6. Do you think you approach projects differently than men?
DECKER: The differences have more to do with age, experience, and education. Every designer is going to approach every project differently. I don’t think there is a specific “female” style, nor do I think that there is a “male” style.

On an emotional level—I think men and women are different. I actually prefer working with men—they are a bit more dispassionate and direct. My female clients tend to be pulled in many directions and they are often more overworked, juggling home, family, and the office. The stress is obvious. Regardless of gender, it is harder to work with someone who has that many demands on their time and energy.

HEIDEN: Yes, somewhat. I am able to see this disparity pretty regularly because my business partner is also my husband, and we don’t always view things in the same way. A lot of philosophical, emotional, and intellectual discussions take place around our household and our office. We are constantly trying to achieve balance in the yin/yang of Smog Design, Inc.

HELFAND: My sense is that men in meetings want to win. They want to dominate, to show they’re in control, to be the smartest person in the room. Women are more subtle, on average, and better at handling several things at once, including the egos of the men they’re in meetings with.

KUHLMANN-LEAVITT: I think I am probably more intuitive than my male counterparts. I don’t think philosophical and intellectual differences are gender-based, but I do think that emotion and intuition are more pronounced in women.

SCHER: I think I approach projects like me, not like other people, male or female.

OBERMAN: One of my favorite stories—this may not answer this question exactly but here goes anyway—is about a design firm owned by two men in the 1980s. Their main conflict was about who did more work. They each consistently felt they were doing more than their partner and expressed this frustration in anger and eventually broke up. In our practice, Bonnie and I each feel like the other is doing more, which always drives us forward to try and do more and do better. We think of this as a gender difference: Men tend to be more egomaniacal than women.

7. Why do you think men tend to be more successful? Are the reasons behavioral or systemic?
SIEGLER: Definitely systemic. [Emily and I] think, though we can’t be sure, that if we were men, we would be paid more money for the same work.

MILLMAN: “Balls,” said the Queen. “If I had them I’d be King.” Men are conditioned to believe that they will be successful. There is an inherent expectation in their psyche. Women have to make more active choices to fuel their successes, and those choices often require career success to take a back seat. It is a phenomenon perpetuated by our society.

BAER: I think it’s both. The business world responds well to alpha dogs—people who are comfortable projecting their sense of leadership and self worth. Women still seem more inclined to be collaborative by nature, at least stylistically, and that can be construed as a lack of power.

DECKER: I question the assumption that men are more successful, especially in this industry. A competitive nature, intelligence, savvy, a strong will, and determination are all contributing factors to anyone’s success. These characteristics are not exclusive to one gender or the other.

HEIDEN: Male ego and a sense of entitlement, mixed with societal approval. I’ve worked with many men whose egos were so omnipotent that they entered the room before they did, and lingered long after they’d left. It’s the stuff of legend. I think men are wired to win, and women have to come at it in a different way.

HELLER: Define success. Are men happier than women? I don’t think so.

SCHER: They work longer hours and are less conflicted in their life choices. Sometimes they have someone making them dinner.

WEESE: I think men are either socialized, or genetically inclined, to compete and self-promote. I see this already in my 5-year-old son when I compare him to his female peers. My business partner and I tend to be less bombastic and aggressive than many of our male peers, though we’re self-confident and comfortable in our skins. And there’s still a major cultural bias—or perhaps this is biological—that I note, with men typically feeling a need to have power or make more money, and women desiring jobs that are meaningful.

WILLOUGHBY: If we define success by titles, accomplishments, and money, then men may be more visible. Many women tend to define success in terms of their well being and success in their overall life experience at work, home, and in the community.

8. If you are as successful as male counterparts, do you think your experience is typical of women designers? Why?
BAER: I was lucky in that I’m a good businessperson by nature. I also don’t have the conflict of whether to throw myself into my work or have children. I was the oldest of six children so felt I’d already gotten to do a lot of “mothering.” I know it is very hard to try and do both well.

HELLER: This gets to the point where gender needs to be put aside. People who are successful make their own opportunities and don’t wait for them passively. I think my experience is typical of anybody who invested the time in working and never stopped to think that they couldn’t do it.

KUHLMANN-LEAVITT: I am a successful businessperson because I work at it. It doesn’t matter if I am a man or a woman, that’s just the handicap that you may or may not have at the outset. With a lot of luck and some skill I got off to a great start in this business and it’s mine to screw up.

MORLA: A successful studio creates amazing design that is on time and on budget. Consistently. Both men and women can achieve the same level of success if they are diligent with all three.

LUPTON: The challenges are harder at mid-life than early on. When you are young and single, you can work all night when needed and be anywhere/everywhere at the drop of the hat. When you have a family, you have to pull back, and this makes it harder to compete. As a curator and educator, I am in an area of the design profession where women have excelled. Institutions are set up well for women. They are safe places that reward— and demand—team work.

SCHER: I was not conflicted by family obligations. I worked like a man straight through my career but I regret not having children.

WEESE: My partner and I believe in and thoroughly enjoy virtually every project and client that we work with; we have a terrific, long-term group of staff members in the studio; and our work almost never overwhelms our lives—we work very moderate hours. Do we pay ourselves as much as our male peers do? No, we give ourselves somewhat less, but that’s a decision we’re comfortable with right now.

WERNER: I think men are successful because they tell people they are successful, so it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. I think women tend to just keep working and don’t really look up long enough to talk about it. Women leave their desks and go home.

9. One of the big questions is the decision to have children. Is it possible to be highly successful with kids?
HEIDEN: I don’t have any kids, but I have seen it influence hiring and promotion decisions in the companies I’ve worked for. I know that having children, or even being of childbearing age is taken into consideration when you are eyed for a senior management position, even though it’s not out on the table. A former [male] boss of mine once said, “I’d rather hire women over men, because they work so much harder with much less expectation.”

MORLA: Yes. I had my children when I was 40; my office was already 12 years old.

KUHLMANN-LEAVITT: Yes. Yes. Yes. In my case, I was fairly well established before having kids and I think that makes it easier. And as most highly successful men have known for years, it helps to have a spouse or partner who will support your career. In my case, my husband stays at home with our 3-year-old son and our 1-year-old daughter. We are all better for it. One thing that the design business culture wrongly perpetuates is the habit of working into the night and weekends. It is possible to do great work and still leave by six or seven o’clock Monday through Friday. Be decisive and disciplined.

LUPTON: Having kids definitely adds a challenge to having a successful career. Some of the prominent women in our field, such as April Greiman and Paula Scher, chose not to have their own kids. Others did it early or late enough that it didn’t interrupt the heart of their careers. Many women are choosing part-time, flex hours, and other arrangements. This makes us highly productive but less visible than our full-time counterparts. It is definitely a sacrifice, but worth it in terms of family autonomy.

RAYE: Sure, there will always be women who do both. But many women do not want to be in the spotlight, which is necessary if you want to become popular. I know some financially successful women designers with children who do great work, but are too preoccupied to play the fame game.

SCHER: I think so. It doesn’t affect the quality of the work, just the amount.

WEESE: If you’re willing to cede some control, work collaboratively, stretch out the time frame in which you want to achieve success, and if you have supportive and complementary partners at home and at work, then, yes. You may not be a superstar but I think you can produce great, meaningful work that has a lasting impact. I also think that kids help prevent burnout—I’m enthusiastic about going to work every day.

It’s simpler to either choose just the career or just the family, and harder to strike a balance between the two. This is not to say that working and parenting in equal measure is an easy road. I’ve accepted a lot of hard compromises, become comfortable with perpetual change, and continuously use every ounce of available energy in this juggling act. Now I obsessively plan my work and work late into the night. I’ve become the master of the same day round-trip to L.A., and I take a baby—or, preferably, my whole family—with me on all overnight business trips. I’ve given up on socializing much in the studio and with colleagues. I question my abilities as both a mother and a designer, and feel that both, at times, are compromised.

10. Why do women quit practice? Specific examples?
FILI: Complete frustration with clients and/or management. I know a number of women who were laid off from their jobs after turning 50. Fifty is depressing enough for many women, but when you combine that with how corporate America views mature women, you have a recipe for crisis. Design to some is considered a younger person’s field. It’s also like women actors—after 50 there are fewer good roles.

OBERMAN: They don’t want to be designers any more?

HELFAND: It would be easy to say it is because the demands of family necessitate a shift in priorities, but I don’t think this is the real answer. I think it is because women evolve and do it well: They realize 20 years into a career that the demands—and the rewards— of full-tilt practice may no longer be what they seemed at the outset. I recently said to my husband, “You never hear someone on their deathbed wishing they’d spent more time at the office.” He looked at me in shock and said, “Are you sure?” I suspect there are few, if any, women who would respond this way.

HELLER: I think the business world has become a lot less fun than it was before the dot-com bust. People who had other interests quit to pursue them. A few have quit to take care of children, but not as many as you might think.

WILLOUGHBY: When I was a young mother and thinking of how to manage what seemed like an impossible life, my mentor Milton Glaser said to me, “Your family must come first, but always keep your hand in the profession and you will be able to come back full time as they grow older.” He was right. The women who stop working completely seem to have more trouble re-entering the market.

MORLA: Because of children, because it is hard work, because they didn’t get the accolades they deserved, because they didn’t get accolades they didn’t deserve, because women are perfectionists and work overtime often without pay, because a good salary is often the by-product of owning your own studio.

RAYE: There’s no denying that having a family hampers a woman’s career. And I believe that the more children a woman raises, the less likely she’ll be to rekindle her career. My mother was a restaurant owner and oil painter before she met my father in the late 1950s, then she literally lost her mind raising six children.

KUHLMANN-LEAVITT: In my opinion women quit design for the same reasons that women quit other careers or jobs: family demands, burnout, and/or change of heart.

SCHER: Family and careers seem to collide but mostly I’ve observed a lack of a certain kind of ambition and drive that allows one to overcome daily frustrations inherent in working with clients.

11. Are things changing for the better for female designers?
SIEGLER: I know more and more women whose husbands help with raising their children, which frees the women up to stay in the workforce.

DECKER: It depends what you mean by change. Are there more prominent female designers now than when I started 25 years ago? Yes. Is the design profession predominantly female? Yes. When my generation began our careers, we really believed we could have it all. We saw juggling home and family with career as a tableau consisting of supportive husbands that would handle half the home and be fully engaged fathers We had the utmost faith in our keen organizational skills and that we could accomplish anything. Reality didn’t factor into the equation—we didn’t realize how exhausting having it all was.

I think that young women today are less idealistic, and I see many more opting for families at an early age, but continuing practice in a more modified manner. The wonder of the design profession is that you can define it for yourself any way you wish—and I think that this generation of women is confident that they can go in and out of a career. It remains to be seen if that will really work over the long term.

SCHER: Yes. They change all the time—incrementally, but all the time. There are far more visible, successful women practitioners today than in the ’70s.

WILLOUGHBY: We still have a long way to go in many industries and countries, but as globalization takes hold we see that everything is connected and interdependent. Women understand this and if we take on proactive roles in the design and management of business, politics, education, and healthcare things will improve. The data is clear: Where women have influence and power, women’s lives improve.

To read outtakes from the interview, click here.