The other day, I was at a conference where a senior woman was presenting a business related topic. There were women who were sitting behind me and I could hear what they were saying. Trust me, I had no intention of eavesdropping but they were speaking very loudly. When the female speaker went on stage, I could hear the ladies behind me say, “What is she wearing? That dress is too tight for her. Her stomach is bulging out — she looks so fat.”

When I heard that, it made me sad because why do we, as women, have to be so critical of each other? There is a Gallup study done every year where they ask women and men whether they prefer a male boss or female boss. For every year that they have done this survey, more women than men said that they prefer a male boss.

According to a Bloomberg article in 2014, they said: “Women fighting for a broader presence in the upper levels of management face at least one very personal obstacle: Most workers don’t want them there. Only one-fifth of people surveyed by Gallup this week said they preferred a female boss over a man. One-third preferred a male boss, and the rest had no preference.

The survey, which collected responses from 1,032 adults living in the U.S., found women were more likely than men to want a male boss: 39 percent of women wanted to be led by a man, compared with 26 percent of men. Men are more likely than women to say they have no preference — 58% mention this response, compared with 34% of women.

In the 60 years that Gallup has conducted this survey, women have never preferred a female boss.”

That makes me sad. If we want to see more women in senior executive positions, then, we as women, need to be supportive of each other. I remember a scene from the movie Mean Girls where Tina Fry’s character said to some young girls, “You all have got to stop calling each other sluts and whores. It just makes it okay for guys to call you sluts and whores.”

If a man got up there on stage, I doubt the women sitting behind me would have said “geez, he looks so fat in his suit.” So why are we, as women, so critical of each other? I am not saying that we are all like that because most of us are not, but for those who are, shouldn’t we stop being so harsh and judgemental? Who cares if the dress makes us look fat! It should be about the message and not whether we look good or not. Let’s be more supportive! We should applaud the success of other women. We should cheer them on by saying: You Go Girl!! And for these women who do make it to the top, they should help younger women get there by mentoring them. We should also stop saying that we prefer male bosses, instead we should say that we are indifferent whether we have a male boss or female boss — what matters is whether he/she can do the job and whether she/he would be good at it!