Embedded Files
opportunities for promotion when they perceive themselves as lacking any qualification.49 These tendencies begin as early as grade school and, consequently, have resulted in women becoming less visible than men in many facets of life including school classrooms, conferences, and public events.51 Worse, when women do speak up first or promote themselves, they are often seen as aggressive or bossy rather than assertive or ambitious. For women to believe they are capable of greatness, they must first be encouraged early in life. This comes not only in the form of individual support but in the presence of leaders with whom young females can identify. As such, women in plastic surgery should remember to encourage other females of all ages. Females in plastic surgery should seek not only to participate in private practice, academic, and professional society pursuits but also to attain leadership in these arenas. Female community and private plastic surgeons, board members, program directors, and senior attendings provide physical, tangible examples of role models to which young women can aspire to become. They may also provide more approachable mentors for young women to discuss professional, academic, and collaborative opportunies.52 Secondly, women in plastic surgery must mentor other young females. Previous studies have shown that female role models are the most influential factor for female medical students interested in plastic surgery.15 Further, women plastic surgeons are more likely than men to benefit from having a same-sex mentor in multiple areas including medicine and professional development opportunities, managerial skills, knowledge, and confidence.16,52 These relationships foster ambition and provide younger women with the skills needed to advance in academic plastic surgery.15 This benefit highlights the impact of underrepresentation of women in plastic surgery leadership as this inherently means fewer female mentors and may contribute to gender gaps in leadership in plastic surgery programs.15,52 As such, it is important for private practice, community employed, and academic plastic surgeons to open their doors to young female physicians. Each of these arenas provides a different and valuable educational opportunity and perspective that may inspire a variety of interests that would otherwise go uncultivated. Lastly, and most importantly, women in plastic surgery must sponsor other women. One egregious behavior that cannot be tolerated is not offering a woman an opportunity because you think she is too busy or will not want it.53 Sponsorship has been defined by Snyder Warwick et al as the synergistic combination of mentorship and endorsement through connections and pitches by a more experienced and networked mentor.19 Whereas males have cultivated a long history of sponsorship among themselves, females have yet to perfect this art.54 Female leaders in all areas of plastic surgery must take mentorship a step further and create sponsorship. We must not only invite young plastic surgery women to meetings, but ask them to speak; we must not only invite these women to sit on various organizational boards, but listen to their ideas; we must not only make them an important member of the Downloaded from https://academic.oup.com/asj/ by guest on 14 February 2020 6 Aesthetic Surgery Journal team, but ask them to lead the team. Our accomplished female leaders in plastic surgery must help young women weave their professional webs within existing networks so that they might become a part of female camaraderie in the same manner our male counterparts have fostered among themselves. Seasoned female mentors must begin to give their ideas away to new plastic surgeons, encouraging hard work borne out of passion and celebrating success. What Role Do Men Play in the Plastic Surgery Gender Disparity Crisis? The role of men in the current gender disparity crisis is just as important as, perhaps in some respects even more than, that of women. Just as with women, the role of male encouragement for women begins on an individual level early in life. For fathers; for men in elementary, undergraduate, and graduate level college education; and for men in the plastic surgery community, encouraging women to simply attempt a new task or goal is key to them gaining of confidence at an early age. Studies have shown that inferior performance of women on psychological tests or puzzles is often the result of lack of attempt to even answer questions.49,55 In these studies, sex differences were eliminated by controlling or manipulating participants’ confidence. That is, when women believed they had done well on the aforementioned initial examinations, they attempted to answer more questions and matched male scoring on subsequent testing.49,55 This illustrates an extremely important point that low confidence results in inaction. What holds women back is the choice not to try. These choices become habit at a young age for most girls. Importantly, girls who are supported by male figures in childhood are more likely to have higher self-esteem and self-confidence, graduate from college, and enter higher-paying, more demanding jobs traditionally held by males.56 In short, positive
Google Sites
Report abuse