At a recent practice interview session for students at a nearby college, volunteer alumni/ae were talking around the dinner table, introducing each other and their backgrounds. At my turn, I mentioned that I had written a book about "women in leadership at corporate boards of directors at Fortune 1000 firms based in California." The woman sitting opposite me, about my age, said,

"Oh, yes. The Glass Ceiling."

I felt as if someone had just picked up some huge carcass of road kill and dropped it in the middle of the table.

Trying to be diplomatic, I said how very proud I was that I’d managed to write a book of over 260 pages, studying 114 women in leadership, and writing up the biographies of 15 very talented women, and never once used the expression "the glass ceiling." Nor did any of the women whom I interviewed ever use the phrase.

Also at the dinner table were two younger, more recent graduates of the college. One was a male with a Latino background and experience in IT education. The other was a woman professional from an Arabic background with extensive recent experience in the law. The first said that, throughout all of his undergraduate and professional background, he had always seen and experienced the benefits of diverse teams. And, he added, those teams were tested and measured by the mettle of their performance and ability to deliver results. He’s seen imbalanced teams -– 80% women and 20% men –- where the leader (a woman) decided the team would be better and more effective when it could benefit from a more balanced combination of skills and perspectives.

The other younger professional described how she was part of a team of 25% women, one of whom was recently promoted to partner. She said her new boss was not limiting anyone’s potential, but rather was giving all of them new and challenging assignments to ensure they developed their own talents.

This is today’s experience: making progress on merit, being measure by performance and results delivered. Today, we are far closer to the goal of an equal playing field that we are to "tgc." Those who fail to recognize that progress are stuck in a era long gone.

It is time that we stopped allowing yesterday’s problems to define how we address the challenges of today. Most certainly, it is time that we dug a very big hole and buried that limiting expression ("tgc") that is as derogatory and limiting as the n* world is to the African American community.

What is the purpose of using that expression as a simplistic knee jerk reaction to any comment or research on the subject of women or other professionals? Does it have any relevance to this 21st century economy or are we simply using it as a token excuse for our own failure? Has the phrase become a lame excuse because "wink wink," we all know that it is futile for women or others because they will only come up against "tgc?"

TGC is gender-profiling at its worst. It is demeaning, insulting, limiting and wrong-headed. It’s time to stop using it in any form.