"I've got a woman's ability to stick to a job and get on with it when everyone else walks off and leaves it"
About this Quote
The line also performs a quiet inversion. Traditionally, women are cast as emotional or delicate; Thatcher reframes femininity as endurance, discipline, and practicality. That’s not incidental branding. It aligns with her broader political persona: duty over sentiment, resolve over consensus, the famous refusal to be swayed. It’s a moral claim as much as a personal one: if others abandon the task, they’re not just weak, they’re unserious.
There’s subtextual aggression too. "Everyone else" isn’t abstract; it’s colleagues, rivals, unions, waverers in Cabinet, the political class prone to retreat when decisions get costly. She implies that her opponents can’t stomach consequence, while she can.
Context matters: Thatcher’s era demanded toughness, and she mastered the rhetoric of toughness without surrendering the distinctiveness of being a woman in that space. The quote doesn’t ask for acceptance. It dares anyone to deny the results.
Quote Details
| Topic | Work Ethic |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Thatcher, Margaret. (2026, January 17). I've got a woman's ability to stick to a job and get on with it when everyone else walks off and leaves it. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-got-a-womans-ability-to-stick-to-a-job-and-25736/
Chicago Style
Thatcher, Margaret. "I've got a woman's ability to stick to a job and get on with it when everyone else walks off and leaves it." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-got-a-womans-ability-to-stick-to-a-job-and-25736/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"I've got a woman's ability to stick to a job and get on with it when everyone else walks off and leaves it." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/ive-got-a-womans-ability-to-stick-to-a-job-and-25736/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.











