Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

Every person should read

Every person female or male should read this book. I think this one of the best books of our time. Dealing with real issues that every modern woman and man face in today's society.

read this one for the Alliance of Women in Workers’ Compensation Book Club & truly enjoyed it. I loved how Sheryl gave examples from her own life about her struggles to succeed, gender stereotypes/biases and how she is continuously striving to do better and to be better. At one point she mentions how she hopes that there will just be “great leaders” and that someone will not be distinguished as a “great female leader”. Her concept of “Lean In” circles is great and I am actually a part of “Lean In” circle at my current job and I am forever grateful for the relationships I am building with these women and that I know I have a safe space with them to voice my concerns & to continue to grow.

There is a lot of value in a woman with a top position in business pointing out the many barriers women face; and calling for changes in the work place, society, and in how both women and men approach business and feminism. For a lot of people these are already known facts, but the nature of this as a "business book" means a lot of people are exposed to these statistics and personal stories who might not otherwise be exposed.

That said, I was familiar with these problems already, and there are only a few suggestions that I thought I could use in the book. For example, she talks about quality time at work instead of quantity of time at work but this doesn't apply at all in the world of the hourly billable. She cites that men are more likely to bill any time spent thinking about work... but as far as I'm concerned that's called "overbilling the client." Also, I think there's a lack of long-term perspective in the book because Sandburg was relatively young in both age and spirit when she wrote the book. I think that if/when she writes a sequel there will be some change in her perspective.

PFS Book Club --- 4th March, 23 On Saturday Pooja talked about book called “Lean in: Women, Work, and the will to lead” by Sheryl Sandberg. Sheryl was the COO of Facebook and still among Facebook board of directors (First woman) Lean in explains why women are still underrepresented in the workforce, what holds them back, how woman can take the lead and hold the flag of female leadership high. She shares her personal stories to throw light on gender differences in work place. Pooja wonderfully explained that Man even knowing 20% of the task can apply for higher ranks unapologetically but woman even if knowing everything is self-doubting. One of the conversations which touched me lot was Sheryl was having learning session with many cohorts and other women and she was asking everybody on what they learnt from session. And Sheryl did not notice that one woman raised her hand but did not get chance to speak and that woman said that I have learnt is to keep your hand raised, you might get a chance. Vijaya aunty gave reference of movie “Hidden figures” where female lead was assigned to space team. Her boss confronts her about her breaks, unaware of the fact that she was forced to walk half a mile to use the nearest bathroom and the discrimination she faced at work. Her boss removes bathroom segregation policy for colored people and included her in high level meetings. Guru gave very nice perspective that there is no short cut solution for women empowerment and for women to be successful and free from all current biases, twenty years from now, work has to start today. He said some considerable work has been done and sex ratio at IIT’s and IIM;s reflect that lit has to be done. Then there was very nice discussion that apart from emancipation of women, empowerment is needed to all weaker sections of society who needs level ground to compete. There was some discussions on books like Psychology of money, thinking fast and slow, fooled by randomness, remnants of separation and getting things done.

As a young woman trying to navigate the corporate world this book was such an eye opener and helped me become more assertive and helped me understand some corporate dynamics.