BOOK REVIEW- LEAN IN BY SHERYL SANDBERG

Read this book if you want to get inside the head of a power elite. Read this book if you want to hear about all of the things that women do wrong, to make sure you don't make the same mistakes. And then, read this book if you want to read all about why Marissa Mayer should be supported and treated as my shero.

 I really loved like this book. As a working Mom (Sheryl Sandberg) who has leaned into opportunities, even with a child, I felt the message would resonate with all of us at some points.

When she recommended, we work our tails off up to the point, I agreed. When she said we should demand job security when we take our maternity leave, I agreed. And when she said that we must demand more from our partners, I also agreed. But there was just too much about this book that I did not like. By the time I got to the last chapter and had to hear all about how great Marissa Mayer is, I stopped reading. Are you kidding me? She is great? Taking off two weeks is great? For who, exactly? Her? So great that she had to build a private nursery next to her office to accommodate her childcare needs? This book does what every feminist diatribe does - fails to give recognition to the great job a woman does – homemaker, motherhood, technocrat. Why don't women want to be feminists? Because of this. I am a professional who is excelling up the career ladder, but I also embraced the most important part of my life, which is balancing between work life and personal life. I have seen so many women forced themselves to take months off during their motherhood period and I believe that it is harder than working in a job. And why do we have to act like this is an anti-woman position? Because if you do, you'll lose respect and fall off the career ladder.

When I read the following quote, I was already sold:

” When a girl tries to lead, she is often labelled bossy. Boys are seldom called bossy because a boy taking the role of a boss does not surprise or offend. As someone who was called this for much of my childhood, I know that it is not a compliment. The stories of my childhood bossiness are told (and retold) with great amusement. “

I had many mixed feelings while reading this book. On one hand it is ridiculously sad that society is still where it is, and on the other hand I kept nodding so hard and sometimes I felt like I was hit by alien attack. That's the impact some chapters had on me. Aliens, here, right now, in my head!

Similarly to Quiet by Susan Cain, I just felt that it was important for me to read this book. Not that I have CHRO ambitions (I actually really like managing people, which makes the whole ‘bossiness’ an even bigger conundrum!) but as a working woman it still struck a chord with me.

What i liked about this book, is that it isn't a let's-sit-all-together-and-whine about the situation. Sandberg gives you some insights into our own brain, and how we are often doing this to ourselves as well.

For me, she did so especially in the first few chapters. The later chapters are more about families and kids, which is a bit less applicable to me now. Nonetheless, she made me think, and made me realize a few things about myself I didn’t really know. There were many alien lightning attack moments, but the most striking one for me was the paragraph about ‘feeling like a fraud’:

“She explained that many people, but especially women, feel fraudulent when they are praised for their accomplishments. Instead of feeling worthy of recognition, they feel undeserving and guilty, as if a mistake has been made. Despite being high achievers, even experts in their fields, women can’t seem to shake the sense that it is only a matter of time until they are found out for who they really are – impostors with limited skills or abilities.”

So true. No matter how many good performance reviews, no matter how often peers tell me they like me on their project because they’ll know that it’s in good hands with me – I still think I will be ‘discovered’ some day for the imposter I am.

Sometimes when people to ask me to send an old study to them, there is a part of me that doesn’t want to. Not because I don’t like sharing, but because I’m convinced it’ll be wrong. I would love to re-look at all the data just to make sure I didn’t do anything stupid in the first place. How silly is that?

I sometimes even feel like that on Goodreads. It’s is a mystery to me why people would follow me, or ask to friend me out of the blue, or like my reviews.

Really, I’m not a smart person and I don’t understand literature at all, I’m just a robot who puts random words behind one another and somehow so far I have regularly managed to trick people into thinking that my review makes sense.

Aren't I lucky?

I applaud Sandberg for writing this book in the most authentic way she may know, but in order for me to give her a standing ovation I need to feel included.