Leading like a Woman

This morning, I listened to a talk by Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook and Fortune's #16 Most Powerful Woman in Business in 2010. Her focus was why we have too few women leaders. She cited disappointing statistics: 9 of 190 world leaders, 5%, are women; 13% of parliament level leaders; 15% of C-level business leaders; and 20% of non-profit leaders.

Sheryl gave a number of reasons for this. She believes that women "drop out" of their careers, in her mind to raise children (and, in my mind, to accept early retirements and workforce reductions that seem to target women and older workers). But she also believes that the mindset women bring to their careers impede their ability to make it to the top.

This is an assertion that has been made many times. Statistics indicate that women underestimate their own abilities while men overestimate them; that women attribute their success to external factors and men to themselves; and that women are disliked when they are successful when men are both liked and respected for their success. Most messages suggest that women need to change their thinking on the first two points and toughen up on the last one.

I think I see it a little differently.

I believe that women are leaders, right here and right now. As Janet and I have been saying for two years in this blog, true leadership begins right where we are; it is not the sole domain of C-level leaders. Women lead through influence and example, even when they don't have a leadership title -- even when they are not earning an income. Women make a difference, every day and every where.

So, what if, instead of changing mindsets, women advocated their mindsets?

• If every leader (and every contributor, for that matter) recognized his/her own strengths and abilities and estimated them accurately -- rather than under or overestimating them -- how much more confidence and relevance would their contributions and results have? how much more long-lasting might they be?
• If every leader recognized that external factors such as timing, circumstance, and other people's contributions were as vital to her/his success as her/his own abilities, how would that change the decisions made? the compensation paid? the jobs retained?

Let's consider leading like women, rather than asking women to change the way they lead. We might create a better world!

Questions to ponder: How do I lead each and every day? Do I recognize my true abilities and use them with confidence? Or do I think small and underestimate what I can do? Or do I get cocky and overestimate what I can do? Do I give credit where credit is due? Or do I credit myself for all my accomplishments?

Leading as a Wife or Husband

This morning, my husband and I experienced a significant snafu that I believed was due to a shortcut he had taken a couple of weeks ago. I knew he knew what I thought; so, I was praying intently to keep my mouth shut!

He later told me he wanted to avert me telling him what he could have done to have avoided this snafu; so, he started in on me. Well, I wasn’t about to keep my mouth shut after that!

Our little spat didn’t last long, but we were quiet as I drove him to the ACE train. My husband was big enough to break the silence by apologizing, which I quickly did, also. Then, we laughed as we told each other what had been going through our minds…and we realized that we could have avoided hurtful words and tones if only we’d focused on ourselves instead of trying to anticipate the other’s actions and protect ourselves from them.

What was remarkable to me was that the tension lasted for such a short period of time and that the little episode ended with love, laughter, and appreciation for each other.

I believe that is thanks to the prayer that I pray nearly every day and in which my husband joins me on weekends. I share it with you here in the hope that it will inspire you to be a leader in your own marriage.

The Married Couple’s Prayer

Dear Lord,

Thank you for giving us each other as spouses and for the love that has grown between us. Help us to be good partners to each other.

We fully realize that we don’t have what it takes to be so without Your help.
Teach us how to pray for each other and to make our prayers a true language of love. Show us what unconditional love really is and how to communicate it in a way the other can clearly perceive.

Bring unity between us so that we can be in agreement about everything (Amos 3:3). Grant us to be like-minded toward one another, according to Christ Jesus (Romans 15:5).


Make us a team, not pursuing separate, competitive, or independent lives, but working together, overlooking each other’s faults and weaknesses for the greater good of our marriage.


Make us each other’s helpmate, companion, champion, friend, and support. Help us to create a peaceful, restful, and safe home together. Teach us how to take care of ourselves and stay attractive to each other. Grow us into creative and confident people who are rich in mind, soul, and spirit. Make each of us the kind of spouse the other can be proud of.


Help us to pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify another (Romans 14:19). May we be “perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Corinthians 1:10).


We lay all of our expectations at Your cross, Lord. We release each other from the burden of fulfilling each other in areas where we should be looking to You. Help us to accept each other the way we are and not try to change each other, yet still release each other to change in ways we cannot even imagine. We leave any changing that needs to be done in Your hands, fully accepting that neither of us is perfect and never will be. Only You, Lord, are perfect and we look to You to perfect us.


We pray that our commitment to You and to one another will grow stronger and more passionate every day. Show us how to support and respect each other as we rise to places of leadership in our home. Help us to understand each other’s dreams and see things from the other’s perspective. Reveal to us what the other wants and needs and show us potential problems before they arise.


Breathe Your life into this marriage, Lord. Make us new people each day. Give us fresh perspectives and positive outlooks. Help us to see each other with new eyes, new appreciation, new love, new compassion, and new acceptance.


Amen.


DURING TIMES OF DIFFICULTY:


Dear Lord,


Take our selfishness, impatience, and irritability and turn them into kindness, long-suffering, and the willingness to bear all things.


Take our old emotional habits, mindsets, automatic reactions, rude assumptions, and self-protective stances and make us patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, and self-controlled.


Take the hardness of our hearts and break down the walls with Your battering ram of revelation.


Give us new hearts and work in us Your love, peace, and joy (Galatians 5:22-23). We are not able to rise above who we are at this moment. Only You can transform us.


Show us where there is sin in our hearts, especially with regard to each other. We confess the times we’ve been unloving, critical, angry, resentful, disrespectful, or unforgiving toward each other. Help us to put aside any hurt, anger, or disappointment we feel and forgive each other the way You do – totally and completely, no looking back. Make us tools of reconciliation, peace, and healing in this marriage. Enable us to communicate well and rescue us from the threshold of separation where the realities of divorce begin.

(BTW, I pray the section for difficult times every day, too -- because I know I do things that irritate my husband and that I am annoyed by things he does; this prayer helps me to deal with that reality!)