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Bartleby -- Mothers of invention
巴托比專欄——新一代母親
The parallels and differences between two generations of female executives
兩代女性高管間的異同
Betsy Holden was vice-president of strategy and new products at Kraft, a giant food company, when she became pregnant for the second time.
貝琪·霍爾登第二次懷孕的時候，是食品巨頭卡夫公司負責戰略和新產品的副總裁。
“No one has ever done the job with two children,” her male boss worried.
“從來沒有誰帶著兩個孩子做過這份工作，”她的男老板擔心。
“How many children do you have?” Ms Holden asked. “Two,” he replied.
“你有幾個孩子？”霍爾頓女士問道。“兩個，”他回答說。
This double standard is only one of the barriers that female executives face, as recounted in “Power Moms”, a new book by Joann Lublin, a former Wall Street Journal columnist.
正如《華爾街日報》前專欄作家喬安·盧布林在其新書《賦予母親力量》中所述，這種雙重標準只是女性高管所面臨的障礙之一。
The author focuses on two waves of female leaders.
作者重點關注了這兩波女性領導人。
The first group were the baby-boomers, born between 1946 and 1964.
第一波是于1946年至1964年間出生的嬰兒潮一代。
These were often the only women in upper management at their firms.
這些人通常是她們公司里唯一一位女性高層管理者。
They faced a lot of pressure to be hands-on mothers, had little support from their husbands and were reluctant to ask for reduced schedules for fear of not seeming committed to their jobs.
作為母親，為了做到親力親為，她們承受著巨大的壓力，她們的丈夫幾乎不會幫忙，而且她們也不愿意開口要求減少工作時間，因為擔心這樣會顯得對工作不盡心。
The stress for these women was immense, especially as they felt unable to discuss their parenting problems with male colleagues.
這些女性承受的壓力是巨大的，尤其是她們還無法與男同事討論自己的育兒問題。
The second wave of women, born between 1974 and 1985, had female colleagues in upper management, expected (and usually received) support from their spouses, and benefited from employer perks, such as maternity leave and flexible working.
第二波是在1974年至1985年出生的女性，她們在高層管理崗位中有了女性同事，期望（通常也會得到）配偶的支持，還能享受雇主提供的額外福利，比如產假和彈性工作時間。
They were able to be more open with colleagues about their parental duties.
她們可以更加坦誠地告訴同事她們肩負著作為母親的責任。
This later generation has mastered the “work-life sway” in which they move back and forth between their personal and professional lives in the course of a day, conducting a meeting before taking their children for a check-up and then returning to the office.
后面這一代人已經可以很好地“在工作與生活之間搖擺”，一天之中，她們在個人生活和職業生活之間來回穿梭，在帶孩子去體檢之前先開個會，然后再回到辦公室。
The earlier generation, by blazing the trail, made it easier for those behind them.
上一代人通過開辟道路，讓她們后面的人更容易做到這一點。
A Harvard Business School study shows that adult daughters of employed mothers are more likely to hold supervisory responsibility and earn higher incomes while sons are likely to spend more time caring for family members.
哈佛商學院的一項研究顯示，在職母親的成年女兒更有可能承擔起監督責任，收入更高，而兒子則很可能會花更多時間照顧家人。
And companies are now much more willing to promote women, who make up more than a fifth of senior executive positions in American firms, compared with just 10% in 1996.
現在的公司更愿意提拔女性，在美國公司高級管理職位中，女性占五分之一以上，而在1996年這一比例僅為10%。
A few are exceptionally accommodating, for example providing rooms where mothers can express milk, sinks to wash the breast pump and even courier services to deliver the milk when they are away on a business trip.
其中有些公司為這些女性提供了極大便利，比如為母親提供哺乳房、洗吸奶器的水池，甚至在她們出差期間提供送奶服務。
But there is still a long way to go.
但前方仍有很長的路要走。
Only 27% of American employers offered paid parental leave in 2019.
2019年，只有27%的美國雇主提供帶薪育兒假。
That may be up from 17% in 2016, but still leaves a lot of mothers uncovered.
這或許相比2016年的17%有所上升，但仍有很多母親未被覆蓋到。
Even where leave is available, many women don’t take full advantage.
即使在有育兒假的公司，許多女性也沒能充分利用這一福利。
A survey of female tech-industry employees in 2018 found that 44% of women who had taken maternity leave had taken off less time than their entitlement because they thought a longer break would damage their careers.
2018年，一項針對科技行業女性員工的調查發現，44%的休過產假的女性休假的時間少于她們應得的休假時間，因為她們認為較長的休假會損害她們的職業發展。
Working mothers are still overloaded.
職場母親仍然在超負荷工作。
Mothers who are employed full-time spend nearly two-thirds more of their day feeding, bathing and caring for their children (under six) than their employed husbands do.
與有工作的丈夫相比，有全職工作的母親每天在喂食、洗澡和照顧孩子（6歲以下）上花的時間要多出近三分之二。
They still struggle with guilt.
她們仍然掙扎在內疚之中。
One executive was on the phone with an important client in her locked office, only for an impatient toddler to bang on the door and repeatedly scream, “You don’t love me.”
一位高管在她鎖著的辦公室里與一位重要客戶通電話，這時一個不耐煩的蹣跚學步的孩子砰地一聲敲門，不停地大喊著：“你不愛我。”
Unsurprisingly, a study found that chronic stress levels are 40% higher in women who are employed and bringing up two children than in childless working women.
不出所料，一項研究發現，有工作并撫養兩個孩子的女性的長期壓力水平比沒有孩子的職業女性高40%。
Worse still, female employees routinely toiling more than 60 hours a week were more than three times as likely to develop heart disease, cancer or diabetes than those on a conventional 40-hour schedule.
更糟糕的是，每周工作超過60小時的女性患心臟病、癌癥或糖尿病的幾率是那些按常規每周工作40小時的女性的三倍多。
Despite the advances made by female executives, things are even more difficult for the vast majority of working mothers.
盡管女性高管取得了一些進步，但對于絕大多數有工作的母親來說，情況實際更加艱難。
Many work in smaller businesses, where maternity benefits and flexible hours are less likely to be available.
許多人在小型企業工作，這些企業不太可能提供產假福利和彈性工作時間。
Many are in low-paid jobs, or in sectors like health care and retailing, where it has been impossible to work remotely during the pandemic.
許多人從事低薪工作，或在醫療保健和零售等行業工作，疫情期間也不可能遠程工作。
The author writes that “nothing is more essential to an employed mother’s professional success than reliable high-quality child care”, and for many women who are not executives, this is a constant headache.
作者寫道，“在職母親要想取得職業上的成功，沒有什么比可靠的、高質量的育兒服務更重要的了”，對于許多不是高管女性來說，這一直是一個令人頭疼的問題。
It is good news that many more women have climbed the corporate ladder, not just in terms of fairness, but because an economy should take advantage of all its potential talent.
好消息是，越來越多的女性在企業里擔任重要的崗位，這不僅是出于公平，還因為一個經濟體應該利用所有其潛在的人才。
There needs to be a lot more progress made in helping the vast majority of women to juggle their home and work lives, not least by providing affordable child care.
在幫助絕大多數女性兼顧家庭和工作生活方面，需要取得更多進步，尤其是提供負擔得起的兒童保育服務。
There are many more cleaners, cooks and carers than there are chief executives.
清潔工、廚師和護理員可比首席執行官多得多。
譯文由可可原創，僅供學習交流使用，未經許可請勿轉載。
