I'd say more from my (very anecdotal) experience: I'm in a male-dominated and technical field, but among (very competent) women that we do have, it seems that growing up in a family where mother is decidedly more successful than the father is quite a common trait. Good role models to follow -- and not just abstractly good, but examples that suggest that women can compete as equals and win on merits in real life -- do matter for confidence, and confidence matters for everything else.
Does anyone know what Jack Welsh's parents did? Does it matter? Do any articles about Larry Page emphasize his parents' support as the reason for his success? I didn't think so. So how come people are actively looking to credit Sandberg's success to anything but her actual work? Because she's a woman.
Sincerely, A female tech worker with divorced, middle-class parents.
What I simply implied was that having institutional advantages makes the whole effort much easier, as compared to another woman who did not grow up with such support.
This is not very hard to see. For every woman like Sheryl Sandberg, there are tons of other women who worked as hard as her. There are tons of women who are as smart as her. But they could not make it as big as Sheryl, simply because of institutional disadvantages.
I could give the example of my mom. Her dad was a railway repairman. The family was not well-educated/privileged as a whole. So, she received little/no guidance on her future. But she studied her socks off when she was a kid. As a result, she started her career as a receptionist in a bank. Steadily, she grew on to become a Foreign Exchange manager.
If she would've had some advantage, say ability to afford Harvard instead of no-name-state-school, she could've started at a higher position rather than a receptionist.
In addition, she also took amazing care of my little brother and me. She couldn't afford to hire a personal babysitter, so she sacrificed her career to raise us. I would argue that my birth was the single biggest reason she couldn't achieve more.
Her work ethic was tremendous. Her ability to pick up concepts beyond her expertise was excellent. But institutional disadvantages ensured that she couldn't start well.
I could give my own example. I am now doing stuff of an engineer's dreams. I had the advantage of great parents who gave me things like a computer at a very young age. This single event is the biggest leg up in my career. Now, I am a happy programmer making shit-load of money. But my friend whose parents bought him a computer 7 years after me, languishes behind.
Why should he be languishing behind when we went to the same school with same classes? We did our homework together too. He got the same grades as me in high school. We were equal by all measure.
All he couldn't decide was where to take his career, whereas, my computer advantage made sure I knew what I loved.
Sorry for the long post. All I want to say is that while I do not discredit Sheryl for her success, I have to say that institutional advantages gave her a leg up. And when she wrote this book, she wrote it without having experienced a big disadvantage.
EDIT: Spelling and grammer
The submission attributes Bill Gates's success first and foremost to his grandparents and parents. This is part of a very common pattern of attributing success to everything but work.
In lean-in, she paints this rosy world in which ambitious women can achieve whatever they want to. Reality is, most people (men included) just don't have the financial freedom, support system, recognition etc. to take huge risks. Even when we take risks, statistically, we fail most of the time.
Most men and women never grew up in a family where both their parents are successful. Heck, many American kids grow up in broken families with parents divorced. Sheryl has had a lot of institutional support that she could take for granted.
Of course, this does not mean women should not have the freedom to do what they want. In fact, I really want to see more women focus on smarts and take leadership positions in the hard stuff (military, congress etc.).
But, just because things worked out for Sheryl, she's talking through a lens of privilege and success. Unfortunately, these lenses are not readily available.