Interview with Neneng Goenadi

1st PART: Woman’s history comprehension/understanding

·         Can you present yourself in a few words and explain us what is your job/responsibilities?

I’m the resources manager for Indonesia in Accenture. But I also work in Philippines, I was there yesterday to meet a client. It’s good for me to be an engineer because our clients are mining companies, oil and gas companies… Recently I’ve been on a mining site where we have a team, and I had a lot more credibility because I’m a civil engineer.

·         How did you come to engineering and sciences?

I did 5 years of Civil engineering and 1 year of MBA in the US. I choose civil engineering because it was the best specialty but actually I don’t really like construction. But I think that civil engineers can go anywhere. We learn a logic that we can use in a lot of jobs. In my promotion, a lot of the students are now working in other fields, like commerce, banking… My father is a doctor and my mother is a house wife. I hesitated between medical studies and engineering, engineering was trendy at that time!   

I did an internship in construction, I’ve been working on a site but I don’t really like it, the workers are not always respectful because you are a girl and it’s very hot! But I have a friend of the university, a girl, who is working on the site, so it’s possible! Me, I prefer to work in an office, to be with people who behave and to be well dressed! I told my daughter to study engineering but she doesn’t want, she is a musician! The girls of the new generation are interested in design, graphic design, but not very much in sciences, which was not the case when I was a student.       

·         Did you have to face any difficulty as a woman in your studies/in your job? Or do you think being a woman facilitated it?

In my university there was only 10% of girls, it was not that difficult for me, the fact that there was only a few girls.

In my class most of the students where male and they were behaving like males. Sometimes the jokes that I had were their jokes, but in different situations I would say those jokes and think that I was not behaving as a lady!

·         How do you conciliate professional and personal life?

In Accenture I started as an analyst and then I made manager. When I became a manager my daughter was still a baby. At that time my daughter was sick, my husband was sick and I had to deal with the office, I wanted to quit but my boss told me that I should slow down, for me it’s difficult to slow down, so I moved from consulting to finance, a support function. I’ve been working in finance for 4 years and when my daughter was bigger I went back to consulting. I always say that the definition of balance is that everyone is different, your balance is your balance life, it depends on the circumstances. For me as long as Saturday and Sunday I don’t have to work, it’s fine. It’s true that it’s very very difficult to balance professional and personal life. And I’m traveling a lot, I’m always on the road, last week I was in Malaysia, the week before I was in Singapore and this morning I was in Manila. I guess that the most important thing is whether your family supports you or not, your husband and your child. My husband is working a lot too, he is traveling but not as much as me.

2nd PART:  General debate on woman engineer: differences and new things a woman can bring in a male team

·         Do you think men and women work differently? Could you give us concrete examples (personal works, project works)?

Women are maybe more sensitive. For example when I talk to you, I look at your body, I see your mimics, I’m not only just hearing what you say. Men they don’t understand the body language like this. Whatever you say is what you say. Men are not sensitive. But us for example in negotiation we can push to a certain thing and when we feel the person uncomfortable then we stop. We can play that. There is another thing, I don’t know if it’s Asian whether it’s female, for example for me I’m ok to apologize, to say sorry, I made a mistake. But this is sometimes very difficult for men because they are proud. And sometimes it’s just easier to apologize; you don’t have to be defensive.

We are sometimes more organized than the men in the discussion. And sometimes in a very difficult situation, you just smile, you talk and smile, and people come down a little bit. When there is a woman in the room, even if she is not talking, usually men behave a bit more, they will be a bit more careful in the way they talk.

Men are very practical. Women think about everything but sometimes then they think too complicated and it becomes a disadvantage. Men go straight. Sometimes we think too much… I guess it’s natural, maybe as women we know when we grow up that in our life we will have to take care of our husband, of our family, of our house and of our job, that’s why we are so organized. And a woman also has to adapt, at home she has to adapt herself to be a mum and a wife, at the office she has to adapt herself to be the boss or whatever…

At the beginning of the hierarchy, the number of men and women is the same, but after a certain level there are definitely more men. I read a survey which says that men would say that they want to be promoted, they speak up, women never speak up. Everyone has a coach in the company, men use the coach to help them to go to the next level, women would talk about happiness or things like this, they don’t ask what they should do to be a manager.

Women, at a certain level, they feel very comfortable in their environment so they don’t try to socialize to have more networks. Men they don’t think about being comfortable or not, they just socialize and they go to higher positions threw their network.

    

·         Do you think that a mixed team is helpful for working atmosphere and/or is linked to team performance?

Accenture has a good ratio of women, but at my level it is not that good. A lot of women who are manager quit their job when they have children. Some of them cannot balance the life between their job and family. So the higher you are, the less you have women. Before the companies preferred to have men at high levels but it’s not like that anymore. For example in Accenture, because we want more women at high positions, we have a program for women who have children, so for example if sometimes you need to work from home, you can. If you need to go home earlier because you need to take care of your kids, then you can, as long as you can compensate, for example working again when everybody is sleeping. We try to do that. For women who come back from maternity leave, we have a program to be sure that they feel comfortable.  

I work in a male environment and it’s maybe more comfortable than a female environment, because sometimes females when they are nasty, they are nasty! Women like to talk, I do too but it’s not good to gossip at work. Male they don’t do this, at work they are really working, they are not gossiping. When we have a meeting together, usually we go out all together at night and there is no problem for me to be there even if I’m a woman.

Sometimes we think overall, what will happen if this is not working, we have so many contingency in our mind but male usually not, they go strait, they don’t think about the contingency. I guess that women, once we have a commitment to a certain thing, our honesty and sense of responsibility is very strong. For example, when I joined Accenture I didn’t knew what it was, I didn’t really like it, but I just wanted to try. And when I tried, I was doing my best because I was feeling this commitment and for me I had to do it well. We have a very high sense of honesty and sense of belonging.

It’s demonstrated that a company will be more successful if the percentage of women in pretty good in the leadership level as well, because they can complement the males. We need an initiative, we need to constantly do something, then the number of women will increase. We have to try to understand constantly why the women leave the company and invent new things for them.