Lisa Myers is an advocate for women everywhere.
Garrett Griffin
Some of the greatest advocates hide in anonymity; some make their presence known to many. Women have endured many hardships at the hands of a world centered on men. Despite such obstacles some women break through and attain an important status. To get one firsthand perspective on the current status of women, I interviewed Ms. Lisa Myers. She is currently the Instructor of Adult Education and the BAAS Coordinator at TAMU-T.
Myers thinks women’s current position in the corporate world she went on to say that
“I still think, especially in the South[ern United States,] that we have some barriers that we need to breakdown. But not so much overt barriers, that is … saying some outward statement that somehow women are inferior to men…but much more indirect such as many employers make the assumption that female workers are working to supplement someone else’s income.”
In her childhood, growing up in the South, Myers and her family experienced different sources and types of discrimination and can connect the past with the present to see the constant weakening of traditional barriers to female entrance into the workforce. Myers discredits this mindset by simply saying,” that is no longer true,” and that” the percentage of women who are the breadwinners of their families, or single, working mothers [are] the fastest growing demographic in our society.” She believes that “we have come a very long way in getting same pay for same work.” She brings up the issue that jobs of hard labor expect higher wages than those that do not despite the fact that such “easy” jobs still require a larger set of skills. Since many of these “office” jobs are filled by women a lower wage has come to be expected than wages received for laborious jobs that are outside the office.
Myers describes women as bringing “a different set of attributes… because of our culture and how we shape and mold individuals.” She elaborates on this by saying that women are better at multitasking, not because of intelligence, but because of our conditioning of genders.
Myers has served on two school boards and the school board of a private school where she helped it become accredited with the state of Texas. This particular school board was over seventy percent male and a current board on which she resides she is the only female member. Myers says this is troubling since “females are the ones who generally serve in that context,” that belong the teachers and staff.
Myers explains that it may be better to consider the positive attributes of women as “‘expectations'” rather than characteristics. In that case she spoke for all women explaining that they often “overcompensate” when put into a position of leadership.
Current society has several women who idolize the progress the female gender has made. Myers believes that Oprah Winfrey, although not ideologically aligned with Myers, has the largest following of people due to her large media presence and large fortune. “People tend to trust her and she has been a successful businesswoman,” which has given Ms. Winfrey a large amount of pull in the feminist sphere of influence.
Myers said that as a leader herself she often fails at one overarching thing: ” producing a peaceful atmosphere.” She said that she always strives for “a win-win situation” but realizes this is not always possible. She does not always give in as easy as she thinks she should in such a situation but she was not sure that this should be considered a negative limitation.
Previous advocates work to give women more chances at leadership have aided in producing the ability for Myers to hold the positions that she has. Myers believes that the most influential historical advocates was “Susan B. Anthony,” who championed women’s rights during the suffrage movement and Eleanor Roosevelt because she was always respected and had a heat of her own which she used in her position of influence as the first lady under her husband Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In addition to these two, she also included Harriet Tubman, who “overcame two barriers, being female and African-American.” In more modern times, in the news world “the one who broke the glass ceiling was Barbara Walters,” according the Myers.
In the next fifty years, Myers sees women “ahead of men [in the workplace] …[because] slowly but surely in the past fifty years females have been overtaking males in the area of education.” She gave the example that “the top ten [schools] are dominated by women” more and more often nowadays and more female students are getting full ride scholarships. In addition to this the median point of male-to-female student ratio was tipped in favor of the women. She went on to say that this “cannot continue without a switching of dominant roles.” There is no middle equilibrium point; either men or women will dominant such statistics, that is certain.
Myers says her “mother and her grandmother” were “strong” and not afraid to show their intelligence.” She said that” it never occurred to me to play dumb…ever.” This results in non-authenticity as women do not showcase their unique talents and strength because they fear it will hurt their chances in ascending the ladder of a corporation. Myers obviously has never done such a thing, she has remained authentic and remains a leader.
Support in the household and a similarity between ideologies within said residence can support and help nurture sound notions in the minds of the involved. When asked about how her husband ‘s actions might have affected her own and whether he supports her I got this response. Myers responded “Yes he does,” and having been married almost thirty years she said that they have discussed issues such as, the supplemental vs. dominant status of salaries and wages of men versus women numerous times. She said that “he made a significant change in the payroll situation at their church” around five years ago in 2009. Now “people [are] paid for their skill sets whether or not they are married…whether or not they have children, you are paying for a job, not based on their life circumstances or their gender.”
Family can often come in the way of career and life planning. Myers says that “[she] put off her education while raising my daughter.” Despite her intense love for education and learning she does not consider this to have been a bad decision and she said that if she had it to do over again she would have done the same thing. She was nor “resentful” of putting her “advancement on hold.”
Myers says that she “fully supports a woman’s own choice in how she maps out her life, and if she chooses to put family on hold to go to school and settle her feet within her profession well absolutely. More power to her!”
She says that “I don’t think any of us has any business making that kind of decision for someone.” She believes that if it takes certain sacrifices to make your situation better and it only affects you directly, go ahead and make those sacrifices.
Myers says that these kinds of questions “are [really] a desk-top topic for me anyway, and I think about it pretty regularly.” I see this as a good thing because we need to keep remembering the issue at hand so we do not slouch and become indifferent and accept the problems of current society. A true she-leader is always concerned with women’s and men’s status in the world and cares to look for solutions to the problems faced by genders. She speaks to me as a true she-leader because of her perpetual concern with women’s status and access to leadership opportunities and her drive to expose others to such thoughts so that perhaps some imputation can occur.