A changing female experience

Natalie Coulter '23

Editor-in-Chief of Content

What makes it acceptable for people to see my gender and assume less of me than what I am worth? What makes others think that being a man is better than being a woman? Why can presenting as a woman be so difficult in today's society?

These questions may seem outrageous and dramatic to some, but these are questions women ask themselves all the time. These are questions I ask myself when reflecting on everything that has happened in my life so far. Starting back in elementary school, I would hear my teacher say, “I need some strong boys to help me move some boxes.” “You’re not strong enough to hold that. Let me get one of the boys to help you.” Skip to middle school, where comments such as: “Wow, you’re pretty good, for a girl,” and “I knew a girl would be the reason we lost” are commonplace during PE and classroom activities.

Growing older means double standards and assumptions grow with me. These comments that follow you begin as childlike insults; which evolve into adult harassment. “Man, I’d love to take you home tonight,” and “Are you legal, baby?” being yelled from a car window as you walk down the street. Walking into a meeting with a passion and a proposal, only to be shot down by, “Can you get me a coffee, sweetheart,” or even “Man, would that chick ever stop talking?”

I have been a witness to this behavior for my entire life. 17 years of growing up in a world filled with misogyny and stereotypes. But as luck will have it, things are starting to change.

In November of 2021, I got the opportunity of a lifetime. I was able to go to London to work on an interview involving Caroline Mogford, the head of marketing at Qualtrics; Sarah Marrs, the head of the organizational psychologists at Qualtrics; and Malala Yousafzai, a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and Pakistani activist for women’s education. For those who may not know, Qualtrics is a company that specializes in experience management. They host surveys and programs to create reports for the companies that use them. The interview was about the importance of women’s education and female empowerment.

Humor aside, I was able to learn about women’s empowerment from hearing Caroline and Sarah during their interviews, as well as the interviews I had the pleasure of conducting with both of them after the shoot. Even our location holds history with the original women’s rights activists, the suffragettes. We (the crew) set up for Malala’s interview in the Granaio Restaurant, which has a back dining area away from the rest of the restaurant. In the past, this restaurant was known as the Criterion Tea Room, where English suffragettes would meet to plan how they would try to gain their right to vote. This history created the perfect background for an interview surrounding the modern fight for female equality. During my interview with Caroline and Sarah, we discussed their experiences being female leads in male-dominated fields, their journeys to achieve their positions, as well as what they have experienced due to the inequality in their workplace.

Below is a bit of my interview with Caroline Mogford:

Natalie Coulter (NC): How is it, working as a woman, in such a high-ranking position in such a professional setting?

Caroline Mogford (CM): When I joined [Qualtrics] five and a half years ago, I would go to the European Leadership Events, and it would be all men, and me. [. . .]Nobody was unfriendly, but I didn't feel like I was part of things. [. . .] Now, the European leadership teams have more women than men, and it's quite funny because all the chatter's about [...] not specifically female stuff, but it's more inclusive now than what it was five and a half years ago. [...] You've got to be really good, right, as a woman in these situations. In my opinion, you've got to be better than the men, you've got to be more on top of your game.

And here is an excerpt from my interview with Sarah Marrs:

Natalie Coulter (NC): What is your job?

Sarah Marrs (SM): I work for a company called Qualtrics, and I head a small team of organizational psychologists. We hardwire [both] our psychology and measurements of how employees feel at work into our technology.

NC: What are some memorable projects you’ve worked on?

SM: There’s been a lot, [the Malala interview] is one of them. A lot of other presentations that I've done are memorable. A big recent one is we’re working on building up the flagship solution we offer to our customers to measure their experience. It took a long time to build. It’s called the EX-25, and it’s probably one of the things I'm most proud of.

NC: As a woman, especially as a professional working woman, is there any advice you may have for someone looking to be a respected woman in a position of power?

SM: I have one piece of advice. I feel a bit hypocritical giving it because I’m 37, and it’s something I only learned in the last six months, but it would be to back yourself. Back yourself when you know that you're right and the others are wrong and that it's just bullshit. We know when we know [we’re correct], and so many times I have just stayed quiet. It’s not only me staying quiet. Whenever someone said I wasn't ready or prepared enough I believed it, and what I didn’t do was back myself, stand up for myself, and have a respectful debate.

After having the chance to interview these two women, I have found myself thinking back to their words and advice many times. There have been moments where I have used the strength of their words to keep myself confident and to keep myself from agreeing with an opinion for the sake of appeasement. I am glad that the world is changing, and that women are beginning to equalize the playing field. Having the fortune to listen, learn and talk about these stories from two impressive women was an experience I will never forget.