If it’s done right.

We all, without being told, know what good workplace competition looks like. For example, some time in your career – hopefully more than once – you’ll vie for a promotion against a coworker. And that’s okay. May the best woman win.

Similarly, in our gut we all know what competition looks like when it goes wrong. Backbiting. Espionage. Sabotage.

Far too often, professional women are still getting workplace competition all wrong. At least that’s the educated opinion of Nan Mooney, author of I Can’t Believe She Did That: Why Women Betray Other Women at Work.

Blame it all on those girlhood lessons.

“As girls, we’re taught that it’s not good to have conflict. It’s not seen as healthy. So when the inevitable conflicts arise in the workplace, women do their best to bury them and pretend they don’t exist,” said Mooney.

“Of course every workplace situation is different, but overall I’d advise women to be open and upfront about existing in a competitive situation — not to try to avoid the conflicts inherent to competition or to pretend such competition doesn’t exist.”

When such conflicts are avoided, that’s when the trouble begins. Covert things happen. Bad things.

“In order to compete in a healthy manner, women need to simply do their best job in as professional a manner as possible and not be afraid of hurting feelings or having their own feelings hurt in the process. I think this goes for competing with either men or women.”

Don’t avoid competition or pretend it doesn’t exist. Compete on purpose. Face it and do it right.

With that in mind, Mooney offers the following tips for young professional women on how to foster good competition in the workplace.

Communicate - Sure it’s going to cause some interpersonal discomfort if both you and a peer are shooting for the same promotion, but you’re only inviting negative competition by not addressing the situation openly and directly. “Discuss your expectations of one another. Nobody loves conflict, but problems do not just magically fix themselves. The longer you wait, the worse things will get. You may be surprised to find how many problematic situations can be improved, if not solved, if you attempt to address them right away.”

You don’t have to be friends with the people you work with - There’s a reason those bosom buddies from Sex in the City didn’t work together, Mooney said. Work situations generate conflict and sometimes you’ll upset people just by doing your job well. Focus on being respectful, fair, ethical, and hard working instead of becoming everyone’s best friend. You’re going to have to be the bad guy, to do unpopular things, when you work with others. Feathers will be ruffled.

“It can weigh heavily on women that they need to be friends with everyone at their job. Women are raised to be nice and liked and to think that that’s the end all and be all,” she said. “That’s right in personal relationships, but not in the workplace. Instead of striving to be liked, strive to be respected.”

Keep a “professional distance” – “When women bond with other women, they share a lot of personal information very quickly. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but one should be careful about that in the workplace. It’s not always a good thing for a colleague to know, for example, that you just broke up with your boyfriend. They can use that to judge your performance.”

Men are lucky in this regard, Mooney said, as they have the camaraderie of “sports talk.” They can bond without saying anything intimate.

For women in the workplace, the key, she said, is to “keep a professional distance.” Revealing too much can make you vulnerable. Save your serious venting sessions for your off-the-clock friends, she said.

Remember, not all women compete alike- All this said above about how women tend to react to competition in the workplace, it’s wise to remember that many women can break those stereotypes. “When they do break those stereotypes, when they appear to be operating out of a different definition of what it means to succeed, it can be a shock.”

Just because you’re both women doesn’t mean you will necessarily think or act the same way. Before jumping to judge or condemn another woman’s behavior, try to put yourself in her shoes.

“Prepare yourself up front that different women are going to have different ways of operating in the workplace and getting ahead,” she said.

Remember, there’s enough room for everyone - Oftentimes, the higher a woman rises in Corporate America, the fewer other women she sees at her same level. That can lead some women to feel threatened by other women who are trying to get to their level. Resist that temptation, Mooney advises. “Instead, be generous with your time, your knowledge and your resources. Behaving as if there’s room enough for everyone is the fastest road toward making sure this becomes a reality.”

It’s all a matter of perspective. A smart young woman coming up under you can be after your job or she can be “a smart, young woman who would be great to have on my team so that we can be even more effective,” Mooney said.

You can be a role model to these up and comers under you, showing them how to handle conflict and work together respectfully.

Be as open and honest as you can, showing that you trust people. Most people will reciprocate by being less likely to backstab you.

Discretion is always a virtue. “Don’t be foolish. If someone is stealing your ideas, don’t share any more ideas with them.”

Don’t avoid competition in the workplace, or pretend it doesn’t exist, this author advises. Instead be above-board and forthright – it just might catch on.

No office hands out a prize for “The Biggest Doormat”- If a woman in your office is doing you wrong, take action. Who cares if it rocks the boat or hurts feelings?

The worst thing you can do is to let it fester and not say anything.

“Competition is part of the work environment, at least any work environment in which something is at stake. When the competition gets unhealthy and dynamics like back-stabbing or sabotage enter the picture, then you need to speak up – whether to the backstabbing colleague or to a boss or supervisor. You have the right, in fact the responsibility, to say your piece,” Mooney said. “Be respectful but be heard.”

Be circumspect in how you confront. Do it in a professional way. “Gather all your information and evidence. For example, if you’re not getting credit for work you’re doing, go into this meeting with examples of work you’re doing. Set a time for the meeting when emotions aren’t high. But remember, as a member of that company you have a right to be heard.”

The Golden Rule still applies - Always treat the women you work with respectfully, even if they don’t follow suit. Compete with others as you would have them compete with you – above-board and respectful. “Don’t lie, cheat or steal even if other women on the job are shameless in this department,” she said. “Sure, money and promotions are flattering to your ego, but never at the price of your self-respect.”

I don’t mean to talk smack about my sisters, but they started it! Look around and you can see the effects of horizontal hostility seeping through the pores of our relationships, organizational positioning, and even in the fairly meaningless daily interactions with fleeting females in our lives.

Just the other day, I caught myself in a mini-vacation back to my own tween cattiness of yesteryear. I spotted an annoying though inconsequential woman in my life tooling around town in a sports bra as a top. Besides the fact that I thought underwear as clothing went wayward with the 80s, I was baffled by her apathy to keeping up appearances. Surely she wasn’t proud of the snow white muffin top peeking above her capris!

The more I thought about my rude reaction, the closer I came to the truth. I was thrust into competitive mode because I feared she had found some secret ingredient to blind confidence that I had not yet attained. In order to bring myself up, my natural reaction was to bring her down. (Although, in all fairness, you had to see the ensemble to fully appreciate my knee-jerk mock reaction.) Still, why did my competitive nature manifest in an attempt to push her down through mean-spirited, gossipy ridicule? Why should it matter to me if she chooses sparkly pasties and daisy dukes over the standard weekend garb favored by the other women in that setting? Although I could pinky-swear that I will forevermore refrain from such petty behaviors, I recognize that I have a lot of introspection to tend to before promising that lofty goal. I simply cannot be held accountable for the poor fashion choices of others and a quick-draw resort to my sex’s evolutionary arsenal against competition. Studies indicate that this type of reaction in woman on woman competitiveness is especially common in the workplace.

Women: sneaky competitors
Nan Mooney, author of  I Can’t Believe She Did That! Why Women Betray Other Women at Work, claims that it’s not just a female problem, as both sexes are extremely competitive in the workplace. The difference is that women tend to compete more surreptitiously, some might even say sneakier, than men. Men reportedly tap into their aggressive nature when dealing with threatening co-workers and, therefore, are more likely to express their distaste directly. However, when women feel competitive with other women, we tend to revert to our evolutionary proclivity toward passivity and are, therefore, more likely to try to bring them down less obviously through gossip, slander, sabotage, and cliquish exclusion. Instead of confronting competition directly or asking ourselves why their success threatens us, we resort to a corrupt war against the competition even as we publicly pretend all is well.

Competition–part of the workplace environment
Phyllis Chesler has a psychologically bound rationale for this tendency toward unhealthy competition between women in the workplace. In her book, Women’s Inhumanity to Women, competition at work is seen as a natural result of the workplace environment. Everyone wants to stand out at work so when someone interferes with that individual desire, the typical reaction is to try to get rid of the rival rather than focus on how to better stand out. Men tend to be more overt in their efforts to rise above the competition and, therefore, make obvious attempts to squash the competition. Following the motto that “all’s fair in business,” men can fight aggressively in the war of business but move on personally almost immediately. Women, on the other hand, tend toward more covert operations, controlling the threat behind the scenes. Thus, while men are just as brutal and, often, even more so, women stay entrenched in the ongoing battle, unable to separate the business aspect from the personal.

Messy as this passive form of competition may be, if it was working for women it might squeak into being acceptable along the vein of  ”all’s fair in business,” but these habits usually prove to be self-defeating and certainly do nothing for women as a unified group. Part of the problem is that the archetype of workplace organizations is a design of men and, so, the tendencies and talents of women are not an intrinsic component of workplace culture. Thus, the typical organizational structure is more easily maneuvered through the aggressive tendencies of men rather than the innate and socialized inclinations for passive conflict resolution of women. Fortunately, passivity doesn’t have to be a nasty word!

Thanks to our intrinsically gentler nature, women tend to have a greater capacity than men toward working compatibly together within networks. According to Mooney, when women form relationships with other women in the workplace, they work more effectively together than men typically do. Also, women are more able to affect other women’s work performance which, of course, can yield hideous results if women in the workplace are attempting to spread negativity, but can be quite useful if that power is reigned in for good and not evil.

Hopefully you have not personally engaged in such unhealthy competitive behaviors with other women at work, but if you have ” you’re not alone. Luckily, you don’t have to feel alone at work either. Embrace other women as alliances: strive to work more cohesively, learn from one another, and communicate honestly. But, remember, you will always get a pass for bitchy behavior if a female co-worker enters the office wearing a sports bra as a top. Sisterhood can’t excuse everything.