If you're savvy and ambitious and you're also aware of the implications in your early 30s of your biology, you know you need to do a lot fast. You need to be able to negotiate some control over your schedule. Toeing the nonlinear line Even in the somewhat older grouping of age 25 to 34, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that women hold more management positions. Among workers age 20 to 24, in 1999, the bureau cites some 117,000 more management spots held by women than by men. Certainly experts in psychology will tell you that men tend to be more linear thinkers.
Women tend to think in ways that are more holistic.
Until recently, the business world was strongly biased toward linear thought. But in the recent changes to fluidity and flexibility of markets, nonlinear thinking may be a much more important skill than it had been. In fact, Tulgan says, a gradual shift toward result and away from tradition also may be opening more channels to women. Loyalty in the workplace in the past was feudal in nature. It was about rites of passage, homage to the hierarchy, paying dues.