Summer Reading: 'Lean In'

While interning at the corporate headquarters of a media company this summer, I finally read Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” (only a year after everyone else who cared had read it). At this point, I could tell you I read the last page, set aside my Kindle and vowed to apply Sandberg’s teachings at work, but I would be lying. I was doing a pretty good job of saying yes to all the interesting, challenging projects my supervisors were offering me. I didn’t have children at home to complicate my considerations of a work-life balance — considerations rendered mostly irrelevant by the fact that interns weren’t allowed to work more than 40 hours a week anyway. However, the debates surrounding her book spurred me to dive in.

So what exactly are Sandberg’s arguments? Here’s what I gathered: Women are not in the positions of power they deserve in the workplace. That’s partly because they often pull back from work once they start expanding their families and partly because, from the get-go, they don’t raise their hands, sit at the table or speak up enough. Of course, general expectations for how women should act — and the ways in which those expectations differ for men — also contribute to the absence of women leaders. However, what women can do now is “lean in” (while also keeping in mind that perfection is impossible).

It seemed like reasonable advice to me, though it’s not without its caveats: Sandberg’s advice is applicable in only some workplace settings and for women who are lucky to have certain privileges. “Lean In” also didn’t address how we as a society can change the things that individual women cannot control, though Sandberg briefly explains her reason for not addressing that in the first chapter of the book.

After I finished the book, I read a few critiques and was shocked by the acid that dripped from some of them. New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, who wrote “Pompom Girl for Feminism,” called Sandberg a wannabe “PowerPoint Pied Piper in Prada ankle boots reigniting the women’s revolution.” If Sandberg were a man, would Dowd have called out her penchant for nice shoes? I don’t think so, and that seems ironic. The very title of Dowd’s article is drawn from a quotation taken grossly out of context. Sandberg labels herself as a “pompom girl for feminism” in a tongue-in-cheek way after recounting an anecdote from her summer working as a page for her hometown congressman, William Lehman. Lehman had promised to introduce her to then-Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill. When Lehman finally made good on his promise, O’Neill reached over, patted Sandberg on the head and said to Lehman, “She’s pretty.” Then he asked Sandberg, “Are you a pom-pom girl?” Sandberg was crushed.

My biggest takeaway from my experience reading “Lean In” this summer is this: Critics often veer into personal attacks to poke holes in the arguments of high-profile figures (often without reading their actual books). If you’re curious about the controversy that surrounds it, like I was, I’d recommend reading it — if nothing else, it is an engaging read.