#invisible-labor

#invisible-labor

Biglaw has been aware for years that women leave the profession at higher rates than men. The data are well known. Attrition remains stubbornly gendered. Leadership remains disproportionately male.

The moment I rise in the morning, I check my phone. Bad habit, to be sure. But I know I'm not the only one. There is a message from an editor marked "urgent," there is an email from the school reminding me it's parent-visit morning, and a text from a fellow soccer mom making sure I remembered the time change for Sunday's tournament. (I hadn't). The day had barely started, and I already felt hopelessly behind.

We all know someone who seems to "forget" how to do something they've done a hundred times before: a partner who can't figure out the laundry settings, a colleague who somehow never learns the new scheduling system, a friend who always "means to" organize the gathering but never quite does. The term " weaponized incompetence" has emerged to describe this pattern: when someone exaggerates or performs helplessness to avoid responsibility and, consciously or not, shifts the burden onto someone else.