There’s nothing like spending a weekend with cattle ranchers and meat packers tomake you feel like less of a man. I was in Ohio for the grand opening of Certified AngusBeef’s Educational and Culinary Center, and while a full write-up of my experienceis on the docket for later, suffice to say for now that hanging out with men who workwith the land and their bare hands on a daily basis certainly puts an office job inperspective. In many instances, I think you could make a strong case that men justaren’t cut out to work inoffices at all.As offices become more automated and business processescontinue to improve, the modern man is increasingly at a disadvantage in the businessworld. To say that a different way, I think we’re fine as workers, but there’sreally nothing that goes on in a modern-day office that allows us to have or assert anykind of competitive advantage, either over our fellow men or our female counterparts. Likeit or not, the things that we’ve evolved to specialize in as men simply don’tcarry a lot of clout in accounts receivable. Women, on the other hand, have skills bettersuited to it.For starters, look at an employer’s options when it comesto bringing on a new employee. In terms of education, women make up more than half of all current college enrollments. If you look beyondundergrad and into graduate programs, the gap widens. Women hold more than 60% of graduate degrees among people aged 25-29.At nearly every level, men are coming to the table with less education than our femalecounterparts. The real kicker? Even if we're just as qualified as a femalecandidate, our competitive nature and negotiating prowess might price us out of the jobanyway. As it turns out, a big factor in the male-female wage gap is that women simply don’t negotiate their salaries early in their careers,resulting in a lower starting salary than some men may have lobbied for. Sure,that’s good news for you when an offer’s on the table, but what ifyou’re a hiring manager evaluating candidates? If budgets are tight andthey’re evenly matched, you’re always going to make an offer to the candidateyou think you can get for a lower price. Continue Reading

http://www.askmen.com/entertainment/austin/men-and-office-work.html ]More...[/url]