Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.93 AVERAGE
3.93 AVERAGE
informative
medium-paced
challenging
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
informative
slow-paced
I liked this. Thought it was interesting. Nothing super new, but always a great reminder to hear things like this! Audio narration was engaging and flowed really well.
Hard for me to listen to the narrator. Really dry. A bit of overlap with another book I'd read that resonated more. Didn't feel the need to finish.
Given a few people I mentor had been reading it as part of an accelerating leadership course, I decided to read it to see whether there was anything nuanced in there that I needed to be aware of.
The short version is, I found it frustrating, though in some parts useful.
Why did I find it useful?
This book should perhaps be titled 'things that get in the way of all of us when we are looking to ascend in business'. A number of the 12 habits are not women only issues, and some of them certainly resonated in my own behaviours.
The author had written similar books that covered the wider world of business, and it seems that they've attempted to force these into a book for women by talking to a number of woman's groups.
Why did it frustrate me?
To start bluntly, there isn't one mention of the word 'patriarchy' anywhere in the book.
Of the 12 habits, of the ones I most closely related to, the stories told and the examples given are ones that simply did not pose a problem for me as a white male in business. And this is where the book really falls down for me - it mostly avoids the elephant in the room.
Thankfully, a number of reviews also call this out. Many of these 12 traits are admirable or aspirational and yes, women have typically seemed better at them than men, yet women are held back, and men aren't.
In this, the book moved from being a useful discussion on things that most people do that could hold their career back into something that generalised terribly about women rather than talking about the systems they spend time in and the need for those to change.
Overall
Even though I found it a frustrating read in places, I'm glad I've read it. As a hopeful ally, it certainly highlighted perhaps a few things where as I mentor and coach women in tech (something I do through a few pathways), it could prove helpful. But it has highlighted even more that my own actions to try to change the systems and organisations are ever more important. It reminded me a little of 'Invisible Women' in highlighting the issues, but unlike that book, it didn't look at the underlying, male led environments that could create these inequalities.
The short version is, I found it frustrating, though in some parts useful.
Why did I find it useful?
This book should perhaps be titled 'things that get in the way of all of us when we are looking to ascend in business'. A number of the 12 habits are not women only issues, and some of them certainly resonated in my own behaviours.
The author had written similar books that covered the wider world of business, and it seems that they've attempted to force these into a book for women by talking to a number of woman's groups.
Why did it frustrate me?
To start bluntly, there isn't one mention of the word 'patriarchy' anywhere in the book.
Of the 12 habits, of the ones I most closely related to, the stories told and the examples given are ones that simply did not pose a problem for me as a white male in business. And this is where the book really falls down for me - it mostly avoids the elephant in the room.
Thankfully, a number of reviews also call this out. Many of these 12 traits are admirable or aspirational and yes, women have typically seemed better at them than men, yet women are held back, and men aren't.
In this, the book moved from being a useful discussion on things that most people do that could hold their career back into something that generalised terribly about women rather than talking about the systems they spend time in and the need for those to change.
Overall
Even though I found it a frustrating read in places, I'm glad I've read it. As a hopeful ally, it certainly highlighted perhaps a few things where as I mentor and coach women in tech (something I do through a few pathways), it could prove helpful. But it has highlighted even more that my own actions to try to change the systems and organisations are ever more important. It reminded me a little of 'Invisible Women' in highlighting the issues, but unlike that book, it didn't look at the underlying, male led environments that could create these inequalities.
challenging
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
If you know me from work and see this review, no you didn't!!
I did not pick this book for my work book club, but it was chosen in my women's mentor pod and man...I wouldn't touch this book again with a ten foot pole. I know I'm kind of in a crap work situation and don't really have any more opportunities to move up anymore, so I'm coming at this with a cynical lens, but this was just not what we need to be preaching right now?
I think elements of the book could be useful here and there, but it felt A) too generalized and B) too focused on fixing women to become men rather than fixing the system. There was about one or two acknowledgements at most about working against an unfair system and then the rest of the book dived into "if you just fix all these behaviors and do none of these wrong, you'll be set! But only worry about one at a time!" I think a lot of the feedback felt geared towards men, IE "men are concise and women like providing context, so be more concise." and there were two habits about providing too much context and also minimizing what you're talking about. There were some moments that offered solutions for keeping your inherent traits as a woman still in tact but just reframing how you're using them, but not enough to justify this book and it's choices.
I also just really feel like there's sooo much generalization that doesn't really allow for any nuance. And maybe that's me bean-souping (taking that from one of my favorite creators, Tell The Bees). One book in under 230 pages isn't going to solve the structural inequities of the workplace. BUT I think the angle of this book, especially having it be a rewrite of what seems like a very male-centric book written by one of the authors, just got too broad. Hell, half the time I felt like I identified more with the male counterparts / generalities than what women do. IE I do mostly reflect my anger outward rather than judge myself. What do I do then? I think this book could've offered more up but just went for the rewrite of the original book with the word women sprinkled in more often than not.
Last note, I was also really quickly turned off at the beginning by the multiple mentions of some eating habit being a "bad" habit. Yeah, maybe that's also me bean-souping, but it's such a turn off diving into a women's empowerment book and one of the first negatives is about having snacks. It shocked me a bit this book was written in 2018 with that kind of nuance but I'm also not THAT surprised given where we're at today.
Overall I wouldn't recommend this. It didn't feel like an intersectional lens, some of the feedback could be useful and I will have to ruminate on what I take from this (maybe the end with more concrete solutions, like peer coaching or "feedforward") but I ended up rushing through this book half-assedly after starting with full focus because it was bothering me so much.
I did not pick this book for my work book club, but it was chosen in my women's mentor pod and man...I wouldn't touch this book again with a ten foot pole. I know I'm kind of in a crap work situation and don't really have any more opportunities to move up anymore, so I'm coming at this with a cynical lens, but this was just not what we need to be preaching right now?
I think elements of the book could be useful here and there, but it felt A) too generalized and B) too focused on fixing women to become men rather than fixing the system. There was about one or two acknowledgements at most about working against an unfair system and then the rest of the book dived into "if you just fix all these behaviors and do none of these wrong, you'll be set! But only worry about one at a time!" I think a lot of the feedback felt geared towards men, IE "men are concise and women like providing context, so be more concise." and there were two habits about providing too much context and also minimizing what you're talking about. There were some moments that offered solutions for keeping your inherent traits as a woman still in tact but just reframing how you're using them, but not enough to justify this book and it's choices.
I also just really feel like there's sooo much generalization that doesn't really allow for any nuance. And maybe that's me bean-souping (taking that from one of my favorite creators, Tell The Bees). One book in under 230 pages isn't going to solve the structural inequities of the workplace. BUT I think the angle of this book, especially having it be a rewrite of what seems like a very male-centric book written by one of the authors, just got too broad. Hell, half the time I felt like I identified more with the male counterparts / generalities than what women do. IE I do mostly reflect my anger outward rather than judge myself. What do I do then? I think this book could've offered more up but just went for the rewrite of the original book with the word women sprinkled in more often than not.
Last note, I was also really quickly turned off at the beginning by the multiple mentions of some eating habit being a "bad" habit. Yeah, maybe that's also me bean-souping, but it's such a turn off diving into a women's empowerment book and one of the first negatives is about having snacks. It shocked me a bit this book was written in 2018 with that kind of nuance but I'm also not THAT surprised given where we're at today.
Overall I wouldn't recommend this. It didn't feel like an intersectional lens, some of the feedback could be useful and I will have to ruminate on what I take from this (maybe the end with more concrete solutions, like peer coaching or "feedforward") but I ended up rushing through this book half-assedly after starting with full focus because it was bothering me so much.
It was good, but repetitive and generalized. I really appreciates the suggestions of feed forward and feed back among colleagues. This is something I try to do, but it's good to think about other ways and reasons for it.
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
informative
reflective
slow-paced