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Lean into leadership | Strategic Management

Dear Audience, Facebook COO SHERRYL SANDBERG is one of the most powerful women in the world. Now she has written a book with which intends to show women the way to the top. It also reveals the three decisive turning points in her own career …

Here comes one of the biggest moments of her career. In August 2011 Sheryl Sandberg joins the top club, being ranked fifth in list of the world’s 100 most powerful women by Forbes. Ahead of her are German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff, and the head of PepsiCo, Indra Nooyi. Behind her are US First Lady Michelle Obama and the Indian politician Sonia Gandhi. Sandberg has made it. She has it in black and white. She is powerful.

Bildschirmfoto 2013-09-22 um 20.04.54But she does not celebrate. She does not post it on Facebook. Sandberg is embarrassed. When somebody congratulates her in the lobby of the Facebook building in Silicon Valley, she explains at length how absurd and frivolous the list is. When somebody posts her achievement on Facebook, Sandberg asks them to take it down. She never says, “Thank you for the compliment.” “I doubt that a man would feel so taken aback when others considered him powerful,” Sandberg writes in her new book. “Even today, I am still working hard on my self-confidence.”

Ulrich Hinsen | ManagementRadio