Smart Women Take Risks: Six Steps for Conquering Your Fears and Making the Leap to Success
CEO and television host Lerner's book aims to teach women they need to be bold, take risks and overcome insecurities to improve their careers. A combination self-help book and business manual, the book's six-step program includes choosing risks that make sense, recruiting mentors (and helpers) and bragging about the successes. Lerner writes in a simple style, but the content's not overly simplistic: she acknowledges that not every risk is a good idea, gives readers tools to discern worthwhile risks from bad ones, tells about how to handle having ideas shot down and provides tips on how to own up to mistakes. She also includes quizzes and exercises to help readers figure out priorities, personality types and the degree of "mind clutter." Scattered throughout the book are inspirational paragraphs about "first" women (first at MIT, first track and field gold medalist, first war correspondent). With section heads like "Whether You Have Achieved Your Goal Or Not - You Are A Winner!", the book can become too cheerleader-ish, but the mixture of personal stories and inspirational prose make this a fun and helpful guide to getting ahead.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.