Flashback to Week 1
In week 1 we read a couple passages by Cal Newport about Passion. In the Articles and the video Newport Discusses ‘The Passion Trap’ 1 as well as the idea that we are able to find passion in many career options, and passion is the last step. Skill, practice, and other things will come first and your passion will grow with your skill.
This week I finally read Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg ( The COO of Facebook ). I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Sheryl gives practical advice to women in the workforce and highlights this difficulties that there are for Women in Business. This book takes the POV that internal factors hold women back (though as Sandberg repeats throughout this book, external factors are also very much a part of the wage gap and leadership gap). When Sandberg gives career advice she stresses the idea of taking risks, applying for jobs you may not feel 100% qualified for, and tells her own personal story of leaving DC business to go work in Silicon Valley – eventually landing a job at GOOGLE. Now Sandberg did not have a background in tech, and certainly did not know she would ever have a passion for ‘connecting the world’ the way Facebook does. This I thought was a great example of what I think Newport was trying to get across.
You can watch Sandberg’s TED Talk that started the Conversation for Lean in here:
- The Passion Trap:
The more emphasis you place on finding work you love, the more unhappy you become when you don’t love every minute of the work you have. ↩
