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American Morning

The Big Question: Do Women in Business Play by Different Rules?

Aired March 06, 2002 - 08:33   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Big question at this hour, do women in business play by different rules? An editor at the "Harvard Business Review" is under fire this morning, accused of a conflict of interest. Suzie Wetlaufer reportedly developed a close relationship with one of her interview subjects, former GE chief Jack Welsh, and then recused herself from the article she was writing. Now according to "The Wall Street Journal," Wetlaufter told colleagues their relationship was a romantic one. Now some say she should resign.

Joining us now to talk about the fallout from the reported liaison and relationships in the workplace, Ronna Lichtenberg, author of "It is Not Business, It's Personal" and in Miami, Dr. Deborah Tannen, who has written the book "I Only Say This Because I Love You."

Good to see both of you. Welcome.

First of all, Ronna, what is your assessment of how Suzie Wetlaufer has handled herself so far?

RONNA LICHTENBERG, AUTHOR, "IT'S NOT BUSINESS, IT'S PERSONAL": Well, she gets points for going to her boss and telling him there's a problem, but I think she made a big mistake telling four of her colleagues she was having a romantic relationship with someone.

ZAHN: Yes, Deborah, what's that all about? Would a man confide those kind of -- I'm sorry, I'll let you get your earpiece straightened out.

DEBORAH TANNEN, AUTHOR, "I ONLY SAY THIS BECAUSE I LOVE YOU": Sorry about that. I think I've got it now.

ZAHN: Great.

Is that something you'd find men doing in the workplace, confiding to a colleague they were having an affair with someone they were working with, or someone they were about to interview?

TANNEN: That seems to be -- well, apparently she had interviewed and written the article before the affair, and then began to be concerned that while it was in press, and it was being put to press, this affair began. This practice of telling the people that you work with about what's going on in your personal life is more common among women than men. Men will frequently boast about something where they feel they have had some sort of a triumph, but women seem to prefer to feel that people they work with are friends, and women judge friendship by intimacy, whether we tell what's going on in our personal lives.

So very frequently we find women getting into trouble, because they've revealed someone they think of as a friend something going on. I mean, think back to the whole Monica Lewinsky thing, which was just because she had told Linda Tripp and others also beforehand.

ZAHN: So, Ronna, you just heard Deborah describe this as a pretty common behavior among some women. What is your advice to young women today if we're sort of genetically primed to do this?

LICTHENBERG: Keep your mouth shut. Guys know that you can't talk about who you're having an affair with at work, same rules for women. If you're going to mix sex and work, that is potentially volatile. It could blow up. So if you do it, then have the guts to keep your mouth shut and not talk about it. She was right to tell her boss, but she wasn't right to tell anyone else.

ZAHN: But Dr. Tannen, is there a double standard at play here? If Suzie had been a man, would this have played out any differently?

TANNEN: I think often women who are in very high positions do find themselves being held to a higher standard in general. And when it comes to having any sort of sexual involvement, unfortunately, we still have that double standard, that people see a woman as somehow being compromised, conquered, where they may see a man as having accomplished something of a triumph in some way, being a conqueror. We wish this has changed completely. Unfortunately, it hasn't changed completely yet.

ZAHN: Ronna, do you see this the same way?

LICHTENBERG: No, I disagree. Remember, this was an ethical issue. This was an interview where the subject had a right to rewrite his answers. So if it had been a guy with a woman CEO, it would have been the same ethical concern. I don't think this was because she with was a woman.

ZAHN: What do you think would have happened if the writer had been a male and the CEO had been a female?

LICHTENBERG: Well, I think if the writer had been a male, he would have had little more drummed into his head about sexual harassment, not talking about sex at work, and there's a greater likelihood if he had brought it up with his boss, he would have limited it to a discussion with the editor, Walter Keachling (ph), and that would have been it.

ZAHN: But Dr. Tannen said she did do the responsible thing. She did alert her boss to this relationship

LICHTENBERG: That was the right thing but telling everybody else that's the wrong thing. That's just tacky.

ZAHN: All right, Dr. Tannen, jump in here.

TANNEN: Yes, I think it's certainly the case had it been a suspicion it had affected the article perhaps people would have responded the same whether it's a man or woman. In this case, we know she had actually put the article to bed before the sexual relationship began, at least that's what we understand, but I think that this does work in an almost automatic sort of way, that whether it's a sexual thing or not, very often women in high positions are perceived as more vulnerable, and so someone I know in business once made this parallel that if you're -- he was someone who raced professionally in yacht racing, that you look for the woman who's at the helm, and go after that one first, because you perceived she's probably weaker and you can pick her off quicker.

So I think it may not be an intentional thing, but I think that often does play a role here. Of course, in this case, we don't know all the specifics of this case, whether editors may have had some of the reason to have a concern.

But I think we really do need take into account that this is a sexual affair, and that they were particularly critical of her, because it does seem pretty clear that she had written the article before, and I think this telling people that you're close to about your concern before you go to the top editor may have been perceived as she should have gone right to editor, but I think for many women, this is the way you kind of decide what to do. You discuss it with people you're close to, to get their opinion on it. I think she may have felt this was all part of the process of handling it in the honorable way.

ZAHN: Need a quick yes or no here, Ronna, if you were running "The Harvard Business Review," would you fire her Suzie Wetlaufer?

LICHTENBERG: No, she's up for an ethics violation, but there was no ethics policy in print yet, so I think it's a little bit of a tough call to fire someone for violating an ethics policy when there hasn't been one clarified.

ZAHN: All right, Ronna Lichtenberg, thank you for joining us this morning, and Dr. Deborah Tannen, we appreciate your time as well.

LICHTENBERG: Thank you.

TANNEN: Thanks, Paula.

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