You open your book by stating that “women are notoriously ambivalent when it comes to leadership.” Why is that?
That was the question we pondered throughout the book. I don’t think there’s a simple answer, but if I were to summarize what we discovered, it’s that girls and young women are programmed very differently from childhood. It is rare for a young girl to aspire to lead — but we see boys taking charge all the time, on and off the sports field. It all comes down to how you are raised and what you’re expected to do. In addition, sometimes women are ambivalent about leadership because they lack the confidence — and that is backed by lots of research. They tend to underestimate their own skill set and ambition, whereas young men aren’t as reluctant to step up.
You and your co-author were the first women to serve as presidents of your respective universities. Were there commonalities
