Sheryl Sandberg, China & Me

by J. T. Gilhool

  At some point, I started thinking about these people who were coming to thank me. Thank me for what? Truth is, I am the one who is thankful. The past two years have been amazing and have, undoubtedly, changed the lives of the people I love most.

  I am not suddenly in denial of the manner in which this game is ending. I have been treated poorly, used and tossed aside. But, to replace me they needed three men and a complete change in structure and that says more than I ever could or will say.

  Most unexpected, however, has been the people who have reached out to me asking to have coffee, dinner, drinks or just a few minutes. Some are Aussies who worked in China and already repatriated themselves. Others are work partners from other organizations who want to say goodbye, talk or share experiences.

  I was thrilled to have dinner plans that did not involve the person taking my job (though I did take him to dinner one night). Dinner every night with the Interloper was just a bit more than I thought I could handle at this point in the metamorphosis. An excuse to get out of dinner was exactly what I needed. And, not exactly what I expected.

  I am not alone. In fact, I am just one more member of a club that sadly exists within the Salt Mine. I listened to others — all women — tell me what was happening to them or recently happened to them. I immediately empathized with them. All were in some stage of the grieving process. All of them wanted to know how I was handling “the situation.”

  I was shocked to learn that so many people in Australia were aware of my circumstances and had heard rumors of how poorly the situation was being handled. Most people at the Salt Mine in China have no idea that I am leaving, let alone the circumstances. But, even more surprising to me, was the reaction among the team here to the way I have chosen to handle these circumstances — playing tour guide to the person replacing me. Most found it confounding.

  I recognize the anger and despair in the faces sitting across from me at dinner. I feel the anxiety and the intensity of their emotions. And I realize that I am beginning to move forward. I have been given the opportunity to say goodbye to people I care about but to do that I had to accept the role of tour guide. For me, it was an easy decision — a simple choice. It gives me more time with my family — despite the travel — and I get to go out with some dignity.

  I get to choose.

  I listened, poured a second glass of wine, picked up the check and left grateful for the conversation. I truly had no idea what I meant to others or, at least, to these others. This is illuminating. You can tell a person that their value is not determined by others and that simply because someone characterizes them in a particular way doesn’t necessarily make it true. You can choose to believe it or you can choose to focus your attention elsewhere.

  My experience is unpleasant. And, it is not unique. I wish it were. I am saddened that it is not. I am choosing, however, to focus on what the broader experience gave me, my husband and our children. I am choosing to focus on the support that I am now able to offer others who find themselves in similar unpleasant circumstances. I am choosing to conduct myself and the affairs of this transition with dignity. I am choosing to respect myself and, by doing so, sending the message that I will not allow others to determine my worth, my value, my measure of success.

  In choosing, I have taken back control. Ironically, it is through shared sacrifice and disappointment that brings me to this point, combined with unexpected gratitude and respect for that sacrifice. The tour continues for the next few weeks but I feel more able to control my emotions and to allow myself to feel whatever emotion I might feel without apologizing or castigating myself for it. Giving myself permission to just let it go, to just feel it, to just be, is powerful. It is a choice. It is a choice to move forward.

  It is my choice.

  Tour Guide Barbie

  March 2013

  Adelaide, Australia

  We got on the plane headed out of Oz and I could feel the darkness creep back and linger in the back of my mind. It was taunting me. We would land in Shanghai and get home around 8 p.m. At 6:15 a.m., my driver would take me back to the airport to go to Thailand. Less than a 10-hour turnaround. Tour Guide Barbie back on the circuit and, this time, the mighty and powerful wizard was not coming with me. Jack met me in Australia for some couple time but he would not be able to do that for the remainder of the tour.

  On the trip back to Shanghai, I am reading The Art of Possibility by Roz and Ben Zander. The book gives you tools to re-frame your life — to discover the art of the possible. While reading it, I start crying. It isn’t like I am reading Schindler’s List here. Why am I crying? Well, that’s a bit complicated and also very simple. The book is on-point. It is everything that is wrong with me and my life, my perspective, my frame, my whatever.

  One of the concepts is “it’s all invented.” Everything is invented:

  • The standard against which I measure myself;

  • The standard others use to measure me;

  • The game that I am playing with the Salt Mine; and

  • The definition of success, happiness, etc.

  Once you realize that it is all invented, then you can re-invent it, ignore it, create a new game, a new reality, anything is possible because the frame in which you place yourself and evaluate your options is likely limited by these inventions.

  On one hand, I agree and even like this notion. It allows me to toss out the crap. Yet, the reality is that I am getting on a plane in just hours to play Tour Guide Barbie in Thailand. Do I want to play Tour Guide Barbie? No. Can I just say no? No. Why not? Because I am afraid I will be viewed negatively and I don’t need any more of that. But if it is all invented, then I should be able to skip the trip. And, it’s my choice. So simple and yet so difficult.

  As I sit here reading, I know I will be on that plane. But, I decide to modify the plan. I will not accompany the Salt Mine boys to Pattaya (no one wants a girl with them there anyway — well, not a girl you work with anyway). I resolve to change my return flight and go home on Wednesday.

  I cried on that flight back from Thailand as I read Lean In.

  From the time I was a little girl I was called “bossy.” In high school, I was voted something like “most likely to be the boss” and it was not meant as a compliment. Now, at work, I am not “charming” and I am “too aggressive.” I have been teased my entire life about this quality, which as it turns out would be a leadership quality if I had been born a boy.

  It’s somewhat comforting to know that even the most successful women in the world — indeed the most powerful — suffer from the same insecurities, are plagued by the same self-doubt and even lack the confidence to believe in themselves. Somehow they overcame it, but I am not sure I will overcome this setback. Not today, at least . . .

  Fear is holding me back. I want to chuck the whole damn thing. I do. I want to walk out and leave them to their boys’ club. I want to work on women’s issues and make a difference for my daughters, my nieces and the granddaughters I hope to have one day. I want to be valued by me — how sad a statement is that? I want to be valued by me . . . which is to say, I find it hard to find value in myself. Why?

  Well, many reasons, but my functional manager, who had been a mentor of mine, delivered the final blow by looking at the work I’ve done and telling me that while I did the work, I failed to cultivate relationships with the boys in the States. I could bore you with the details of evidence that prove some of his specific examples wrong but why? That isn’t the point.

  The point is I am a woman who was put into a position of authority that required real-time decision making and the exercise of judgment. And, I am ranked two levels below the men in similar jobs. No one likes an “underling” giving them assignments, particularly when that underling is a woman. Set up to fail and, in spite of that fact, succeeding. What else could they do but characterize me as a non-team player?

  It is my greatest fear — to be thrown away. It haunts me. It lives in the nooks and crannies of my soul and ta
unts me. Worse, as I smile and lead not just the Interloper but also the Englishman (who is also involved in replacing me — yes, it takes three men to replace an un-charming woman, including 1 senior executive) around Bangkok, I am reminded that I am emptying the last pieces of me into the trash bin before I am pushed aside like day-old bread.

  Even worse, like in Oz, the team in Thailand is far too generous. One of them makes a big speech thanking me and goes so far as to say that they hope I will continue to have oversight of the region. I am sure the Interloper and the Englishman loved that one. And, there was a crisis to manage while I was there, and, yes, I handled it. Idiot.

  What would I have become if I had not been riddled with self-doubt, if I had stayed the course, been more steady? What could I have achieved? I will never know. Sheryl Sandberg is right: It begins when we are girls and it is reinforced our entire lives. Even other women will stifle you.

  I have daughters. I have nieces. I am haunted by them now too, but also inspired. I must find my course again and believe in me. I am only beginning to peel the onion and the depth of the pain, disappointment and despair is, at times, overwhelming.

  And, yet, just as deep is the profound happiness I feel when another woman tells me that I have inspired her, particularly the women who sought me out on the Barbie Tour.

  It’s there. Somewhere, that new frame, the re-invention of me is there.

  I leaned in and felt the backlash. But, I don’t want to lean back. I want to lean in further. This will undoubtedly put me at odds with former mentors, even friends, but I am committed to this cause. Perhaps there is a possibility of creating a shared vision but I am skeptical at this moment.

  First, I need to commit to myself and restore my faith in me. I must be crazy — okay, we knew that didn’t we?

  Fear . . . Success . . . Reality . . . Perception

  March 2013

  Shanghai

  In 1991, I was a first-year law student when U.S. Supreme Court Justice Nominee Clarence Thomas was in the midst of Senate confirmation hearings and Anita Hill raised allegations of sexual harassment against him. I remember watching the hearings in the law school common area. What really struck me was the composition of the Senate panel as I watched Professor Hill testify. I also remember the strikingly different tones of Professor Hill and Nominee Thomas.

  The Senate hearing made an enduring impression upon me. Recently, I’ve been thinking about Anita Hill, Hillary Clinton, Sheryl Sandberg and me. Not because I belong in their company (I don’t), but wouldn’t lunch be interesting? I’ve been thinking about them and how their experiences influenced me, shaped me and reinforced my internal feelings about myself.

  I remember Thomas being demonstrably angry and consistently (and, clearly, effectively) using the term lynching. I recall thinking that the coverage of his “anger” made him seem resolute.

  In contrast, Hill tried very hard to remain calm, reserved, if not somewhat demure but in no way embarrassed. She deftly answered the question. Senator Biden asked if she recalled the name Thomas used to describe a particular penis. “Yes,” she answered. Only when asked specifically to provide the actual name did she give it up: “long dong silver.”

  I remember thinking, at that time, that if she wanted anyone to believe her she would have to remain calm. She could not play the “lynch” card or she would be characterized as overly dramatic. Her testimony had to be factual, clinical, surgical.

  The juxtaposition of her demeanor against his was striking to me. Anger, resolute anger, from a man was acceptable and even admirable, particularly as his wife sat behind him holding back tears. Hill could not play the angry card in the same way. She was the demon, the devil, the spiteful woman coming forward to have her revenge. Anger would not help erase that stereotypical image, which was far too easy to cast. She would be irrational, delusional, scorned. Watching her testify was like watching a tightrope walker work without a net.

  I also remember thinking that the hearing seemed like a trial. Except that, if it were a trial, I would have expected to see a woman, an African American man and maybe even an African American woman on the jury. But the panel was composed of white men. White men who had very little life experience similar to Thomas or Hill.

  It scared the hell out of me then, and it still does.

  How is it that, more than 20 years after Anita Hill, I am still afraid and what exactly am I afraid of?

  • Success?

  • Being discovered as a fraud?

  • The stereotypes that come with being a “successful woman”?

  In addition to being afraid of something that I can’t quite put my finger on, I also wonder if I am self destructing or trying to self-destruct and, if so, why. Maybe I am afraid of success. Women check out. I’ve seen it.

  • Do they check out because they decide that being home with their children is a better choice (which it is for some women)?

  • Do they check out because successful women are perceived as something less than a woman?

  • Do women check out by being self-destructive?

  • Is it just too hard? And, if so, what is so hard?

  The Impostor Phenomenon

  In 1968, when I was still just a baby, academics and researchers asked these same questions. [See e.g., Behavior: Sex and Success, Time Magazine, 1972]

  One of them was a woman named Matina Horner. Ms. Horner was a scholar and administrator born in 1939. She conducted early research into women’s fear of success. She later became the youngest president of Radcliffe College during the period when Radcliffe redefined its relationship with Harvard University.

  Horner’s research concluded that women are conflicted when their competencies, interests, and abilities do not align with the stereotypical and internalized female sex role. But, the desire or motive to avoid success has to be triggered to have an effect on their performance.

  To determine if a motive to avoid success existed, Horner had test subjects watch members of their own gender and recorded their comments. When statements were made showing a degree of conflict about the success or the potential for negative consequences because of success, Horner concluded a motive to avoid success was present. Even statements suggesting the individual was not responsible for the success or denying the success entirely were considered evidence of a motive to avoid success.

  A decade after Horner, Paulene Chance and Suzanne Imes coined the term “impostor phenomenon” to describe highly educated women who had significant professional accomplishments yet felt they were fooling people about their brightness. Four types of behavior were identified with the impostor phenomenon:

  • Group 1 lived in constant fear that their ruse would be discovered;

  • Group 2 resorted to flattery;

  • Group 3 used their charm on superiors, to gain favor; and

  • Group 4 feared rejection for appearing too smart and accomplished as a woman in our society.

  The concept was extended to men by Manfred Kets de Vries in a Harvard Business Review article in 2005. Kets de Vries introduced the possibility that there are “genuine fakers” – individuals who lack the qualifications and skills to perform. Genuine fakers are different from individuals who are truly competent but believe that they are fooling people.

  Not surprisingly, one of the conclusions of the research has been that personal attitudes are not based upon reality but internal psychic inequities. In other words, perception shapes our reality and our perceptions are formed, in part, by our own internal struggle to rationalize our self-talk. A genuine faker may believe he or she is an expert and move up the ranks while another competent individual may believe they are a fraud waiting to be discovered and self-destruct.

  In 2006, International Forum of Psychoanalysis devoted an entire issue to the subject. The majority of articles were written by feminist authors. These authors placed an emphasis on social attitudes toward women, in addition to psychodynamics.

  The various authors acknowledged that at
titudes toward women presented real challenges and that the glass ceiling was, in fact, a real barrier. The more important question for the researchers, however, was how these very real circumstances were approached by women. The internal struggle going on within each woman determines whether she will fight the injustice or succumb to it. Her choice — to fight or succumb — determines her level of personal achievement. [Source: “Fear of Success,” Carl V. Rabstejnek, www.HOUD.info]

  I am not an academic but I am fascinated by this research and what I’ve been able to understand about the phenomenon. Would the researchers qualify me as competent or just a faker? Is my own internal struggle raging on such that I have yet to decide if I will simply put down my sword or fight on? What about the Salt Mine? Would there be a stand-off between me and the Salt Mine like the one between Thomas and Hill? Would I be cast as the woman scorned? Have we grown up since the Thomas-Hill hearings?

  Hillary Clinton: The Definition of Success

  I am a fan of Hillary Clinton for many reasons, including the fact that she makes it okay for me to be me. Crazy? Maybe. But, that is how it feels when I watch her. She is a role model in some way. I watched her evolve like other women of my generation: The Bill Clinton Presidential campaigns, the health care debate, the Monica scandal, Hillary’s own Senate and Presidential campaigns.

  Like many women, I wondered why she couldn’t beat Barack Obama. Was it that nobody likes a smart girl? Was it that we couldn’t take a woman seriously? The media was fascinated by her hair and wardrobe, but her mind?

  Now I read that Hillary is “redefining success.” The following is an excerpt from Arianna Huffington, “Redefining the Meaning of Success: Hillary Clinton’s Next Great Challenge?” The Blog on huffingtonpost.com, Feb. 5, 2013:

  “[Hillary’s] the most important woman in America,” writes Michael Tomasky. “More: she is almost certainly the most important woman in all of our political history.” For an entire generation, she’s been the foremost example of the successful woman. Here’s what Salon’s Rebecca Traister said about Hillary: