In the Company of Women: Indirect Agression Among Women: Why We Hurt Each Other and How to Stop » (Reprint)

Pat Heim, Ph.D., is president of the Heim Group, a management consulting service in the area of gender issues, communication, and leadership, whose clients include Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, AT&T, and General Mills. She is the author (with Susan K. Golant) of Hardball for Women and Smashing the Glass Ceiling.

Susan Murphy, Ph.D., MBA, is the president of Energy Engineering, Inc. She has thirty years experience as a business and organization consultant.

Two leading experts on gender issues in the workplace describe how indirect aggression among women undermines their professional and personal success, and explain how to change conflict into cooperation.

Following the success of Queen Bees and Wannabes and Odd Girl Out, about aggression in girls, In the Company of Women explains how indirect, or "relational," aggression can hurt women and hinder them from achieving success and harmony in their adult lives. Gender studies have shown that when a goal is in sight, men generally use direct action to attain it. Women, on the other hand, have been socialized to express aggressive actions through indirect means-using behavior such as shunning, stigmatizing, and gossiping to emotionally cripple those standing in the way of the achievement they seek.

With startling insights into the meaning of our everyday behavior, this book offers straightforward techniques to change conflict among women into cooperation by resolving discords peaceably, building relationships, and making the most of women's unique leadership and communication skills.