NextGen Know-How: Stop telling girls that ‘bossy’ is leadership
Real leaders, female or male, are others-focused and not ego- or task-focused.
It was a week before Christmas, and my three kids were reenacting The Nutcracker in our living room when a fight broke out. My 7-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Olivia, started yelling at her younger brother because he didn’t announce her performance the way she wanted him to. She screamed at him to turn off the lights and start over, and Luca left the room in tears. As I attempted to intervene and bring some peace to the situation, Olivia started bossing her little sister around, too, scolding Clara as she touched the props Olivia had put out for her own performance. I tried to calm a now crying Clara and told Olivia that she needed to play nicely with her brother and sister.
“They weren’t doing what I told them to do!” she yelled, obviously frustrated.
“People usually don’t do what you want when you yell at them,” I replied. “If you are calmer and patient, maybe they will want to play with you.”
This situation made me reflect on a comment that Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, made in an interview several years ago about girls and leadership. She said:
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