Being a Woman in a Man’s World

This is a topic I have been very excited to talk about and it is all about being a girly girl, a woman however you look at it in a workplace that is completely full of men. Spoiler alert it is actually not that fun. BUT I say that with some hesitation because getting to work in these environments has taught me more about working hard than any other experience in my life. Now don’t get me wrong here.. It was not the overwhelming amount of men and testosterone that made me feel well led through the struggles of the industry. It was the overwhelming amount of men that made me feel like I had to work twice as hard to be recognized for my skills. 

This is a good time for me to start telling you about the song that inspired this entire social club in the first place. Mirrorball by Taylor Swift talks a lot about feeling like you put your best foot forward 100 percent of the time to the point of feeling shattered into a million pieces just to have some light shine off of you for someone to notice your hard work. I’ll go more into detail about this song and how the lyrics have impacted the growth of this club. However for now, I’ll post some lyrics below you can read them and tie them into this post where you see fit. 

Back on topic, I first want to talk about some of my experiences working at different golf courses as a woman over the last five years. My first real job at a golf course was during college where I worked at the golf shop at a local golf course with two older men and one young guy and no women. This was the first time I realized how a male dominated industry looked. I spent everyday in between classes working at this golf course, checking people in for tee times. This job was one of the more mellow ones that I held but it still taught me a lot. This was the point in time where I was still unsure of my career choices and did not really know what I wanted to do with my life. I didn’t know yet that golf would be my whole entire life, I thought I wanted to be a lawyer or a business owner (I still want to be a business owner but that is beside this particular point) and I remember specifically having a coworker who had very specific thoughts about what I should do with my life and what kind of woman I should want to be. He aired his thoughts about law school being the very best option and taking out those loans for school would pay for themselves in no time; being a business owner was stupid because as a young woman what business did I expect to successfully run fresh out of college. 

Now what you have to remember is that at this point in my life I was still extremely professionally impressionable so hearing these things completely threw me off. I would love to say that hearing these things was motivational but it was not at the time. I could also not wrap my head around the overwhelming amount of negativity that was coming from this person. This was my first experience but would absolutely not be the last time. 

Fast forward to a year later and I got my first real job in the industry. I started training for my PAT (the playing ability test to become a PGA professional) and I was super excited about the opportunities that I thought were to come. I was wrong. Most of what came after going pro was backhanded ‘compliments’, sexist comments, sexually inappropriate comments and I learned relatively quickly that the negativity I had faced at my first job was the tip of the iceberg. 

I won’t go into the nitty gritty of everything I have heard but I will go through a few of the highest highlights in my career. The first place spot going to an ex-member at this second job I had found, less than a year into me working there. I was standing in the pro shop with the then head professional and so far it had been a completely uneventful day. This ‘gentleman’ comes walking into the shop that day with a smug look on his face, a club in his hand and what seemed like an infinite amount of pointless things to say. For context, you should know I was in a relationship at the time and word had somehow gotten around that it was a rocky one, how that got around is a story for another time. This man decided that on his to-do list on this day was to try and teach me how to pose in sexually explicit photos so that I could attempt to save my relationship, because from his experience that is usually the cause for a rocky relationship. Shocking that he thinks this way… Anyways, the head professional (my boss) at the time, standing there next to me watching this happen decided it was just the funniest thing he had seen all day and could not contain his laughter at the situation. Thankfully the situation was handled properly when it was reported, but I want us all to sit and think for a second; when would that ever happen to a man when he is clocked in at his job? Would a woman objectify a man based on a rumor just for the kick of it? You can ponder that.

Aside from the blatantly egregious stories like this one I am full of stories of backhanded comments as well, for example; ‘You have a good swing for a woman’ ‘You hit the ball pretty far for a girl’ ‘You? You’re a pro? I didn’t know women could be pros’. The list goes on. The point of this blog is to complain and gripe about all of the negative things I hear on a daily basis, the point is to show everyone who reads this that being a woman usually earns extra negativity and criticism, especially in the workplace. My hope is that reading things like this will help us women come together to stand up for ourselves every single time, and to not allow things to go unseen the way most of us feel like we need to.

HOW COACHING WOMEN, AS A WOMAN, CHANGED MY LIFE

I can’t even express how excited I am to be writing this because it means Mirrorball is finally real and I get this platform to share my stories and experiences in the golf industry. The very first story I really wanted to share is everything I got to experience while coaching a women’s college team for the first time, and to share all of the things these ladies taught me. 

Coaching this team is easily the most impactful thing I’ve done in my career to date. I spent several months learning about each of them and learning their style of play without directly coaching them and when I finally got the opportunity to formally work with them I learned very quickly that I needed them more than they needed me. I thought I would come in and be the female coach they have always needed and wanted and I would be able to lead and guide them to more success than they had ever seen. Girl, was I wrong. While I still want to believe they needed my guidance and leadership, NO, I needed theirs. Going into this experience I had only ever been surrounded by men in the industry and people who did not see the significance of being a woman in a male-dominant field. Seeing this group of girls be dominant and lead their way through everything they did opened my eyes completely. There are obstacles in this game and in life that make women’s lives exponentially harder that unfortunately men just would not understand. 

The women on this team worked together, they built the most genuine friendships I have ever seen, and they succeeded together against every possible odd working against them. They taught me resilience, time and time again. They have experienced a huge amount of unfairness in their time on a college team and came out of it as better people. Their games developed and grew in ways we never imagined and their headspace was unbreakable. Coaching this team made me want to be a better golfer, a better person and a better woman every single day. There were days I would sit up and think of ways I could contribute to their lives and ways I could make their golf game better, or their school lives better. I would rack my brain for anything I could do for them. 

One of those nights happened while we were on our first trip as a team with me as their coach. I sat up thinking of something I could give every senior on my team to remind them I was their biggest supporter and that they could rely on me on and off the course. This was the moment I realized these girls changed me and changed my life. I had never been someone who felt needed and felt like I could change other people’s lives, but all of a sudden that was my reality. My whole life became about making sure these girls were good. All of the sudden I had a reason to stay in the golf industry and a reason to love teaching and coaching again. The greatest joy of my career has been having them trust me and rely on me, as a golfer and as a woman and to this day I sit up thinking of ways to thank them for this. 

As a direct result of coaching these girls I have changed as a coach and as a person tremendously. The way I play the game of golf is different, the way I teach the game of golf is not different, and the way I carry myself in the world is entirely different. This experience has both humbled me and empowered me to move through life as a woman who supports others but stands up for herself every single time. I used to be a girl who would sit back and watch people achieve things I dreamed of, and watch people who don’t work as hard get the things I had always wanted. As soon as I met this team everything changed. 

Now we are in our off season so I do not get to see the girls for a while and it is the strangest feeling. I want nothing more at this point than to be back in season with these athletes, coaching them and leading them, and learning from them. 

P.S. if any of them read this. THANK YOU FOR CHANGING MY LIFE!