In a team which decides to build product of any kind for society - the greatest leverage comes from being an impeccable team player and collaboration. Yet, very few cultivate this skill with sincerity - or even pause to observe its exponential impact on velocity, innovation, and the impact of translating ideas of diverse minds.
I took this year- an exercise to listen and document every time I see an anomaly in words -> action consistency in my or other people behavior.
Over time, I've encountered two recurring patterns that undermine true collaboration, particularly for women in male-dominated tech environments.
The first is the persistent bias in recognizing contributions: men's ideas are often amplified and credited over women's. This feels like an industry-wide issue- for both tech and science- rooted in historical patterns where groups of men build products with limited empathy or openness to women's input. Science has recognized its poor choice of giving the idea win to a man over a woman with multiple stories that were uncovered by history. Tech not so much. Time and again, I've voiced an idea, only to see it reborn under the banner of the room's most assertive male.
I trace this to evolutionary behavior bias:
1. In groups of four or more men, a ritual of mutual affirmation unfolds—what might be called "idea reinforcement"—where strengths are hyped in a bid for dominance. In the technology world, the tilt toward masculine dominance is so ancient it almost feels invisible. It manifests subtly—the misattribution of credit, the magnification of male voices, and the quiet erasure of female insight. I’ve lived this pattern repeatedly. I’ve suggested ideas in meetings, only to watch them repackaged later as the contributions of the loudest or most assertive man in the room. This isn’t anecdotal—it’s systemic. The “Matilda Effect” names it precisely: when identical contributions are judged more competent when presented through masculine cues.
2. Empathy recedes amid performative assertion. Evolutionary pressures favored male rivalry over nurture; Neuroscientifically, women exhibit higher levels of empathy due to greater oxytocin influence, which enhances emotional attunement and social bonding, while men show more variability in empathy networks, often skewed toward cognitive rather than affective processing.In group settings, this manifests as reduced sensitivity to diverse inputs, perpetuating blind spots.
In my early days, I confronted these biases head-on. And here are my clear realizations:
- Genuine listening is rare; perhaps 95% of people hear only echoes of their own preconceptions.
- Control is a male default, often masquerading as decisive leadership, which only entrenches the cycle.
- Even some women mirror these tactics to survive.
- Persistent truth-telling in consensus-driven groups invites exile; compliance trumps integrity.
- True humility—born from embracing failures—is the rarest trait in unchecked male cohorts, absent a foundation of character.
This initiates a sense of being perpetually sidelined, never quite a peer amid the inequality. And that is why status game survives far stronger in organizations. Also this is the exact reason why some start-ups with high ARR win as they defy the above points in the way they operate; stepping out of status hierarchies and engaging on the axis of value creation and learning instead. There are no substitutes for people. Period.
Thus from the book deep survival and it's rules of life, I learnt to exercise my first rule
I took this year- an exercise to listen and document every time I see an anomaly in words -> action consistency in my or other people behavior.
Over time, I've encountered two recurring patterns that undermine true collaboration, particularly for women in male-dominated tech environments.
The first is the persistent bias in recognizing contributions: men's ideas are often amplified and credited over women's. This feels like an industry-wide issue- for both tech and science- rooted in historical patterns where groups of men build products with limited empathy or openness to women's input. Science has recognized its poor choice of giving the idea win to a man over a woman with multiple stories that were uncovered by history. Tech not so much. Time and again, I've voiced an idea, only to see it reborn under the banner of the room's most assertive male.
I trace this to evolutionary behavior bias:
1. In groups of four or more men, a ritual of mutual affirmation unfolds—what might be called "idea reinforcement"—where strengths are hyped in a bid for dominance. In the technology world, the tilt toward masculine dominance is so ancient it almost feels invisible. It manifests subtly—the misattribution of credit, the magnification of male voices, and the quiet erasure of female insight. I’ve lived this pattern repeatedly. I’ve suggested ideas in meetings, only to watch them repackaged later as the contributions of the loudest or most assertive man in the room. This isn’t anecdotal—it’s systemic. The “Matilda Effect” names it precisely: when identical contributions are judged more competent when presented through masculine cues.
2. Empathy recedes amid performative assertion. Evolutionary pressures favored male rivalry over nurture; Neuroscientifically, women exhibit higher levels of empathy due to greater oxytocin influence, which enhances emotional attunement and social bonding, while men show more variability in empathy networks, often skewed toward cognitive rather than affective processing.In group settings, this manifests as reduced sensitivity to diverse inputs, perpetuating blind spots.
In my early days, I confronted these biases head-on. And here are my clear realizations:
- Genuine listening is rare; perhaps 95% of people hear only echoes of their own preconceptions.
- Control is a male default, often masquerading as decisive leadership, which only entrenches the cycle.
- Even some women mirror these tactics to survive.
- Persistent truth-telling in consensus-driven groups invites exile; compliance trumps integrity.
- True humility—born from embracing failures—is the rarest trait in unchecked male cohorts, absent a foundation of character.
This initiates a sense of being perpetually sidelined, never quite a peer amid the inequality. And that is why status game survives far stronger in organizations. Also this is the exact reason why some start-ups with high ARR win as they defy the above points in the way they operate; stepping out of status hierarchies and engaging on the axis of value creation and learning instead. There are no substitutes for people. Period.
Thus from the book deep survival and it's rules of life, I learnt to exercise my first rule
Be here now. It’s a good survival rule. It means to pay attention and keep an up-to-date mental model.
This segues to the second pattern: fractured communication, drowned in noise. Organizations, vast and human, invite "normal accidents". Large organizations magnify this confusion. With every layer added—processes, rituals, performance boards—the signal-to-noise ratio falls. Miscommunication becomes baked into the system, a “normal accident” of scale.We respond with control fantasies: reorganizations, frameworks, “alignment decks.” We worship the plan. But as history—and physics—show, the harder we push against natural friction, the more resistance grows. Chaos compounds itself under the illusion of order.
This blindness is not unique to work; it’s the default of the human mind. We fail to see slow erosion because we live too fast. The mountain seems eternal because our perception is brief. The sun appears still until we notice its absence.To glimpse truth amid motion requires deliberate stillness.
And here is where I learnt to implement my second rule as an action in my life:
Everything takes eight times as long as it’s supposed to. That was the friction rule, which wilderness travelers will do well to heed.
Empirical evidence underscores the power of advocating equal opportunity and respect for every individual’s potential. Teams with equal mixes of individuality outperform male-dominated ones in sales, profits, innovation, and scientific impact. Diverse teams produce more novel ideas, higher citations, and up to 19-25% greater revenue from innovation in tech sectors. They operate with radical trust—no politics, no ego games.
Ideas win on merit, not volume. Integrity compounds: Humility from failures, empathy as leverage. Diverse minds align not through force, but shared truth-seeking. In such rare ensembles, bias dissolves; everyone feels like a peer, velocity soars, and creation becomes effortless.
From that still point, creation becomes an act of truth itself
