Lean In may still be on the bestseller list, but Sandburg isn’t popular with everyone and research doesn’t necessarily support what she is selling. A new report from Accenture says it may not be about leaning in, but more about building career capital. Building career capital is about differentiating and offering something that is valuable in return for a great job. It’s about finding a niche. Career capital provides leverage when it comes to job searching or promotions. It is a basic supply and demand concept.
WHAT DOES SANDBERG HAVE TO SAY
Sandberg promotes the idea that it is all about pushing harder and not letting excuses hold women back. Sandberg’s book doesn’t cry about companies not supporting women trying to balance work and family. Instead, she focuses on how women hold themselves back from achieving leadership positions. Rather than supporting women’s decisions for working inside or outside the home, Sandberg would prefer to encourage women to aspire to leadership.
WHAT WOMEN REALLY WANT
Some women may want to lean in, but not all women agree. Rosa Brooks, a contributing editor at Foreign Policy, says that she hates Sheryl Sandburg and tells women to “recline.” Brooks found that the more she leaned in, the more boxed in she felt by all of the engagements and balancing career and family. Brooks calls for a push back to redefine what leaning in means. It cannot mean more work and longer hours. Being overworked can lead to poor decision-making and less creativity. It really is about creating personal value-add, or career capital. It also means being strategic and adding projects that support overall career goals. Leaning in for the sake of leaning in is inefficient and draining.
RECRUITING WOMEN
Recruiting women for heavily male dominated fields or companies can be challenging. It is about finding the right individual for a job, but when diversity is desired, it is important to understand how to meet the recruiting challenge.
When it comes to recruiting women, companies want candidates that are interested in career capital. So how do you sift through the resumes and profiles to find the standout candidates?
- Screen the resumes and profiles that are simply full of busywork. Big changes and accomplishments speak volumes about a candidate. It’s not enough to simply show up each day and answer emails and create a PowerPoint, especially if those activities don’t advance the company or agency.
- Look for individuals that are self-aware. Candidates who do not know what they want to do could easily turn into unhappy employees.
- Pursue candidates that seem open to feedback and criticism. Individuals who desire feedback are individuals who want to grow.
- Highlight how an individual can grow and in what ways the candidate will be challenged. Individuals who are interested in building career capital want to grow and be challenged – in ways that correspond with their personal career path.
- Don’t ignore the candidates (especially the female candidates) that have taken different career paths. Sandberg calls the leadership climb a jungle gym – not a ladder.
CLEARED NETWORK TIP – Better Broadcast Messages
Are your broadcast messages a boring, bland version of your job postings? They shouldn’t be! Quickly convey the top things you’re looking for, or the purpose. Broadcast messages on the Cleared Network aren’t the time for the kind of mundane update you might include on Twitter – think of them as true company or contract highlights you’d want on a billboard. When it comes to message length, use up ever word in your 240-count character limit, if you need it. Just make sure everything is relevant, applicable, and compels a job seeker to respond. If you need to convey more, attach a link to your update, especially if you’re posting about a job opening.
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