Big Girls Still Don't Cry

Shaunti Feldhahn, the author of The Male Factor: The Unwritten Rules, Misperceptions, and Secret Beliefs of Men in the Workplace (Broadway), takes a different tack. Feldhahn, a syndicated columnist, has surveyed and interviewed more than 3,000 men, including many C-level executives, granting them anonymity in exchange for frank boy talk. Among her findings: men are better able to compartmentalize what she calls "Work World" and "Personal World." Men report that "at work, the personal world goes away." Women who don't follow that precept and take things personally are deemed "emotional" and "high maintenance." Says Feldhahn: "I found that the assumption that 'emotion' means 'you are not thinking' is nearly universal among men and often lends itself to a fear of emotion getting involved."

Business-school professors agree. "When a woman acts in a stereotypical way, people then evaluate her in a stereotypical way," says Ashleigh Rosette of the Duke Business School. "So, unfortunately, when a book advises a woman to be careful of the manner in which she displays her emotions, it probably is sound advice." In other words, the workplace remains a low-emotion, no-cry zone, even though more of us are in it.