The COO of Facebook Is Telling Us to Sit At The Table
An explanation on why we have too few female leaders
As a young woman with big aspirations, since I first listened to Sheryl Sandberg —the chief operating officer (COO)of Facebook — speaking about keeping women in the workforce, I knew there were things I had to change.
Sheryl has been speaking about the subject for many years now — she even wrote a book named Lean in — but her TED talk summarizes quite well the many reasons why we have too few women leaders nowadays. Because, even if it’s hard to admit, Sheryl helps reminds us that:
Women are not making it to the top of any profession anywhere in the world.
When she said those words, I couldn’t stop listening to what she had to say next. Deep inside I already knew it, I think we all do. The gender gap in the professional world has always been the big elephant in the room. However, sometimes it seems we need to hear it out loud from someone else for it to truly hit us. The report of the World economic forum for 2020 shows us clearly what Sheryl was talking about, the percentage of females worldwide for senior roles is around 36%. In the United States, for example, the percent of females in companies boards of directors is not even 22% and for the majority of other countries, the percentage goes down. These numbers haven't — dramatically — changed for years.
I constantly saw these numbers being represented physically in the university and now in the workforce. All top directors being men and only a ridiculously small percentage being women. I always asked myself why… Once I heard a Peruvian linguist and politician, Martha Hildebrandt, said that she has had to be an exceptional woman to be recognized by society as the same as any mediocre man. A bit hard to hear but I agree — partially. I think women FEEL the need to be “exceptional” to be able to achieve big success and recognition from others.
That is why Sheryl, who is at the top of this profession at one of the most important tech company — also ranked on Fortune’s list of the 50 Most Powerful Women in Business and as one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People in the World — is telling us that we have to change those numbers.
How can we change the numbers as individuals? Sheryl thinks that keeping women in the workforce is the answer, and the first thing to do so is by sitting at the table.
Sit at the table
What does Sheryl mean by sitting at the table? She explained quite well through a personal story. One time she hosted a meeting at Facebook for Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and four members of his staff, for a discussion about the economy. The attendees — mostly male — took their seats at the large conference table. However, the members of the staff of the secretary Geithner, all women, chose chairs off the side of the room and they remained there until the end of the meeting. Even if two of them were pretty senior in their department!
As Sheryl explained later, the four women had every right to be at this meeting, but because of their seating choice, they seemed like spectators rather than participants.
Don’t expect that you will get to the corner office by sitting on the sidelines.
She is very clear about this. We should encourage ourselves to “sit at the table”. Because we — as women — are not only facing institutional obstacles but also we are creating obstacles ourselves. We are sabotaging our way of changing the numbers by not trusting our worth.
The confidence gap
Sheryl shared another story about this confidence gap that I think easily illustrates this issue. In college, she took a literary course with her roommate and her brother. Her roommate was a brilliant literary student, so she read all the books in the original language — I believe it was Latin — and went to all the classes. Sheryl herself read all the books in English and went to some lectures. Her brother, on the other hand, read 1 book of 12 and went to a couple of lectures. Some days before the exam, he went to their room to get himself tutored. What do you think happened after the exam? Her brilliant roommate and Sheryl herself were so worried about how they could have done better and picking details. However, her brother even if he didn’t have all Sheryl and her roommate’s knowledge, he was sure he would get the top grade of the class.
Crazy? Not really. This story and many others where women hesitate more than men shows what the data shows — Sheryl is only putting it on the table:
Women systematically understimate their own abilities.
Sheryl affirmed that if you test men and women and you ask them questions on totally objective criteria like GPAs, men get it wrong slightly high, women slightly low. Personally, I had so many female friends in college that excelled in many courses, always been at the top of the class. However, in the workforce, all these young women started to disappear from the spotlight.
The Harvard business review revealed that Hewlett Packard (HP) company found that women only applied for a promotion when they believed they met 100% of the qualifications listed for the job. Men on the other side apply for a job when they meet only 60% of the qualifications. Also, that is maybe why women do not negotiate for themselves in the workforce. Linda Babcock, Ph.D., a professor of economics found out in a survey of job negotiations among graduating students, that 57 % of men negotiated their initial compensation, compared with only 7 % of women.
Sheryl is also bringing to light that men attribute their success to themselves, and women attribute to other external factors — so true. Women would say that someone helped them, they were lucky or they worked really hard.
When I heard it, I recognized myself at that time. But as she says:
No one gets to the corner office by sitting to the side, not at the table, and no one gets the promotion if they don’t think they deserve their success.
Success vs likability
However, we can all acknowledge that sitting at the table, expressing our opinions, negotiating, asking for a raise… can be complicated for a woman because we don’t want to come across as aggressive. Sheryl affirmed and the data show it too:
Success and likability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated to women.
Have you ever heard about the story of Heidi and Howard Roizen? Sheryl uses this story to explain this correlation in likability. This is an experiment done in 2003 with business students. The researcher, leading the study, presented the story of a successful entrepreneur to the students. They only changed the name Heidi to Howard for half of the students. When they asked each half their impression, students rated as equally competent. However, they liked Howard better. Apparently, Howard seemed a cool colleague. Heidi, not so much, she was seen as selfish and you don't want to work for or with her.
The information was the same, the only difference was gender.
These study has been repeated some years later by Anderson Cooper at the New York University. And it seems that today’s students are more receptive to the idea of a successful woman. Nevertheless, there is really an evolution in the right sense for the success and likability of women? I hope, but I still don’t see it today, at least from my experience. I don’t see the numbers changing.
Where do we go from here?
Sheryl is speaking about it. I think we all need to do it too. It needs to be shared not only between women in the workforce but also students and most importantly it needs to be heard by the managers of companies. As Sheryl expressed itself:
How good are we as managers of our companies and organizations at seeing that men are reaching for opportunities more than women?
We got to get women to sit on the table.
Since I listened to Sheryl’s speech I changed some of my behaviors:
- I negotiated my first salary;
- I applied to jobs knowing I didn’t have 100% of the qualifications listed for the job — and I got the majority of them;
- I attribute my abilities to myself;
- I raise my hand, I sit at the table, I reach for opportunities;
- I am successful in my field and I am liked for my accomplishments.
I think I am changing the numbers, I think we all can. We can change the numbers starting by ourselves.
