The Guide to Handling Mansplainers at Work

The concept of mansplaining gained popularity in Rebecca Solnit’s essay Men Explain Things to Me. In 2012, Solnit recounted the effects of her words, saying, “young women subsequently added the word “mansplaining” to the lexicon.

I hasten to add that the essay makes it clear mansplaining is not a universal flaw of the gender, just the "intersection between overconfidence and cluelessness where some portion of that gender gets stuck.”

What Is Mansplaining?

Most of us don’t need an explanation. Still, for the sake of clarity, mansplaining is when a man offers an unsolicited explanation to a woman in a condescending, overconfident, or oversimplified manner.

Mansplaining was officially added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in 2018 as “to explain something to a woman in a condescending way that assumes she has no knowledge about the topic.”

Most men don’t wake up and think of ways to mansplain to women. I’d like to give the benefit of the doubt that most men don’t realize they’re doing it. I’ve also seen the term mansplaining thrown around in an accusatory way.

In terms of the women's issues one could encounter at work, mansplaining can seem like a nuisance rather than a problem. However, when you have folks in leadership positions, mansplaining becomes part of a toxic culture—a culture in which a woman's own experience is not taken seriously. It's even worse for women of color navigating the intersectionality of gender and race. 

So to clear things up, if you ask a man to explain something and upon hearing their explanation, you disagree with what they have to say or don’t like their tone of voice, that’s not mansplaining.

People are entitled to their opinion, and just because you disagree doesn’t mean it qualifies as mansplaining. Also, sometimes people are just rude.

What Mansplaining Looks Like (+ How Anyone Can Mansplain)  

We're not here to bash men—not at all. 

While performing research for this article, I brought up the topic of mansplaining to my husband, an elementary school teacher. As a male working in a profession where, on average, there are three females to every one male, he said he’s encountered the male version of mansplaining—womansplaining—where a woman explains something to a man without being solicited.

The only difference being the gender roles are reversed. There are actually multiple variations of mansplaining, including whitesplaining, privilege-splaining, and so on. The act is named based on whoever society deems to have the most power in the conversation.

All of this to say, the concept of mansplaining is a phenomenon that can be experienced by all genders, races, and every person in some way, shape, or form. So why is it that mansplaining is the most well-known and used? 

Communication experts say that men speak to achieve power and status, while women speak to achieve connection. You’ve also heard that women get interrupted more than men in conversations. A 2014 study at George Washington University found that male colleagues interrupt 33 percent more often when they’re talking with women vs. men.

So it’s likely that mansplaining has gained more popularity and usage over the years because women have been struggling to get their voices heard for decades, and we finally have a word to use to pinpoint some of that behavior.

Types of Mansplainers 

If you’re trying to put your thumb on what a mansplainer looks like, here are some examples.

The Mansplainer Who Claims to Know More About the Female Body Than You Do

Have you ever had a man tell you how you’re feeling, what’s happening to your body, or insist they know exactly what you’re experiencing? Chances are you were talking to a mansplainer. This is especially evident when a man explains female-specific topics, like reproductive health or things like getting your period. Unless the man is a doctor, chances are they’re not qualified to explain the female body to you nor can they define your emotions.

The Mansplainer Who Insists They’re More Knowledgeable About Your Area of Expertise

You have the degree, and you have years of experience in your field, and yet, he spent fifteen minutes gifting his incomplete knowledge to you. What a gift! 

Remember, you’re the expert, and it’s totally fine to remind them of that. The lines of mansplaining vs. explaining may get a little blurry here when you’re in conversation with a male coworker, but the key difference is whether you asked for an explanation or not.

The Mainsplainer Who Conforms to Stereotypical Gender Roles

Has a man ever explained car maintenance or sports to you in an oversimplified or patronizing way because they assume that as a woman you know less about the topic than they do?

This is a prime example of a mansplainer. It would be the equivalent of a woman explaining to a man how to do laundry or bake a pie because "those are women things." This type of mansplainer assumes that because you’re a woman you know less about what society deems stereotypical male activities. 

Common Mansplaining Situations at Work 

Mansplaining reinforces sexist gender stereotypes, undervalues women and their competence, and can impact a woman’s career. It doesn’t only happen in our personal lives, but it also happens in the workplace. Here are a few situations where you may have experienced mansplaining at work.

The Condescending Coworker

Condescending coworkers have existed since the dawn of time, and they likely aren’t going away any time soon. When a man speaks in a condescending tone, they’re acting, whether intentionally or not, as if they’re superior to their coworker. Dude, not cool. 

This is seen when a man believes they know more than a woman coworker or they sit above a woman in their organizational chart, so they think it gives them some right to speak the way they do. This is a prime example of mansplaining at work where the lines can get blurry because superiority doesn’t always equal more experience. 

The Clueless Coworker

Mansplaining doesn’t always stem from a condescending place; sometimes, it comes from a place of cluelessness. Cute, right? Not really. 

Instead of admitting in conversation that a man doesn’t know something or asking a person to elaborate, they continue to discuss a topic that they have no business explaining. They continue to insert their inaccurate knowledge into the conversation with extreme confidence instead of backing down and admitting they don’t know what they’re talking about.

The Coworker Who Needs to Be Dominant in the Conversation

There’s always that one person that needs to be the most powerful person in the conversation. Often it doesn’t matter what you say or what you do because it’s in their nature to be dominant.

This makes everyone else in the room feel inferior to this person, no matter how much everyone else asserts themselves. This type of coworker often interrupts during conversations and takes the lead in meetings. When this happens, over and over, female employees never get a word in—and, instead, could start to sink into quiet self-doubt. 

The 2019 LeanIn.org Women in the Workplace Report found that 50 percent of women have experienced being interrupted or spoken over compared to 34 percent of men. 

The Only "Outsider" Coworker in the Room Is You

When you’re the only woman in a meeting, it’s very easy to feel like an outsider. To combat those feelings, you need to be conscious about speaking up and be an active participant in the conversation.

It also means that those in the room with you need to provide you with the space to do that. If your company and coworkers don’t value creating that space for you and you don’t advocate for yourself, it’s easy to find yourself in a situation with a mansplainer.

How to Explain Mansplaining to a Mansplainer

Say that fast five times. 

Explaining mansplaining to a mansplainer can be tricky and uncomfortable. So how can you delicately educate them while nipping their patronizing behavior in the bud? 

The most obvious thing to do is to call out their mansplaining in the moment.

Most "splainers" don’t know they’re doing it. For them to recognize the behavior and be more cognizant of it in the future, they need to know firsthand what it looks like.

If you find yourself in a situation where you’re experiencing mansplaining, bring it to their attention. If it doesn’t feel appropriate to bring it up in front of others at the time, ask to speak to them in private. If they're mansplaining something that seems more trivial, you can even address it in a casual conversation. 

The goal is for them to learn from their actions and work to change their actions in the future. It's making sure that a mansplainer is aware that they are making mistaken assumptions that their qualified women colleagues wouldn't (or couldn't) know something for some arbitrary reason. 

But recognize that some people will never change, so if they snub your attempt to explain mansplaining and continue to mansplain going forward, try not to take it personally.

The way they choose to speak is not a reflection of you, and reacting emotionally can make the situation worse. Take a breath and, if the behavior warrants, make a plan to talk with your manager. 

For the quick and dirty way to explain mansplaining to a mansplainer, here are some phrases you can use to explain: