This month one of the "modern day" women featured in The Eve Factor accepted a new opportunity as CFO for a major hotel company headquartered in Los Angeles. Her life, even her child-rearing, has been an example of how women who believe in themselves and learn to communicate in a man's world can excel. Her story, written here, will appear in the chapter on communication along with Eleanor Roosevelt's historical examples of "playing the game the way men do".
At an intimate dinner gathering of the Executive Women's Roundtable, Pat Priest, managing director of The Beck Group, a billion dollar construction company, was reminiscing about a recent visit from her mother. The two were sitting in the breakfast room having coffee together and glanced out to see Pat's daughter in the back yard. She was playing alone, rocking a stick in her arms. Grandma, startled, wanted to know what on earth the child was doing. Pat explained that her daughter was playing dolls.
You see, reacting to her own efforts to excel in a male-dominated industry, Pat wanted to make sure that both her children, a boy and a girl, grew up believing that there were no gender restrictions on their achieving their personal goals. Pat's daughter at age seven had never owned a doll. Grandma's immediate response was, "Pat, get that child a doll!" As a respectful daughter, Pat complied.
As she was telling this story, Pat laughed and said that the day before, the very same stick had been a gun in the arms of her son. He had been in the backyard blasting away at some unseen enemy, making the rat-ta-ta-ta-ta sound that only little boys can make.
The incident makes a strong case for nature in the philosophical tug-of-war, nature vs. nurture; however, Pat's personal success in the construction industry proves that with the proper direction, nurture is also a powerful force.
