As the elephant in the room went unacknowledged, it started acting up, trampling over my relationships. - Sheryl Sandberg

"[Eric Schmidt] explained that only one criterion that mattered when picking a job- fat growth. When companies grow quickly, there are more things to do than there are people to do them. When companies grow more slowly or stop growing, there is less to do and too many people to not be doing them. Politics and stagnation set in, and everyone falters, He told me, "If you're offered a seat on a rocket sip, you don't ask what seat. You just get on.

Acting in stereotypically feminine ways makes it difficult for women to reach for the same opportunities as men, but defying expectations and reaching for those opportunities leads to being judged as undeserving and selfish.

As Gloria Steinem observed, “Whoever has power takes over the noun — and the norm — while the less powerful get an adjective.”1 Since no one wants to be perceived as less powerful, a lot of women reject the gender identification and insist, “I don’t see myself as a woman; I see myself as a novelist/​athlete/​professional/​fill-in-the-blank.” They are right to do so. No one wants her achievements modified. We all just want to be the noun.