tailfins
04-10-2013, 09:41 AM
Why Thatcher Wouldn’t Succeed in Our ‘Lean In’ Culture
* My ten year old can use an Excel Spreadsheet
That is so Sandberg: Sheryl plans her career moves in an Excel spreadsheet.
*One woman should hold another back if she produces incorrect answers and nonfunctional deliverables
That same rough style might disqualify a rising Thatcher today. Over and again, today’s leaders counsel their pupils, especially the female ones, to network and get along, and focus on discrimination. “Many people believe that the workplace is still a meritocracy,” writes Sandberg, suggesting that the people who hold such beliefs are blind or wrong.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Sandberg also maintains, “to think about one woman holding another back.” Indeed it is, but an emphasis on woman-to-woman help tends to reward the get-along women rather than the aggressive ones.
* Let's all be lemmings and go over the cliff
Which brings us to the largest obstacle to today’s Iron Ladies: the emphasis on corporate or government process. As Sandberg laboriously notes, Harvard Business School (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-14/sheryl-sandberg-the-hbr-interview.html), which already famously focused on teamwork and consensus, has lately emphasized teamwork even more. It’s hard to imagine Thatcher (“Defeat? I do not recognize the word”) thriving at HBS.
* Reserved parking for pregnant women versus freeing a community from an Argentine dictatorship: Yeah, those are comparable accomplishments. NOT!
The result of the collaborative culture is that corporations or government institutions focus intensely on internal culture and pour their energy into achieving minuscule policy changes relating to workplace efficiency, gender or race. The great victory with which future Thatcher biographers are likely to open their accounts is her winning back the Falkland Islands from the Argentine junta. The great victory with which Sandberg opens her book was getting Google Inc. (GOOG) (http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/GOOG:US) to establish reserved parking for pregnant women.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-08/why-thatcher-wouldn-t-succeed-in-our-lean-in-culture.html
* My ten year old can use an Excel Spreadsheet
That is so Sandberg: Sheryl plans her career moves in an Excel spreadsheet.
*One woman should hold another back if she produces incorrect answers and nonfunctional deliverables
That same rough style might disqualify a rising Thatcher today. Over and again, today’s leaders counsel their pupils, especially the female ones, to network and get along, and focus on discrimination. “Many people believe that the workplace is still a meritocracy,” writes Sandberg, suggesting that the people who hold such beliefs are blind or wrong.
“It’s heartbreaking,” Sandberg also maintains, “to think about one woman holding another back.” Indeed it is, but an emphasis on woman-to-woman help tends to reward the get-along women rather than the aggressive ones.
* Let's all be lemmings and go over the cliff
Which brings us to the largest obstacle to today’s Iron Ladies: the emphasis on corporate or government process. As Sandberg laboriously notes, Harvard Business School (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-14/sheryl-sandberg-the-hbr-interview.html), which already famously focused on teamwork and consensus, has lately emphasized teamwork even more. It’s hard to imagine Thatcher (“Defeat? I do not recognize the word”) thriving at HBS.
* Reserved parking for pregnant women versus freeing a community from an Argentine dictatorship: Yeah, those are comparable accomplishments. NOT!
The result of the collaborative culture is that corporations or government institutions focus intensely on internal culture and pour their energy into achieving minuscule policy changes relating to workplace efficiency, gender or race. The great victory with which future Thatcher biographers are likely to open their accounts is her winning back the Falkland Islands from the Argentine junta. The great victory with which Sandberg opens her book was getting Google Inc. (GOOG) (http://www.bloomberg.com/quote/GOOG:US) to establish reserved parking for pregnant women.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-08/why-thatcher-wouldn-t-succeed-in-our-lean-in-culture.html