What you can’t see can still hurt you.
Sheryl Sandberg learned this principle early in her career at Google, where her personal experience directly informed institutional policy. In 2004, she became pregnant with her first child. With this experience came a revelation: there should be special parking privileges for pregnant women. Since Sandberg was a leader in the company, she could swiftly effect this change. But the experience also gestured to a larger problem. With so few women in high-profile leadership roles, Google and other companies had serious blind spots in their policies.
The problem is not just in Silicon Valley. In the US, most large organizations still struggle to include different kinds of people in their C-suites. This creates a form of corporate blindness. Multiple perspectives are necessary to correctly position and judge the company’s policies, products, and services.
Do you need more perspectives in your boardroom? Learn more about Sandberg’s point of view with our Instaread on Lean In.
