Recently I attended a luncheon for women entrepreneurs. The luncheon was sponsored by several corporations, including Chevron and Disney. I was one of the last to arrive and took one of few available seats. As I introduced myself to my table-mates, the woman on my right, a manager at Disney, exclaimed, “I know you! I heard you speak last year in Las Vegas. You changed my career!”

She was so happy and excited! I verbalized my joy in being able to help her and asked for details. She explained, “I was ready to quit, my boss drove me so crazy. We just didn’t get along. Then I heard your presentation on gender communication style differences in the workplace, and realized that maybe our conflict centered around communication styles. I wondered if it could really be that simple. He was always asking for more details, making me explain what I was doing and why. I had always interpreted that he didn’t trust me or think I was competent. After hearing you, I thought maybe he just had the feminine style of wanting more details and enjoying discussing the projects with me. When I approached our interactions with that in mind, everything changed! We started getting along much better and I got promoted a few months later! And that’s not all! My new boss had a reputation with his female managers of being hard to get along with. So I used your information with him too and now we all love working with him. Thank you so much!”

I was thrilled to hear my expertise helped her. My point in posting this is – many workplace teamwork and personality conflicts stem from gender communication style differences. People tend to underestimate the impact of these differences, when in fact awareness and understanding of the differences, along with skill development on how to deal with them, can yield enormous positive results. And this is merely one little example!