Forbes Coaches Council Post: Has Talking About ‘Hard Work’ Become Taboo For Women?
Randi Braun is a member of the Forbes Coaches Council, where this post was first published on Forbes.com. Randi is the CEO of Something Major and the Wall Street Journal Bestselling author of Something Major: The New Playbook for Women at Work.
Posting a time-lapse video of myself riding my Peloton in a sports bra, while nine months pregnant, was not on my social media bingo card for 2024.
But as I neared the end of my third pregnancy, I realized something striking: Like so many women whose child-bearing years overlap with their ladder-climbing ones, every pregnancy I’ve had has been a time of immense professional advancement and, dare I say, hustle in my career.
When I took to LinkedIn to share these reflections, I was overwhelmed by messages encouraging me to rest or slow down or inquiring about what I was doing for my self-care (despite the fact that I had recorded the video performing one of my favorite self-care activities).
But it wasn’t just this post. It’s a trend I’ve noticed again and again, as a women’s leadership coach and author: When women talk publicly about their hard work, the overwhelming response is about imploring rest and self-care—not about championing their achievements.
Listen, I am all about rest and self-care being the drivers that empower us to achieve our goals and dreams, but this has made me wonder: Is it taboo for women to talk about their hard work?
The Myth Of Effortlessness
While celebrated male innovators of our time like Mark Zuckerburg are known for grinding it out across days-long hackathons, female innovators like self-made billionaire and Spanx founder Sara Blakely are constantly asked to talk about how they "balance it all."
Yes, in an always-on culture, the conversation about balance and self-care is a critical one—regardless of gender. Yet something about this conversation feels broken, if not downright weaponized as just one more thing women have to walk the tightrope on perfectly: obligating women to perform a standard of "balance" that men just aren’t held to.
In a culture that rewards overwork, it's ironic that one of the most toxic messages bombarding women on social media is what I call the Myth of Effortlessness: a state of being successful, pretty or downright perfect without trying. Consider the number of makeup products in the viral videos about how to do your makeup so it looks like you’re not wearing makeup. Or the photos your co-worker shares of her seemingly perfectly behaved children that include picture-perfect outfits but no evidence of the tantrum that occurred in them five minutes beforehand.
Messages about being "effortless" bombard women across Instagram and TikTok while research shows—from the mental load of mothers to the widening of the pay gap—that it’s never been harder to be a woman who "does it all."
The Effects Of Social Media
As therapist and best-selling leadership author Brené Brown describes it, we’re now stuck inside an "influencer-industrial complex" where the giving of advice has become downright predatory. While influencers get wealthy off our guilt and burnout, the Myth of Effortlessness we’re sold on social media compounds the stress we already feel.
It’s not enough to be successful; you’re doing something wrong if you don’t also meditate 20 minutes a day ("sign up for their exclusive program now") or drink a special supplement that will "optimize" your brain health ("link to discount code in their bio"), so you can chase that illusive dream of working less but achieving more.
While in the real world of offices and coworkers, status is conveyed by being "always on" or in grind mode, on social media it’s conveyed by performative self-care and effortlessness—a paradoxical, if not impossible, standard that inevitably sets women up to feel like they’ve failed even when they’ve succeeded in accomplishing great things.
Releasing Hustle Culture While Celebrating Hustle
Over the past few years, that "always-on" mindset has been challenged, and there has been an important movement to call out hustle culture—which perpetuates a constant state of overwork and performative productivity—as toxic. Critics rightfully point out that hustle culture benefits a few at the top (usually male, pale and wealthy) at the cost of those performing the daily grind (with the cost highest for those from marginalized communities).
I completely agree that hustle culture is toxic. Aside from the mental health crisis it has created, our hustle culture is literally killing people. But we can’t let the good things about "hustle" get swept away with "hustle culture."
In fact, I believe we need to celebrate the women who are hustling—that is, working hard day in and day out to chase their dreams and goals—and separate them from those trapped in the cycle of hustle culture—grinding themselves down to chase somebody else’s dreams.
It's not about perpetuating overwork. In fact, if we’re doing the "hustle" part right, self-care is a critical catalyst for sustaining our hard work—our most audacious goals and dreams are often a long game, and we can’t get there if we burn out along the way.
The Way Forward
We must release this public performance of productivity and overwork to free ourselves from hustle culture. But we can’t let the pendulum swing so far the other way that we get swept into performing the Myth of Effortlessness. The truth is that hard work is ... well, hard work.
We need to recognize the women who hustle: championing their hard work, amplifying their voices and accomplishments and naming the adversity they have overcome to get where they are, including (and especially) systemic inequities.
I want to live in a world where women can hustle and be proud of their hard work without being beholden to the Myth of Effortlessness or held hostage by hustle culture. Will you join me?
Randi Braun is a certified executive coach and the author of Something Major: The New Playbook for Women at Work. Get in touch with Randi via email or social (below). Copyright 2024. All rights reserved.