Bell Labs produced a film in 1975 to recruit women engineers. It begins and ends with college students’ impressions of whether women can be engineers. The majority of the film shows the home and work lives of five women at Bell Labs. What’s most striking and indicative of the age of the film is that the questioning and justifications of women as engineers are not really about the industry but about women having careers outside the home at all, any career. The film’s subjects make the statement that it’s OK for both the husband and wife to work, to have kids in daycare, and that those who think a woman’s place is in the kitchen should be ignored. We’ve come a long way in some respects, and yet in others we haven’t. There may be more women in engineering jobs now than in 1975 but there still aren’t enough.

Companies are making sure that women get enough mentoring to help them up the career ladder, however a study reveals that some women may actually be getting too much mentoring but still are not getting paid or promoted as much as their male counterparts. The difference is sponsorship.  Mentors offer advice and feedback, but men more often have the added benefit of a mentor who also acts as a sponsor, influencing others and advocating on behalf of their mentee.  That endorsement makes a critical difference in their advancement.  Mentors also need training in how to effectively coach those who have a different style than they are accustomed to.  Women often suffer from the double-bind and choice of whether to behave more like their aggressive peers who are perceived as better leaders, when that same behavior can get them labeled as being not easy to work more often than their male counterparts.