Editing to include what happened next.
After posting, I picked up my kids from the bus stop. I was worked up and told them about the commercial. My son said “Mom. It’s ok. Keep your hands on the wheel!” As I became animated talking with my hands while driving 😂
My daughter said, “Mom, Mya & I are smarter than any of the boys in class. Its a fact.”
I took a deep breath and we moved back into our regular routine.
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Keep your hands on the wheel.
It’s a fact.
Excellent reminders.
Hands on the Wheel: One of my biggest challenges, and I know I’m not alone here, is fighting off the never ending distraction and noise in life today. It steals our focus, time and energy. Yesterday, I let this commercial take mine. Today, I am glad the LinkedIn algorithm served it up to me so I could call out what I saw. I just wish I had been more zen about it!
Facts: We all have to continually seek out the data. Recent data. Remain skeptical until you see the data, know and trust its collection method and can independently verify its accuracy.
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Yesterday was the 14th anniversary of the day I became a mother. Otherwise known as my oldest child’s 14th birthday. My children have made me, and continue to help me become, a better human being, a more compassionate boss and a wiser leader. As someone with strong workaholic tendencies, they force me to have more balance. And they make a bad day in the office melt away in a second as my priorities come back into focus.
#Matel if you really think there is a dream gap, don’t show me this commercial. Show me, and all the girls out there, a commercial with amazing women who have achieved great things, while being one of the most important things of all - a Mom.
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This #Matel initiative is over 5 years old (original press release 10/9/18). And their own executive leadership team today has 3 female leaders and 8 male leaders. Gosh, they haven’t figured out how to fix the problem in their own organization.
👋🏻 From my personal experience, in the room when discussions are happening about potential, there is a general assumption that unless women have shouted from the rooftops their desire to advance, they are not interested (especially if they have young children).
🙋🏻♀️ My push is always the same - Have you asked her? Do you know or are you assuming?
⚡ Let's get a commercial showing that - encouraging the people in the room to think and act differently. Then, and only then, will we see real change.
🤔 'Cause I'm pretty sure this commercial, while well intended, just reinforces a false narrative that has been used for far too long as an excuse not to seek out female leaders. They're out there. They're ready. Its our job to go find them.
And P.S. My daughter is pretty damn sure she's gonna run the world.
https://lnkd.in/gQEVUqmW
A powerful, thought-provoking campaign from #Barbie!
The Dream Gap is the space in between young girls’ wildly imaginative ambition and their full potential—hindered not because they’re incapable, but by the society they grow up in. Conscious and unconscious biases try to water down their dreams early on, but the Barbie Dream Gap Project is on a mission to close the gap by challenging gender stereotypes and helping undo the biases that hold girls back.
And while they’re driving awareness with this campaign, I think we all know it’s going to take an even bigger collective effort. We have a responsibility to close this gap for the next generation of girls—to nurture their #confidence, reinforce their abilities, and lift them up as dreamers and doers!
Mattel, Inc.
