Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

Although it deals heavily in personal anecdotes, Lean In is at heart more of a persuasive tract than a memoir: Sandberg hopes to convince readers to support her central claims about gender equality, and she uses her own experiences as evidence in support of her conclusions. Lean In's introduction, then, functions similarly to the opening paragraphs of an academic essay: Sandberg's goal in this first section of the book is to orient her readers to the broad outlines of her argument.

In part, that means providing readers with the historical and cultural context they need to understand Lean In. To that end, Sandberg begins with a description of the problem Lean In is meant to address, noting that women are still vastly outnumbered in most positions of political and economic leadership. Sandberg argues that this is not only unfair in and of itself, but that it is also a roadblock to gender equality in other areas of life; with more women in power, Sandberg suggests, there would be more incentive to tackle issues like sexual violence and the wage gap. Sandberg therefore characterizes Lean In as a kind of "feminist manifesto," in the sense that it aims to solve issues previously identified by first and (especially) second-wave feminists (9). Sandberg says, however, that where previous feminist works have tended to focus on the need for institutional change (e.g. changes to laws on discrimination, harassment, etc.), Lean In will focus on the need for personal change: the "internal barriers" each woman needs to overcome in order for women as a group to succeed.

The introduction, then, aligns Sandberg's arguments with the liberal feminist tradition that emphasizes the agency of women as individuals (as opposed to stressing the power of social structures and institutions). Liberal feminism is sometimes criticized for a perceived failure to address the needs of women further marginalized as a result of their class, race, and/or physical health: past a certain point, systemic obstacles arguably become so overwhelming that they essentially foreclose meaningful choice. Sandberg, however, anticipates this argument, saying that while elements of her book "will be most relevant to women fortunate enough to have choices about how much and when and where to work," other sections will speak to "situations that women face in every workplace, within every community, and in every home" (10). In some ways, the fact that the feminism Sandberg espouses is so personal might even expand its applicability: Sandberg wants to "internalize" feminism, making it a kind of self-improvement. This is an agenda any woman could theoretically adopt, although the potential fortension between women's choices as individuals and the obstacles they face as a group never entirely disappears from Lean In.

In the meantime, however, Sandberg uses Chapter One to begin fleshing out what she means when she talks about psychological barriers to success. Citing both formal studies and her own experiences, Sandberg argues that the relative scarcity of female leaders results, in part, from women's adherence to gender norms that depict authority and femininity as incompatible. It is not simply that women comply with these norms for fear of being seen as unlikeable, or undesirable, but rather that they often do so instinctively; messaging that links women's worth to their appearance and agreeableness is so pervasive that it influences women's habitual, unconscious behavior. In fact, even women who generally resist gender norms, like Sandberg herself, still struggle with guilt and anxiety for doing so. For Sandberg, then, the first step toward gender equality needs to be noticing the moments when fear dictates our actions: a willingness to push past that fear will underlie many of Sandberg's suggestions throughout Lean In.