Lean In

This past weekend I read Lean In, a book written by Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook. This book is about pretty much what is described on the cover- “Women, Work and the Will to Lead”.

I’ll admit that I had a completely different idea of what the tone of this book would be like. I thought Sheryl Sandberg was going to be judging any woman that did not devote every waking moment of her life to her career. This book is actually the complete opposite.

Here are some good points that I really took away from this book:

• Some women only want to work. Some women only want to raise children. Some women want to do both. Every woman has to make that decision for herself and they should not be judged for it.
• Women are viewed differently in the workplace by both other women and men. This is something I already knew from experience but Sheryl Sandberg sites *many* studies on this topic. She talks about some great ways to work around this.
• On communication: Each person has their own opinion. When opinions differ, it is very unlikely that anyone’s mind is going to be changed. Understanding this is the key to communicating effectively <– so true!

I would not consider this book the bible for feminism and equality in the workplace but it was a good read and gave a lot of good career advice. I did not relate to some of the book because I work in a field that is dominated by women but it was still worth the read. Some of the criticism from this book is that Sheryl Sandberg is too elitist to really be able to relate to the struggles of every day women. While this may be true, it was still interesting to hear about her experiences moving up throughout her career. I would highly recommend this book for anyone, even guys!