Opinion Adopting feminine characteristics in business

To grow business,it’s crucial to get a deeper understanding of women’s disposition. Organisations can profit from a woman’s spending habit,as also by deploying inherent feminine qualities into organisational culture to make it more humane. I have identified nine feminine attributes that can sway and control business.

Nurturing: By nature,women are caring. Business needs to similarly nurture consumers to prevent them going to others. Shareholders need continuous care,employees and partners need nurturing to deliver high quality. Nurturing must be a top management obsession to run a harmonious organisation.

Lover of intangibles: Creating the intangible in a business will help get good talent,retain employees for the long term,clinch better value from external partners,earn a premium,better share value and market capitalisation. The result is goodwill,which connects to a woman’s character as a lover of intangibles.

Patience: Patience does not mean slowing business down. Patience enables an organisation to better understand and internalise the latent trend to capture tomorrow like a woman does. If women didn’t have patience,they could not have carried a baby to fruition for nine months.

Aesthetics: Women’s aesthetics starts from their physical harmonious anatomical structure. Through civilisation women have aesthetically ornamented themselves using colour on the lips,eyes,feet and hair to beautify themselves. An aesthetic working environment reduces monotony and routine,induces people to complement aesthetics in their behaviour and differentiates a product or service in its very first contact to customers. Aesthetics must address the entire value chain,from back office activities to the front,just the way women are ritualistic about personal grooming and spending on beautiful intimate wear even though it’s never publicly seen.

Unlimited immoderate excitement: Women are known to feel unlimited subliminal pleasure in a physical relationship. If an organisation can excite its distribution channel and consumers with delivery that relates to continuous pleasure,repurchase will happen automatically.

Subtlety: Subtlety is a very feminine characteristic; men are in-the-face. Mothers cool down seemingly unsolvable father-child relationships with love,understanding and great subtlety. In the clutter of today’s media,subtlety in business is important. Screaming advertisements may get quick jerky sales,but a brand that stops moving when advertisements stop,proves it has no subtle value. Creating passion for a common operational goal needs subtle handling as well as making sure a single consistent message flows across the organisation.

Subtlety is also paradoxical. A loud character can carry a depth of highly elevated profound values. When you compare Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe,both are very good players,but its Bjorn’s subtlety that may have made him the universal icon of tennis.

Exuberance: Women by nature are exuberant,both in liberal and traditional societies. Nobody can challenge the implicit knowledge and stamina they have in creating personal differentiation. This energetic quality holds up in all cultures,religions,and social climates.

To increase a brand’s salience you need exuberance as its focus. Mont Blanc pens exuberantly exhibit the snowflake symbol so it’s visible on a man’s shirt pocket,but the pen itself has subtle characteristics. Subtlety and exuberance are two faces of the same coin where you need to find the right trade-off for business to fly.

Networking: Women of all economic strata are masters at maintaining long-time relationships among family,friends,and even with friends of their children. They create and nurture networks and keep them alive for no particular reason and with no ulterior motive.

Why is networking a corporate concern? Because a vendor could be your consumer,an employee your shareholder. Emulate a women’s dexterity in networking to keep all stakeholders in the loop and you in their top-of-mind.

Mystique: An air of mystery is the shell that envelops a woman. Her each accessory is selected carefully to connect to an individual occasion. Her subtle,inscrutable,subliminal need is her mystique. Why do women create such allure? In any country a woman protects her inherent mystique as it gives her the power to control her destiny.

When organisational deliverables connect with the power of the mystique,intangible goodwill is created. Nurturing the mystique value reflects as a premium that enhances shareholder value and profitability.

The hidden value of these nine characteristics of women are the unarticulated answers to business success. They are connected to the consumer’s psychological aspect,organisational culture or partner handling aspect. Co-opting them can help marketers and organisations approach consumers with subtlety and sensitivity,resulting in enhanced business.

Shombit Sengupta is an international creative business strategy consultant to top management. Reach him at http://www.shiningconsulting.com