What's Up With This?

Link: Independent Street : Ayn Rand, Where Are You?.

Here's a great post from the Wall Street Journal's "Independent Street" blog, noting that the WSJ's recent list of top business thinkers and a recent story in USA Today talking about rich entrepreneurs have one thing in common: neither one contains a single woman. The comments are even better than the post itself.

I don't know the solution to this problem, but I suspect that having these kinds of conversations is part of it.

And, at the risk of sounding way too hopeful, I think time is part of it, also: I hang out quite a bit with my son (20), my daughter and her husband (24 and 25), and their friends (18-30, mostly)...and I just can't imagine that, when they're my age, there will still be this disparity between men and women in business. They seem much clearer (to me) about actual gender differences and fake gender differences: much less likely to assume - for instance - that men are intrinsically better at business than women.

I don't want to wait 30 years, though -- so let's keep talking...

Comments

[Wally Bock]

I think there are two issues that are not getting enough attention when it comes to the business guru list and the presence (or lack) of women thereon.

First, you can't get on the guru list unless you first get on the best seller list. Business books are a high road to reputation and women do not seem to be writing many. I counted out the last fifty books I've been asked to review. There were only two woman authors, you and Lisa Haneberg. There was one other woman who was a co-author with two men.

Second, it's hard to judge a process that's not entirely transparent. The guru ranking begins with an unshared list of people whose names are run through the Google and Lexis/Nexis screens. But I can't find any statement about who comes up with that list and what criteria they use. Without knowing that we can't make any judgments about possible bias.

[Erika Andersen]

Wally -

You're absolutely right, I just went back and looked at Portfolio's list, and of the 50 or so business books they published in 2007, only 3 of them were by women: me, Carly Fiorina, and a woman named Catherine McBreen (and she was a co-author).

This is fascinating point you've brought up -- I'm going to post about it tomorrow.

Thanks!