In The Conversation (and Fast Company), Kaplan looks to organizational solutions to a dynamic that silences women’s views and blocks their advancement.

“Note, as Solnit does, that “mansplaining is not a universal flaw of the male gender, just the intersection between overconfidence and cluelessness where some portion of that gender gets stuck.”

But the mansplaining term has stuck. And research demonstrates that the feeling of being mansplained is, in fact, not just a feeling.

Studies show that in meetings, men speak more, and more powerful men speak even more. Men interrupt more, and are less likely than women to cede the floor when they are interrupted. Women worry (correctly) that if they fight to get their voices heard, they will experience backlash.”