According to a recent TIME Magazine article, former British Prime Minister Tony Blair believes that “the art of leadership is saying no, not yes.” In fact, both Steve Jobs, the genius behind Apple, and Warren Buffet, the renowned investment guru, share that conviction. As Buffet puts it, “The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say ‘no’ to almost everything.”
Read MoreMy father had more integrity than any person I’ve ever known. He never lied, never embellished, never sugarcoated, never cut corners, never deviated even a little from the truth, and never marched to anyone’s drum but his own. His favorite adage, which he lived by unerringly, was from Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice: “To thine own self be true, and it shall follow as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Read MoreWhen my sons were toddlers and I went back to work, my father warned: “You’ll regret this decision when your children are teens and exhibit all sorts of problems.”
Read MoreThe vast majority— 76% — of American parents think their children are getting a good education, a national survey conducted by the Associated Press reveals. But recent reports comparing U.S. education to education in 39 other industrialized countries show that they’re wrong.
Read MoreA recent study reinforces something I’ve learned the long, hard way: that to succeed in the workplace, we women need to desensitize ourselves to criticism and develop a thick skin because, inevitably, negative comments are going to come our way.
The study, conducted by linguist Kieran Snyder for Fortune Magazine, examined 248 performance reviews of people employed by 28 technology companies, 58% of whom were men, and 42% women.
Read MoreOne of the most important things a leader can do is create a culture in which it’s safe to express doubts and fears, make mistakes, and admit failure. Such a culture yields four powerful rewards.
It encourages people to acknowledge rather than hide their vulnerabilities and allows them to see that they’re not alone —
I think that most women acutely understand how much the future of our country depends on how much and how wisely we invest in our children. That’s why so many of us stay at home during our children’s formative years or work part-time or choose careers that give us time to be with our kids. And that’s why women should fight to uphold the Common Core Standards, which are aimed at improving the quality of America’s public schools.
Read MoreJune always makes me think of weddings, and that reminds me of my own wedding, the drama surrounding it, and why it was a missed opportunity.
Read MoreThe firing of Jill Abramson from her position as Executive Editor of The New York Times once again focuses the spotlight on the treatment of strong, high-ranking women managers.
Read MoreI read an article in The Atlantic last week about the vast “confidence gap” that separates the sexes, and it made me ponder why I haven’t suffered from the same self-doubts that afflict so many women. The article’s authors, Katty Kay and Claire Shipman, point to several studies showing that women not only lack confidence about their performance and careers but often under-estimate their abilities—in contrast to men, who generally have few doubts about their competence or capacities. This lack of self-assurance holds women back because, it turns out, confidence matters as much as competence in achieving professional success.
Read MorePeople have often asked me what “career path” I took to becoming a management consultant to social justice organizations. Sometimes I give them my revisionist history, which makes it seem as though I consciously chose all my earlier jobs as building blocks toward this career. But more often I tell them the truth, which is that I simply took jobs that interested me, and where I ended up was mostly a function of serendipity.
Read MoreWomen make up nearly half of the U.S. labor force, but on average they still only earn about three-quarters as much as men do. Why?
Read More
