<p>Here is an article that I thought had an interesting take on the “lean in” controversy.</p>
<p>[What</a> ‘Lean In’ Misunderstands About Gender Differences - Christina Hoff Sommers - The Atlantic](<a href=“What 'Lean In' Misunderstands About Gender Differences - The Atlantic”>What 'Lean In' Misunderstands About Gender Differences - The Atlantic)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t see what’s so new here.</p>
<p>The article is simply talking about what we used to call “mommy tracking” – in which a woman downsizes her career during the period when she’s actively raising children. She may switch to part-time work, leave the labor force entirely for a time, take a job with flexible hours even though it pays less, avoid jobs that involve travel and overtime, or do some combination of these things at different times during the child-rearing years. This makes it possible for her to devote more time to family responsibilities, and it frees her partner to pursue his career full-tilt – which may be financially advantageous for the family. It’s one way to deal with the reality that combining two high-powered careers plus good parenting is extremely difficult – and perhaps not achievable for many families.</p>
<p>Many of us were mommy trackers. Many of today’s parents of young children still do it – although perhaps there are more “daddy trackers” nowadays. I work with a few. The men don’t seem to do it by choice, the way many women do. Instead, they happen to find themselves in jobs that are more flexible than their wives’ jobs, and they drift into handling more of the family responsibilities.</p>
<p>What interests me, from my perspective at the other end of the parenting process, is what happens to the “mommy/daddy trackers” when their active parenting responsibilities end. Most still have at least a decade – sometimes as long as two decades – before retirement. How do they fit into the job market? In my personal experience, where they fit is in jobs well below their actual potential in terms of responsibility and income. The skills – and there are plenty of them-- that they gained during their years of parenting don’t seem to be transferable to the workplace. But maybe that’s just me.</p>
<p>Do you think you were a mommy tracker because you were afraid or oppresses? I think that is the question raised.</p>
<p>^^choices, choices, choices…nothing has changed over the last couple/triple of decades…</p>
<p>New York Magazine this week (march 25th issue) has the opposite side of the spectrum again; women who have made the choice to drop out for whatever reason…not afraid; not oppressed…</p>
<p>isn’t all of this “old news”?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Sandburg touches on this a little bit in her TED talk on YouTube. For women who want both children and a career, staying involved in your career is important.
I know several families where both parents have very high-track, demanding careers, at the same time they are raising their kids. They do seem to “have it all”, but what makes it work is a real working partnership with their spouses. Two women I know are CEOs - one of a multi-million dollar company and one of a medical school. Of course they have outside help- their high salaries allow for that. But these women never left their careers.
It’s not for every woman, which Sandburg admits. She’s not speaking to every woman, but to those women who do very much want a challenging, life-long career as well as a family.
I see these women- like Sandburg, and like the women like her that I know- as real trailblazers. I see their husbands as trailblazers, as well.
I think some misunderstand Sandburg’s message, thinking that because she’d like to see more women at the top of business and government that she thinks all women should want to pursue this goal. That’s not what I took from her talk. I do want to read her book.
Nothing in her talk speaks to women feeling oppressed. There is definitely fear of success, and lack of confidence that can hold women back, and she speaks to that.</p>
<p>Oh, just don’t even get me started.
This woman has children in elementary school. She is just beginning her “career” as a mother. When my kids were in elementary school, I thought our household arrangement (breadwinner mom/at-home dad) was just ducky.</p>
<p>Hi
Have anyone finished her book?
I am surprised to find it enjoyable, quite interesting especially how she handled her Harvard classes.
It seems dumbed down a bit in order to appeal to everyday people from the get-go introduction and she have achieved her goal.
Soon to be in the NYT best seller and it seems “lean in” is now new buzzword, something in the line of “outlier”</p>
<p>As of March 31 2013 issue
It is THE NYT top seller</p>
<p>I’m interested in reading it, but will wait til my library has it. I see women lean back often, usually as a way to manage different parts of her life, but sometimes out of insecurity and fear. When I counsel them I hear the fear is fueled by being unfamiliar and uncomfortable with valuing themselves and asking to be valued by management. An example is an engineer who told me this week she would accept her manager’s position, (he just left and recommended her for his role) without a promotion and without a raise, I discouraged her charity and we explored why she devalues her own expertise and hard work.</p>
<p>that said, I leaned back at particular points in my life, by doing part time consulting, to be more focused on mothering, and am glad I did, it was right for me, but was never because I felt afraid or oppressed, simply because it was right for me and my family. It was a stages thing. I did always maintain my professional licensure and stayed connected to my career, even if less fully, which made the full time return smoother. I have a satisfying and successful career, but also recognize I might have had more opportunities and money had I never pulled back. That’s sometimes frustrating but I do believe I would do it again, as those choices gave me the best return on investment in other ways.</p>
<p>If we want women to feel empowered to seek high career goals, why do we call “fear” when they feel empowered to back off?</p>
<p>if they’re empowered to back off of course that’s not fear. I think sometimes leaning back is a choice, just like leaning in can be a choice, and only the woman herself knows when to choose which direction to take. However sometimes leaning back or backing off is done out of fear. when it’s fear I think we can encourage ourselves and each other to take a chance despite the fear.</p>
<p>I have two daughters. Based on my experience and from what I have seen around me, I would encourage them to stay with their career even if financially they could afford to stay home. I would tell them to hire a nanny, cook, driver, whatever help they need to make their life easier so they could continue with their careers. Even if what they make is less than than what they would pay for the nanny, view it as an investment for their careers. Life is long, it is hard to have just one breadwinner, and it would be very hard for them to go back if they stay out for 10 to 15 years. Having kids was the best thing I ever did, but now we are empty nesters, I am very glad that I am working, never thought I would say that.</p>
<p>oldfort, I totally agree. I too worked throughout my children’s lives and, while there were days I wished I didn’t, overall it was terrific. It’s made me who I am today.</p>
<p>ETA: But that’s me. It’s not right for every woman, or for every couple, or for every family. YMMV.</p>
<p>While the phrase “leaning in” implies a powerful message of choice, the phrase “leaning back” implies fear, pulling back, pulling inward.</p>
<p>I know a number of women and men who have made a career/life choice to change the focus of their energies from career to family for at time (or permanently) in their lives. </p>
<p>I consider that choice to be not one of leaning back, but to be one of changing direction, or striking a balance.</p>
<p>Leaning forward can pitch a person into as much of a life imbalance as leaning back can. </p>
<p>My BIL, a physician, did just that this year. He was making more money than he had ever imagined, but seeing very little of his four children. One member of his group was diagnosed with fast moving stage 4 cancer 2 years ago. This physician continued to work as much as he could until a month before his death. In the midst of this, the other partners in the practice voted to NOT give the dying physician his yearly bonus because he hadn’t been taking call and wasn’t pulling his weight.</p>
<p>BIL started looking for a different practice the following week. He is working in a much smaller, quieter practice now, spending much more time with his children, making much less money, but much happier. </p>
<p>Did he “lean back”? I think he had an epiphany about what he really valued in his life and then changed course. If he was a woman, would we consider his career move to be “leaning back”?</p>
<p>Hi
It have been explained in the book as “impostor syndrome”
that women tend to feel they are fraud as they become more successful and not be able to claim their achievements on face value as men easily could.
The celebrity example used in the book however, was Tina Fey. I found it strange that her ascend in career is the result of being well planned and calculated “impostor”.
Now I see her face on the corner of CC page, I keep wondering why the author singled her out as an example.</p>
<p>I think it comes down to personal choices.
Some working mothers do love taking care of young children’s daily needs, pudding hands to sandboxed shoes. Even they could have easily outsourced any chores some find serenity in folding laundry fresh out from the drier in Saturday afternoon, as tigermother’s high achieving MD sister did.
Money can not buy back lost time with your young children. But good news is that we do not know what we have missed because we have made one certain choice at time.
It is better not to second guess once we make choices and give a go our best.
Easier said, of course.</p>
<p>As long as it is assumed that household help for cooking, cleaning, driving the kids around, etc is relieving the MOTHER of her duties, we have gotten nowhere. I agree completely with Sandberg that the biggest thing you can do is marry the right partner - one who wouldn’t dream of dumping that all on your lap.</p>
<p>A big piece of me tends to agree with oldfort. But only when things line up. I was commuting long distances, my clients were further apart, my industry was shifting. I wanted more of “me” in the equation. And, like many, I had already put off kids. I didn’t have anything more to prove. Nor did I have the big bucks to opt out easily. But I look back and see clearly that that I made choices.</p>
<p>This isn’t always about a woman’s fears, timidity or imposter syndrome. I’d caution you to not disrespect those choices women make. Thirty years ago, some mocked women who only wanted to be mommies. Let’s not now mock women who pull back. Real empowerment is not a blanket formula.</p>
<p>On the one hand, I agree completely with oldfort that life is long and every woman should be able to support herself on the other hand, it is the only life I will ever have and I wanted to have a time in my life to revel in motherhood and that it never happened is something I will grieve to my deathbed. Now that they are older and the economy is awful,I am very grateful to have a an income that would support my family if necessary, to have been set for retirement in my mid-40s and to not be trying to re-enter the job market like so many people I know. Rationally, those are great things, as is the ability to pay for good schools and give the kids opportunities I never had. But I would have liked a time to take the kids to preschool and get to know other mommies, to have been physically present in a way that my husband was, simply because I wanted to, and to have ever had a less hectic life. But I didn’t. We don’t all get everything we want and the bottom line is that the kids are all wonderful.</p>
<p>I personally believe that the choice to stay home should be respected, but for average women the cost is very high.</p>
<p>Every time I hear you talk about this, ZM, I imagine the joy you are going to have in grandmotherness. You are going to have some seriously loved and adored grandbabies. </p>
<p>I wish you ten, at least. :)</p>
<p>I like this woman who wrote the book. I think she has some interesting things to say about young women. I think it is difficult to apply macro ideas to micro lives, and everyone is mostly doing the best with what is right in front of them at the moment.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl, my husband always did the cleaning, driving, laundry, errands (thank God not the cooking) and it was devastating to our marriage because I wanted to do those things, at least for a while, and couldn’t. It took me years to let go of my rage and resentment and it is still a deeply sensitive issue that he is part of the mommy group and it is he whom they call for things relating to my son. The saving grace is that I am very close to my kids, but that, too came with sacrifice, and it should be every woman’s choice to decide epwhat is worth sacrificing and what is just too much.</p>