Part I

It's simple: The article is promoting a grand disaster. It's still more simple: The article has a huge logical gap.

Sandberg does a lot of 'reaching out' to women; she does so much of this that the article can reasonably pose the question:

"Can Sheryl Sandberg upend Silicon Valley’s male-dominated culture?"

In particular, as in Sandberg's buffet dinners with lots of women, her commencement speech at Barnard College, her TED talk, she's trying to talk to many women or 'most' women about how to 'do better'.

Then, that's the gap, at least in the article, and maybe also in what she is doing: Right away we can see that her example and thinking as in the article (again, I'm talking about the article here and not necessarily her) just cannot even hope to work for more than 1% of women. For the other 99+%, her example and advice, as in the article, is just somewhat dangerous fantasy nonsense.

For an analogy, not perfect but close enough, the claim is, play as well as Dirk Nowitzki and you, too, can win an NBA championship. Nope: No matter how many people play as well as Dirk Nowitzki, in a given year (on separate teams) at most one will win an NBA championship. So, the fantasy of the article is nonsense.

To move this simple analogy closer to the real situation, only a very tiny fraction of people can have careers at or near the top of hot, leading, very valuable businesses.

Or, no matter what the heck the advice, just CANNOT put more than 1% of the people in the top 1% of the positions. EVER. Again, for the logical gap, the article is suggesting, entertaining its readers, with the fantasy that all women who will "Be like Sheryl" can also be in the top 1% of business jobs. Nope. So, the fantasy of the article is nonsense.

Next, there is a striking conflict right at the surface: She has a nanny at home and a staff at work. So, what about THOSE women, that is, the nanny, no doubt a woman, and the staff, likely well over 50% women? That is, what about their 'work-life balance'? For the children of the nanny, does the nanny have a nanny? For the staff, does each staff member have a staff? Since the answers are likely no, the fantasy of the article is nonsense.

So, net, how many women are setting aside their own 'work-life balance' so that Ms. Sandberg can be such a 'successful woman'?

Then at work, when 'crunch time' comes and she needs to be home with her two children, what does she do? Sure: First, she has a staff. Second, she can delegate. Third, she can rush home and spend 'quality time' with her children while the nanny does the washing, cleaning, cooking, etc. Again, the fantasy of the article is nonsense, fundamentally, for all but a tiny fraction of women.

Next, for 'career advice' for women, the article and her example are nonsense. Here is the blunt, bold, bottom line fact of life about careers in the US now and for some decades: Making your career direction trying to be near the top of a large corporation is a fool's errand. First, unless one gets lucky with stock, such as Ms. Sandberg did at Google, there's actually not much money, from just salary, after taxes, after unreimbursed business expenses, e.g., the clothes, car, nanny, house, buffets, in being in such a position. E.g., her car will be expensive because as soon as it needs maintenance she won't sit there for a few hours in a muffler shop, brake shop, tune-up shop, tire shop, oil change place, etc. and, instead, will just trade in the thing for a new one. Second, such jobs tend not to last very long.

In particular, the article is swooning over the situation that Ms. Sandberg can be a CEO: Sure, just start a lemonade stand and be a CEO. But the article means that she can be hired as a CEO in some large corporation. Well, maybe. Then what? She's just a hired CEO, and that's NOT a very good job because (1) have to spend most of the effort trying to be successful while pleasing both the SEC and Wall Street (keeping down class action stockholder suits, etc.) and (2) actually do not have much real control over the future of the business. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs (after his RETURN to Apple which was nearly dead), Larry Ellison, Fred Smith have control; John Akers, Lou Gerstner, Jeffery Immelt, Carly Florina, didn't or don't. Such jobs tend not to last very long.

The article shows another serious problem: Ms. Sandberg flatly doesn't know what the heck she wants. What she's done is to work hard, be great at memorization, dot i's, cross t's, each day have all the items on her to-do list checked off, do well going without sleep, save time on hair, makeup, exercise, and clothes, all for the goal of getting 'security' in some sense from getting praise, acceptance, and approval from a herd of women and the public from being an 'accomplished woman'.

That's her life's goal, her (P. Tillich) 'ultimate concern' -- 'security' in some sense from getting praise, acceptance, and approval from a herd of women and the public from being an 'accomplished woman'.

She's making two huge mistakes: (1) The point of work is to make money, bring the money home, deposit it in the family checkbook, pay the bills, and get some good financial security for the family. Period. That's IT. Asking for more from work is a fool's errand pursued only by fools. (2) The good things in life are what pursue once have done well enough on financial security. Mostly these good things are the home and family and things close to them. These good things are mostly NOT distant things such as praise, acceptance, and approval from a herd of women and the public.

If I were her husband, then I would conclude that she was a disaster as a wife, mother, and person because she is much more interested in praise, acceptance, and approval from New York City, Boston, etc. than from her own husband and children. Bummer. Super bummer. Super confused, lost, brain-dead bummer.

I've seen such things far too often before: Some of these women are totally beyond belief. In their teens and twenties, they can work harder and go with less sleep than any man could ever hope to approach. They have fantastic rote memories. Their abilities at detail work of dotting i's and crossing t's is astounding, bested only by computers. They can zip through humanities subjects, especially novels, with blinding speed and get A+ on a corresponding test with discussion questions. Their social skills can be somewhat mechanical and analytical (not like 'Miss Congeniality') but far, far better than any man could every hope to understand. There are usually close associations with anxiety, perfectionism, and even obsessive-compulsive disorder. Finally, the thinking is usually quite distant from reality; e.g., they don't see that they are neglecting what is important, their home, for nonsense on the other side of the country. That is, they don't have good life goals and work hard for them; instead they have compulsions, that is, things they do to near exhaustion without knowing why.

Finally, they are not willing to get their happiness from their home and their security from joining with their husband to "take on the world together" and, instead, want to be full of anxiety from feeling persecuted by men, thus, want to compete with men and beat men 'in their own game', etc. Brain-dead.

For all their PBK, etc. accomplishments, they actually are not 'smart' but dumb. I've seen far too many.