Taking On the Big Boys

A manifesto for the workplace feminist that moved Oscar winner Jane Fonda to exclaim “Please, please, please. All working women must read this book!”

Enough about “breaking the glass ceiling.” Here are blueprints for a redesign of the entire building, ground up, to benefit women and men—as well as the bottom line.

In Taking on the Big Boys, longtime labor activist Ellen Bravo explores workplace environments in both business and government. She recounts women’s testimonies from offices, assembly lines, hospitals, and schools, unmasking the patronizing, trivializing, and minimizing tactics employed by “the big boys” and their surrogates, such as portraying feminism as women against men, and dismissing demands for pay equity, family leave, and flex time as outrageous.

Also included are practical tips on everything from dealing with a sexual harasser to getting family members to share chores—and build equal relationships.

In this “smart, kind, funny, and very effective” Gold Medal Winner of ForeWord Magazine’s Book of the Year Award for Women’s Issues, Bravo argues for feminism as a system of beliefs, laws, and practices that value women and work associated with women, while detailing activist strategies to achieve a society where everybody—women and men—reach their potential (Gloria Steinem, feminist icon).