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For these reasons, along with thousands of years of human history, fathers have generally had a more significant impact on a child's career choices and work habits than mothers have had. The workplace has always been a masculine model and arena for men, and men have been solely defined by their work and the success within it. Most men still view a failed career opportunity as a personal failure, and many women feel the same way about men who don't succeed in their jobs. The home, on the other hand, has been a feminine model for women. Women have been defined by how well they cared for their children and tended to home duties. Right, wrong, or otherwise, these cultural beliefs are very strong and have been in place for thousands of years. Fathers have always been expected to work the land or, since the Industrial Revolution, work away from the home and support all their family's material and financial needs and wants. In family law court, however, the majority of child custody cases are settled in favor of the mother having both the legal and physical custody of the children. The reason is that, regardless of the father's emotional and mental fitness, women are viewed as better primary parents. More and more men and women are challenging these types of cultural stereotypes, but there is considerable wisdom for a daughter and son to gain from understanding the effect of their father's work ethic in relation to their beliefs about their own professional lives.

In terms of the third objection -- that because a child wasn't close to a father, the father probably didn't have much of an impact -- the opposite is usually true. We live in a society where fathers are often emotionally absent at home; they cede much of the parenting responsibility to moms. Children possess a natural psychological and emotional need for both parents to be present, and, when one isn't, a negative effect can result. When dads are absent, the effect usually is most keenly felt in areas such as a work ethic, ambition, and relating to authority figures. Fathers matter to their children, and all children naturally crave their fathers' involvement in their lives. Absence, of course, isn't the only issue that causes career problems for a child. A father-child relationship that is problematic, strained, or filled with anger and disappointment may have a profound effect on everything from career choices to relationships with colleagues. As negative as this might seem, there's a positive flip side to it. The relationship with your father (or stepfather or any male father figure) can provide you with a wealth of information and insight -- and that goes even for a bad relationship! You can use this information and insight to get back on track or to move your performance to the next level. Understanding your father's legacy in terms of relationships, work, and finances can be a powerful resource and springboard for your career.

Believing that your father's career has no relevance to your own is often myopic and dangerous. Let's say, for instance, that your father started working for General Electric right after the war and stayed with the company for forty-eight years in a non-management capacity until his retirement. You have gone to college, have an advanced degree, have worked in several management positions, and have been laid off twice as a result of corporate mergers. It appears on the surface that your and your father's career lives have nothing in common. Consider, for a minute, your father's motivation, certain career choices, work stability/endurance, and relationship style. These nonverbal daily behaviors contributed to the very fabric and foundation of your own father factor. Even if you're a woman, you have your own father factor, which is your style of behaving, professionally and otherwise, which was influenced by your father. You observed your father in his career and watched him survive in the same place for forty-eight years. Your father's work behaviors contributed valuable pointers on how to conduct yourself in your career. There are considerable nuggets of information and wisdom to be found in how your father survived in the workplace, managed difficult supervisors, and remained in the same job for so many years. Don't dismiss his career life because it appears so different from yours. The same tools can be useful for you to survive in your career as they were for your father.

Finally, your father may not have been a career role model or the type of person you care to emulate. The slippery slope of anger, resentment, and rage in this relationship is one that many daughters and sons, regardless of age, fall into, desperately trying to become the professional that their father never was. This career approach is a reaction to the family trauma that you experienced growing up. There is an edge of aggressiveness and "cold-heartedness" to professionals who have never resolved or come to terms with who and what their father was. The driving force in this son's or daughter's career is the complete rejection of who and what their father was as a parent, working adult, and partner to his or her mother. The career legacy is overcoming the disappointment and disillusionment of men. Trust of authority figures is a difficult thing for professionals who have had this type of father-child relationship.