Madison yoga therapist Natalie Buster invited female colleagues to gather one morning in July to form a “circle” of support. She chose Lazy Jane’s on Williamson Street for the meet-up because the breakfast spot is owned by a woman — Jane Capito.
“It evolved into something more than I thought possible,” Buster said. “We really got lost in each others’ stories and lost in each others’ connections.”
That first meeting was a local incarnation of the movement fostered by Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg’s bestseller, “Lean In,” (Knopf, 2013) and a companion website that encourages women to reach out to colleagues and form circles of support to work through their own obstacles to professional success. Sandberg’s book and organization encourages women to pursue their career ambitions without ambivalence.
The message has been controversial. Critics say that as a highly educated wealthy woman Sandberg doesn’t understand the problems of average women trying to make it. Others worry that the focus on changing personal habits will dilute the effort to change institutions that discriminate.
For many women, however, the Lean In circles that have begun sprouting up are offering a new kind of support.
About 7,000 circles have registered with Sandberg’s Lean In Foundation since the book was published in March. The circles are simply regular meetings of working women in person or even virtually to discuss the issues they face in their careers and managing the demands of family life. The Lean In Foundation offers agendas, discussion guides and lectures on their website. They encourage women to choose which resources seem most helpful and to experiment with what works for their circle.
For Buster, who spent a dozen years as an actress in New York City before coming back to Wisconsin, the meeting at Lazy Jane’s exceeded expectations. Women who might be in competition with each other professionally should be able to improve each other as well, Buster said.
“I really want mentorship to happen,” Buster said. “I want cross-advocation and support of each other.”
Not all the circles register with the foundation. Buster, for example, was sparked by the ideas in the book but hasn’t hooked up formally.
But a circle started by Madison executives Stephanie Farnia and Jeanne Rosen is registered and is scheduling the recommended one meeting a month for at least 10 months.
Farnia, who enjoyed a network of colleagues in Minneapolis as director of payor policy for the National Marrow Donor Program, said she felt somewhat adrift when she moved here. Rosen, communications director for Association Management Partners and Executive Directors (AMPED), said her regular professional networking didn’t address work-life balance issues. Both found the website, with its short video clips and training tools, appealing.
“These kinds of resources are rarely available free,” said Farnia, who has two small children and travels frequently for her job. “This is not a networking group as much as a circle where you are invested in each other.”
Added Rosen, who has a pre-teen daughter, “Maybe in 10 or 20 years, we won’t have to be doing this.”
Other approaches
The empowerment idea isn’t new, though the technology — a web-based outreach that helps women connect with a circle — may be.
Mentoring groups for professional women have existed for decades here.
Recently, Wisconsin Women Entrepreneurs (WWE) created peer mentoring groups. Barbara Samuel, education director and president-elect, said she felt many WWE members were struggling to become profitable in their businesses.
“But this was something we couldn’t talk about,” Samuel said. “At networking events, we had to put our best face forward. There was no time or place where we could let our guard down and talk to others about our struggles, our challenges and how to deal with them and reach success.”
Madison lawyer Linda Bochert, president of TEMPO Madison, an invitation-only, peer-to-peer organization with about 300 members, said some fields are more receptive to women in leadership than others.
“Despite the fact that many law school graduating classes for the last several years have been 50 percent or more women,” Bochert said, “the ‘top’ spots in private law firms across the country are predominantly filled by men.”
Bochert said TEMPO is trying to target particular fields in which women are under-represented and to invite the women in those fields to be members.
Holly Waterman, controller for a family business, said the Wisconsin Dells Women’s Association, which has about 35 members, has operated for 40 years, meeting once a month from September through May.
“We talk about local politics,” Waterman said. “We support each other as mothers. We talk about wellness. We support each other on all levels. Women can come and see themselves as the professionals that they are.”
Critics weigh in
Meanwhile, longtime advocates for gender equality in Wisconsin worry that Sandberg’s “Lean In” message internalizes women’s obstacles in the business world and avoids confronting the institutions that perpetuate those obstacles.
“There need to be women who are championing change through political policy as well as those who are pioneering change within the roles they have taken in the workplace,” said Pat Alea, a strategic planning consultant who co-founded the Women’s Executive Leadership Summit at UW-Madison’s business school. “Every woman, in my opinion, should address issues of fairness and equity in whatever way she can, and it’s critically important to the sanity of all of us that we not pretend inequity is ‘not a problem’ for us.”
Former Democratic Lieutenant Governor Barbara Lawton said the “Lean In” approach avoids addressing how women’s reproductive roles skew the playing field.
Figuring out career success is tough in a system that doesn’t guarantee maternity benefits and skimps on child care, she said.
“The younger generation doesn’t want to believe gender equality is an issue,” said Lawton, who launched an economic development initiative called “Wisconsin Women = Prosperity” in 2003. “Older women fear they are going to be penalized for bringing it up, but gender discrimination persists. Women have been taught not to whine. That perpetuates a culture that undervalues women. We have to change the culture. You don’t change the culture without addressing all that holds us back.”
Farnia, who holds a master's degree in public health policy from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, acknowledged there are policies that could create a more family-friendly work environment for both genders.
“However, the U.S. is not going to magically turn into Norway overnight, and, in the meantime, I still have to figure out how to navigate the individual situation that I and my family are in,” Farnia said.
“I have to figure out how to prepare for and come back from maternity leave while still being useful and relevant in my work role, how to actually carve the time out of my workday to make use of the breastfeeding policies that have been established, and how to still go on important work trips without being absent too often from my family. My hope is that when women stay in the workplace, particularly in leadership roles, while dealing with and talking about these issues, the policies will start to translate into a reality that benefits everyone. The point of the Lean In circle is to support each other through this process.”
