, the perfect partner, super parent, hobbyist par excellence — without ever taking time for yourself. Superwoman Syndrome can drastically impact work-life satisfaction.
That's the message of the Association of Women in Science (AWIS), which launched their recent Work-Life Satisfaction workshop at the 2010 American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in San Diego.
In 2009, the Elsevier Foundation New Scholars program recognized the need to address the career point at which work-life pressure — and attrition from STEM fields — is highest by awarding AWIS a three-year $105,000 grant to roll out a full-scale program on work-life satisfaction. The Improving Work-Life Satisfaction for Women Program includes online resources and workshops across the country, mostly through AWIS's 52 affiliated chapters. It has provided women (and men) with the opportunity to broaden their network as well as realize that they are not alone in striving for balance between their personal and professional lives. Participants come away with the tools and knowledge to better understand what is important to them and the questions they need to continuously ask themselves as they juggle the demands placed upon them.
Since launch, 342 women have participated in 11 chapters, including Chicago, Seattle, Sacramento, throughout Texas and the San Francisco and Washington DC areas. The workshops help women in science, technology, engineering, mathematics and medicine (STEMM) examine how their current choices affect their work-life satisfaction and identify the changes that will have the biggest impact on their professional and personal development, productivity and performance.
Janet Bandows Koster, the Executive Director of AWIS, believes that while advocating for change in policies and systems is critical, women — especially early-to-mid-career scientists — have to find the best personal work-life balance strategies for them. In AWIS's recent survey of 409 members, 68 percent reported that work-life balance issues had a definite impact on their decision to have or delay having children; meanwhile, 70 percent reported either not taking advantage of or not having access to work-life balance resources.
"We quickly recognized that we hit a nerve with issues affecting work-life balance. Koster said. "It's a very important theme to our AWIS members, and it's not just going to go away. In fact, recent studies indicate that the issue is not just a women's issue anymore; men are increasingly stressed and trying to come to terms with balancing work with family and personal priorities."
