Oli, in 1988 I moved to a unit of my employer that had a large group of women managers. I learned that the most powerful women were...nannies. Not a day went by without several of my female colleagues coaxing, pleading, pampering, their nannies. Some also used free-lance gofers to shop for them, wait for deliveries, find summer camps for their kids. One of my female colleagues referred to hers as "my wife."

TIS: In that same era, female managers lived by a rigid, self-imposed dress code. Dark-colored business suits, hose, pleated blouses, closed pumps (no heels higher than 3"), straight, medium-length hair (curly-haired women weren't taken seriously). When walking to meetings, they donned new white athletic shoes with only enough piping to distinguish them from nurse or waitress shoes; white athletic socks with the tops turnd down exactly 2"; toting a bottle of Naya water in one hand (Poland Springs was "tacky"), and a bag holding their dress shoes in the other. They referred to themselves and other female managers as "women"; clerical and secretarial women were "girls" or "ladies." Clerical and secretarial women referred to themselves as "girls," and to managers as "ladies."