Leaning In in Academia

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I’d like to talk about Sheryl Sandberg’s book Lean In, which came out in March and seems to have touched a national nerve, given the amount of attention it’s gotten. To be honest, I’ve been dragging my feet a bit writing about it, because I feel that the conversation around the message in the book has gotten so distorted and so ridiculously simplified that I wasn’t sure I wanted to engage with it. However, I think it is a very important book that has started a conversation on the exact topic this blog is designed to address, so…I’m going in!

Perhaps it’s best to start by laying out two of the main critiques of the book (by the way: I found the pattern of reaction to Lean In fascinating. In the first two weeks or so after it was released, there was some cautious praise of the book from reviewers, then an ENORMOUS backlash of criticism that dwarfed the earlier praise—from all sides of the ideological spectrum!). If you haven’t read the book, I encourage you to do so, because I think both of these critiques do not engage fully with Sandberg’s material. Anyway, the first goes something like this: Sandberg is telling all women that if they don’t throw themselves fully into their careers, they are losers, bad feminists, and impeding progress. This is complete and utter nonsense; Sandberg says nothing of the sort in her book. She is addressing specifically the audience of women who want to achieve leadership roles in traditionally male-dominated arenas (i.e. politics, the private sector, academia, non-governmental organizations…pretty much all of them!). I find this interpretation of the book to be a little like picking up a book on how to win marathons and saying the author means that everyone should be a marathon runner.

The second major critique has a little more traction, in my opinion. In Lean In, Sandberg addresses the problem of under-representation of women in leadership roles. She claims that in order to solve this problem, women have to adjust their own thinking, lifestyles, and behavior in order to rise to leadership in their chosen fields. This is controversial, because some claim that it amounts to blaming the victim (women) for not succeeding in a system that is rigged against them; or, setting women up to fail before putting the necessary structures in place for them to succeed. We pretty much know what these structures are, because most of the developed world other than the United States has them: paid maternity leave, career flexibility, equal pay for equal work, and affordable, high-quality daycare.

But here’s the thing: feminists (and radicals of all sorts) have always acknowledged that, in addition to effecting structural change, attitudinal change is necessary. If we change the ways that we operate, without changing the underlying ways we think about our capabilities, our gender roles, and our behavior, it’s unclear whether the improvements would be sustainable. That’s why some books now considered feminist classics—The Feminine Mystique, or The Beauty Myth—are less about re-structuring society and more about recognizing and countering the narratives we receive as women about how we understand our own worthiness.

Sandberg gives many examples in Lean In of narratives that women receive and believe in the workplace, which hold us back. She uses extensive social science research to support her point. I have seen these self-defeating narratives operating among women in academia, and have even recognized them in myself. One fascinating academic finding, consistent across the STEM disciplines (science-technology-engineering-math) is that, although the abilities of women and men in these fields do not differ significantly, women perceive their abilities to be less than they actually are, while men perceive their abilities to be greater than they actually are! Clearly this has implications for which fields women choose to enter as Ph.D. students and as faculty, and may keep women with strong abilities out of their chosen field.

I teach a graduate level computer modeling class that uses calculus and differential equations. Some students of both genders feel their math background may be insufficient for the class, and approach me about it at the beginning of the semester. The interesting thing is, the male students tend to ask me, “What readings or exercises do you recommend to brush up on my math skills?”—implying, of course, that they have the capability to master the requisite skills; they just need to put in the effort. The female students often tell me, “Math scares me!”, or “I’m worried that I won’t be able to do the math in the class.” This is a fundamentally different type of statement, because it is about ability, rather than effort. Men are taught, and self-reinforce, the notion that they can do anything math- or science-related if they work hard enough. Women worry that they actually can’t succeed no matter how hard they try. This can be a self-fulfilling prophecy, because the attitude needed to succeed at modeling (and in a graduate program, for that matter!) is one of confidence, determination, and perseverance.

This is just one example; Sandberg goes on in her book, and I could too. I think Lean In has accomplished something important by starting a national conversation on: (1) the dearth of women in leadership, despite (ostensibly) decades of feminist progress; and (2) the attitudes commonly held by both men and women in the leadership ‘pipeline’ that hold women back. If you want to give yourself a sobering reality check about your own attitudes and biases, go to https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/. The lessons we learn as children (for example, by seeing these awful shirts when we go shopping), and which are reinforced throughout our lives, affect what we women feel we are capable of. We need to change our attitudes and our institutions; Sandberg is wise to point this out.