Have you ever felt that you had to pretend you aren’t as smart as you are in order to fit in or get people to like you? If so, how did you deal with that situation?

As a civil engineer, my job requires as much social intelligence as it does technical intelligence. In some situations, I need to communicate my authority and credentials so that people understand my technical credibility. But in other situations, I disarm people or downplay those same credentials. I’ll ask people to explain it like I’m five or I won’t call a timeout when they start to do the dreaded mansplaining. In those situations, I consciously make the decision to appeal to the crowd or else I’ve decided that this situation doesn’t require intellectual respect from all parties. It’s not worth the stress to always fit in with my intellectual peers, especially if they are people who won’t be changing their viewpoints easily. I see this as a human experience and not necessarily a woman’s experience. As the poet John Lydgate says “you can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all the people all of the time”.

 However, there are certainly situations where my capabilities are called into question purely based on my demographic. Unfortunately because of bias, the situations above happen way more often to women than men. It’s important to then decide if it is worth the energy to dissuade opinions or pretend I’m less knowledgeable than I am. I know that I can always lean on my allies to talk me up to those people if needed or I can ask my allies to repeat what I’ve said so that the content is respected, even if I don’t get credit personally for it. It takes a lot of work to become socially aware of how other people respond in each situation.

 In my personal life I find that I downplay my capabilities more often than in my professional life. Around new people I am cautious around people’s preconceived notions about women in STEM. I have come to expect people to be impressed and maybe a bit intimidated by my career choices (and how much I excel at them). Once I begin to be more familiar with people, no one is confused about my strengths as well as my faults. I keep the people in my life that are okay with my authentic self, both strengths and faults.

 My advice is this, be confident in who you are. If you are confident, then it doesn’t matter how anyone else perceives you. Find your worth and make sure that no one else has control of it but you.