The recent controversy around Meta's whole process of moving away from fact-checking has become, understandably, centred on Mark Zuckerberg's statement that "we need more masculine energy in tech."
In the UK and USA, "masculine" and "feminine" are loaded words, and heavily shackled to "men" and "women" respectively; people tend to hear "masculine energy" and jump to "men"...and, from there, jump to "That's misogyny!"
But masculine and feminine are simply types of energy that people bring to a space; they do not have to correlate to expressed genders of "man" and "woman".
Masculine Energy
Masculine energy is the energy of determined, often single-minded and individualistic, focus. It's the energy of direct, concise communication. It's the energy that says "Tell me if you have a problem, and I'll stop it being a problem for you." It's the energy of competition, it's the energy that desires to win.
Masculine energy, out of balance, shows its uncentredness in aggression, in abrupt refusal to consider other peoples' input and insights, in competition becoming not about personal excellence, but about preventing others showing their own excellence. It's a determined single-minded focus shifting into stubborn blinkeredness. It's the desire to win giving way to the desire to see others lose.
Balanced masculine energy is an excellent grounding energy for creative teams, who can often get caught up in elaborate ideas and intricate conceptual thinking, but then find themselves struggling to bring those things back down to earth, and set to work making them an actualised, physical reality.
Balanced masculinity can be an excellent partner to people who struggle with maintaining focus, or are prone to "daydreaming."
Balanced masculine energy is the energy of the pitch, the energy of the sell.
Balanced masculinity is vital in times of crisis, when everyone is unsettled and in their feelings, and there is no clear road ahead.
Businesses, organisations, teams, and communities need balanced masculinity. They need the people who are going to quietly take someone aside, and say "Your tie's not tied right - here, let me show you." They need people who are going to raise their voice above the noise of dissent - without shouting - and say "We're going to try it this way for now. If that doesn't work, we'll come back, and have another discussion." They need people who can listen without interrupting, ask succinct questions to enhance their own understanding, and then say "I can handle that for you - or I can show you what to do if you'd prefer?"
Masculine energy, when it's in balance, isn't "toxic", it isn't all about "pushing out women to make men comfortable"; women can bring masculine energy to situations, too. Some women wholly embody masculine energy, and are proud to do so. Many women have lived lives where they have been obliged to develop their own masculinity, because poverty, geographical isolation, or lack of community have meant that they had to move forward without men to support them.
Feminine energy
Feminine energy seeks consensus. It centres collaboration, not competition. It wants to succeed - not necessarily to win. Feminine energy focuses on resolving the emotions enmeshed with a situation, not necessarily the situation itself. Feminine energy wants to see everyone grow through working on problems, not simply "solve the problem."
Unbalanced feminine energy can create toxicity through excessively centring emotions, leading to feelings of people, rather than ideas of processes, being attacked, or the use of emotions to manipulate discourse. It can create the appearance of "favourites", centring others who bring a collaborative, emotion-centred, tangenting communication style to a workplace, and excluding those who communicate more directly.
Balanced femininity is exceptionally good at identifying the "hidden" blockers to progress, which most often lie in peoples' subconscious beliefs and feelings, rather than in physical problems.
Feminine energy, in balance, creates highly functional groups from random collections of diverse individuals, drawing out skills and passions to create an effective, multifaceted team.
Balanced femininity quells agitation and dissent by ensuring everyone feels heard, and facilitating oversight of all possible options for moving forward.
Feminine energy, in balance, notices who is flagging, who is at risk of charging off in the wrong direction, who is uncomfortable, and brings everybody to a point of recharged, restful, renewed focus through cohesive inclusion.
Businesses, teams, and organisations need balanced feminine energy. They need the person who is able to say "You seem a bit off - do you want to talk about it?" They need someone who honours feelings - which, yes are "just feelings", but are experienced as very real by those going through them, and which can and do create very real, immediate barriers.
Again, men can bring feminine energy without themselves "being feminine" - I've encountered several men with feminine energy in my life, in positions as diverse as therapists, IT consultants, and performers. The majority of them have been cisgender-heterosexual identified men - something it's important to note, as society seems to persist in an outdated moral panic that says men embodying feminine energy will automatically be gay, or non-cis (and, of course, the persistent delusion that being such is "bad".) If we "allow" men to hold feminine energy, the received wisdom goes, they'll "turn into women", or "become transgender". Interestingly, the perception of women holding masculine energy, without being masculine themselves, is that they're "more reasonable", "more receptive to logic", "easier to work with" - all of which, of course, are rooted in systemic misogyny, which insists that any emotion-centredness, any idea that collaboration may be more effective than competition, is "dysfunctional" and "destructive."
So; does business need more masculine energy?
Potentially.
The answer will be different for each business. If you're wondering whether your organisation would benefit from an influx of masculine energy, ask yourself the following questions:
1. Do we often seem to have meetings with no clear purpose?
2. Do meetings frequently overrun because people are allowed to talk about irrelevant things, or repeat contributions others have already made?
3. Is there a lot of communication about "how XYZ made ABC feel"?
4. Are colleagues frequently being placed in mandatory "emotional intelligence" or "challenging conversations" classes, with this being positioned as a "resolution" to problems which actually remain unresolved?
5. If your organisation employs reciprocal mentorship, does it frequently end up being "everyone yelling and complaining for an hour", with no feeling of productivity?
In the UK and USA, "masculine" and "feminine" are loaded words, and heavily shackled to "men" and "women" respectively; people tend to hear "masculine energy" and jump to "men"...and, from there, jump to "That's misogyny!"
But masculine and feminine are simply types of energy that people bring to a space; they do not have to correlate to expressed genders of "man" and "woman".
Masculine Energy
Masculine energy is the energy of determined, often single-minded and individualistic, focus. It's the energy of direct, concise communication. It's the energy that says "Tell me if you have a problem, and I'll stop it being a problem for you." It's the energy of competition, it's the energy that desires to win.
Masculine energy, out of balance, shows its uncentredness in aggression, in abrupt refusal to consider other peoples' input and insights, in competition becoming not about personal excellence, but about preventing others showing their own excellence. It's a determined single-minded focus shifting into stubborn blinkeredness. It's the desire to win giving way to the desire to see others lose.
Balanced masculine energy is an excellent grounding energy for creative teams, who can often get caught up in elaborate ideas and intricate conceptual thinking, but then find themselves struggling to bring those things back down to earth, and set to work making them an actualised, physical reality.
Balanced masculinity can be an excellent partner to people who struggle with maintaining focus, or are prone to "daydreaming."
Balanced masculine energy is the energy of the pitch, the energy of the sell.
Balanced masculinity is vital in times of crisis, when everyone is unsettled and in their feelings, and there is no clear road ahead.
Businesses, organisations, teams, and communities need balanced masculinity. They need the people who are going to quietly take someone aside, and say "Your tie's not tied right - here, let me show you." They need people who are going to raise their voice above the noise of dissent - without shouting - and say "We're going to try it this way for now. If that doesn't work, we'll come back, and have another discussion." They need people who can listen without interrupting, ask succinct questions to enhance their own understanding, and then say "I can handle that for you - or I can show you what to do if you'd prefer?"
Masculine energy, when it's in balance, isn't "toxic", it isn't all about "pushing out women to make men comfortable"; women can bring masculine energy to situations, too. Some women wholly embody masculine energy, and are proud to do so. Many women have lived lives where they have been obliged to develop their own masculinity, because poverty, geographical isolation, or lack of community have meant that they had to move forward without men to support them.
Feminine energy
Feminine energy seeks consensus. It centres collaboration, not competition. It wants to succeed - not necessarily to win. Feminine energy focuses on resolving the emotions enmeshed with a situation, not necessarily the situation itself. Feminine energy wants to see everyone grow through working on problems, not simply "solve the problem."
Unbalanced feminine energy can create toxicity through excessively centring emotions, leading to feelings of people, rather than ideas of processes, being attacked, or the use of emotions to manipulate discourse. It can create the appearance of "favourites", centring others who bring a collaborative, emotion-centred, tangenting communication style to a workplace, and excluding those who communicate more directly.
Balanced femininity is exceptionally good at identifying the "hidden" blockers to progress, which most often lie in peoples' subconscious beliefs and feelings, rather than in physical problems.
Feminine energy, in balance, creates highly functional groups from random collections of diverse individuals, drawing out skills and passions to create an effective, multifaceted team.
Balanced femininity quells agitation and dissent by ensuring everyone feels heard, and facilitating oversight of all possible options for moving forward.
Feminine energy, in balance, notices who is flagging, who is at risk of charging off in the wrong direction, who is uncomfortable, and brings everybody to a point of recharged, restful, renewed focus through cohesive inclusion.
Businesses, teams, and organisations need balanced feminine energy. They need the person who is able to say "You seem a bit off - do you want to talk about it?" They need someone who honours feelings - which, yes are "just feelings", but are experienced as very real by those going through them, and which can and do create very real, immediate barriers.
Again, men can bring feminine energy without themselves "being feminine" - I've encountered several men with feminine energy in my life, in positions as diverse as therapists, IT consultants, and performers. The majority of them have been cisgender-heterosexual identified men - something it's important to note, as society seems to persist in an outdated moral panic that says men embodying feminine energy will automatically be gay, or non-cis (and, of course, the persistent delusion that being such is "bad".) If we "allow" men to hold feminine energy, the received wisdom goes, they'll "turn into women", or "become transgender". Interestingly, the perception of women holding masculine energy, without being masculine themselves, is that they're "more reasonable", "more receptive to logic", "easier to work with" - all of which, of course, are rooted in systemic misogyny, which insists that any emotion-centredness, any idea that collaboration may be more effective than competition, is "dysfunctional" and "destructive."
So; does business need more masculine energy?
Potentially.
The answer will be different for each business. If you're wondering whether your organisation would benefit from an influx of masculine energy, ask yourself the following questions:
1. Do we often seem to have meetings with no clear purpose?
2. Do meetings frequently overrun because people are allowed to talk about irrelevant things, or repeat contributions others have already made?
3. Is there a lot of communication about "how XYZ made ABC feel"?
4. Are colleagues frequently being placed in mandatory "emotional intelligence" or "challenging conversations" classes, with this being positioned as a "resolution" to problems which actually remain unresolved?
5. If your organisation employs reciprocal mentorship, does it frequently end up being "everyone yelling and complaining for an hour", with no feeling of productivity?
If the answers are "Yes" (all or mostly), then you likely do need some more masculine energy. That may not mean "more men"; it might look like investing in training the women in your organisation to feel comfortable holding masculine energy. (The Productive Pessimist can help with this; drop us an email: theproductivepessimist@yahoo.com.) Or perhaps you actually do need to centre (or re-centre) men in your hiring process.
How to tell if your business needs more feminine energy
Again, the answer to whether your business needs more feminine energy will vary from business to business. As with identifying whether you may need an influx of masculine energy, answering the following questions can help you establish whether you're potentially short on feminine energy:
1. Do you find yourself/your colleagues sticking rigidly to your job description, because it feels unsafe to try and branch out?
2. Do you frequently find requests for wider conversations about workplace and sector challenges are dismissed, and you're simply told to "focus on the brief", or similar?
3. Are you actively encouraged to see your colleagues as potential threats to your own success, and as people who cannot be trusted?
4. Do leadership present everything as a "crisis" or "emergency"?
5. Do you often feel you/your team are being "railroaded" down a particular course of action, with no ability to raise concerns?
If the answers are all or mostly "Yes" - you may need to bring in some feminine energy. Again, this doesn't necessarily mean "employ women" - you may be in a sector which isn't actually attractive to women, for reasons that can't be altered, you may be in an area with a gender imbalance in the population, and there just aren't that many women looking for work. You can create comfort in your male team members with the idea of holding feminine energy. (Again, we're here to help with that - drop us an email at theproductivepessimist@yahoo.com)
Perhaps you've discovered that, actually, your team or organisation is pretty balanced in the energies you have onboard - in which case, fantastic; if you know how you achieved that balance, keep doing more of the same. If you have no idea how it worked out like that- we're happy to take a look at your dynamics, and identify what led to you having the team you have (so you can keep building similar teams.)
Mark Zuckerberg is, unfortunately, an example of hesitant masculine energy - he isn't confident in his own masculinity and capability, so he's dashing from one source of "authoritative, definitive masculine energy" (as he perceives it) to another. The inevitable result of that is that hesitant masculine energy will always do what Zuckerberg, and many other individuals who have been told their masculine energy is inherently worthless, toxic, destructive, childish, etc, or who simply have no experience as adults holding masculine energy have shown themselves to do, and mis-identify unbalanced masculinity, which relies on aggression and threat, as assertive, leadership-imbued, balanced masculine energy.
Balanced masculine energy engages with criticism and challenge - but insists that both come from a position of objective concern, and logic, rather than emotions.
Balanced masculinity is open to the possibility that it has chosen the wrong focus, and will be proactive in returning to a better position.
Balanced masculine energy doesn't need to shout or parade; its presence commands attention - think of the experience when, in front of a rowdy auditorium, a particular speaker or performer just very casually, very unobtrusively, without any introduction or entrance music, ambles across the stage, almost seems to "accidentally" step into the spotlight...and the crowd falls silent almost as one, without any instruction, compulsion, or guidance to do so. That is the effect of confident, intentional masculinity at work. And yes; women can hold that power, too. And not all men do hold it, though all can learn to.
Any energy will become toxic if it's out of balance for too long.
Balanced energy, on the other hand, is always good energy, which influences positive results.
Some people will respond best to particular kinds of energy - I, for example, have come to recognise that it is not the case that I have historically "consistently found women to be poor leaders" - I simply respond best to masculine energy, and the female leaders I worked with in employed positions held feminine energy. This explains also the types of women I enter into relationship with, both platonic and romantic; they tend to hold a deeply blended energy, and are able to raise or lower one form of energy over the other almost at will. I can work with feminine energy, held by men or women, but it never feels completely comfortable, and is always a conscious effort - that's not necessarily a bad thing, but, sometimes, we all need to be able to find a space where we "just feel the vibes are right", and we're not having to put deliberate effort into attuning to the energy, interpreting communication styles, etc.
I often feel that when women insist that "Yes, it is all men!" what they're trying to communicate is the sense of being pressured to "just get with" masculine energy, when that's not the energy they naturally gel with. It feels like conflict, like deliberate oppression, as though it's "everywhere, all the time." Because, the fact that women continue to date men, continue to allow men to father children with them, continue to accept employment offered by men, continue to vote for male politicians, shows that there isn't a consistent, cohesive sense that "men are dangerous to women" (although, of course, statistics represent the reality of that statement) - why would you keep bringing yourself into connection with a source of danger? Why would you vote for dangerous people to be in positions where they literally get to decide how you may live your life? And, objectively, not all men want to harm women, not all men act in harmful ways, not all men are misogynistic... The reality isn't coming from "How all men literally behave all the time" - it's coming from somewhere else, and that "somewhere else" is the point where masculine energy chafes against someone who works most naturally with feminine energy.
Likewise, the same process is at work in men (and more than a few women) who are constantly complaining about "how women are", who ridicule genuine, inclusive feminism, who attack women, physically or verbally, for simply existing - the only reason for such an extreme reaction is the intense discomfort of encountering an energy you are not naturally inclined towards working with.
That isn't a justification; anyone can - and should - learn to be adaptive, to adjust to the energy they find themselves presented with, and to recognise that their discomfort with that energy can just be a "feeling"; once you learn to identify unbalanced energy, masculine or feminine, you'll become more confident in calling it out, and consequently more able to tolerate balanced energy that is not the kind you prefer to work with.
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