Kris Schultz

This New York Times article looks at the phenomenon of women crying on the job. I'd been thinking about that since I heard Martha Stewart threatened to dismiss an apprentice who was upset about a team failure on the show, saying "Cry and you are out of here. Women in business don't cry, my dear."

I am fascinated by the gender differences between women and men in politics and in work, but this quote from the article was my favorite:

Executives like Susan Lyne of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia and Anne Sweeney, president of the Disney-ABC Television Group, were models for the president on "Commander in Chief," according to Rod Lurie, the executive producer of the series. And while his fictional president may be unlikely to break down in the
Oval Office, would a real woman as president need to be as stoic?

"Unfortunately," Mr. Lurie said, "she would have to be more stoic than a
man."

When President Bill Clinton got teary-eyed over an injustice or tragedy, I felt comforted. I wish President George W. Bush would have gotten at least a bit teary-eyed during Hurricane Katrina, rather than the same old arrogant jocularity we got during his first on-the-ground press conference in Alabama joking with Senator Trent Lott.

What I say to the future Ms. President is "be yourself, cry away, and I'll send the tissues. Be human and show us your gravitas. " I think there can be more leadership in a moment of true emotion than a distancing coldness of so-called proper and collected behavior.

So, cry away, sisters! And guys, too, for that matter.