Whitman in Huff Po feature on crying at work

May 30, 2014

Marina v.N. Whitman is featured in Catherine Pearson's "What 15 Female Leaders Really Think about Crying at Work," published in the Huffington Post on May 28.

"There may be no crying in baseball, but whether there's a place for it in the office is another question entirely," writes Pearson, who asked more than a dozen female leaders "about the complex etiquette of crying at work."

Professor Marina von Neumann Whitman, author of The Martian's Daughter and a prominent economist and business leader, admits to having come perilously close to crying publicly at the office once or twice. That said, she thinks it's generally inadvisable.

"If the person you're confronting is male, it provides one more excuse to make him think "Isn't that just like a woman?" And if she's female, tears may make her feel defensive, guilty or at least uncomfortable, which is never good idea in the workplace." For Whitman's full comments, and the reactions of other prominent female leaders, visit the Huffington Post.