Suzi Guidroz
The children's book “My Way Sally” provides a great analogy to women in leadership. In this novel, Sally is a hound who quits running with the pack and ends up being cornered by a small fox. This hound uses its energy and different leadership abilities that she has obtained to lead the way for other hounds. Although this is a small kid’s book, it has lots of lessons and underlying messages to unpack. Similar to Sally in this book, we can look at women in leadership positions the same way. Just like Sally becomes a leader and positive role model to a pack of foxhounds, women can become leaders in the workforce and make an even greater impact. Sally chose to go against the rules that “were” developed and created new even better ones, showing strong character and leadership abilities.
Women are more than capable of doing the same thing in the workforce by applying this concept to their own leadership roles such as being an executive of a company, owning a company or more. An article titled “Women and the Vision Thing” by Ibarra and Obodaru speaks on women in the workforce and how they have outshone men in most of the leadership dimensions measured. This is important to point out in relation to the My Way Sally story because just like the foxhound, women can outshine men in the workforce and build a legacy. They state that “we are in danger today of being mesmerized by people who play with our reptilian brain. For me, it is manipulation. I can do the storytelling too, but I refuse to play on people’s emotions. If the string pulling is too obvious, I can’t make myself do it” (4). This author pointed this out to explain that women are just as capable as men in excelling in the workforce. The difference is that to make a difference we must use these powers that we have in a non-malicious way that encourages people and not let the limiting views of what society tells us women what we “should be” get in our way.
The author also gets into the topic of a woman's lack of vision, which relates right back to the children's novel in regards to leadership and confidence. It states, “Women may dismiss the importance of vision—and they may be reassured by the many claims made over the years about their superior emotional intelligence—but the fact remains that women are a minority in the top ranks of business organizations. Our findings suggest to us that the shortfall is in no small part due to women’s perceived lack of vision” (4). For example, if the foxhound would have doubted her personal abilities to lead the pack, then she wouldn’t have made such a big impact on the pack. The overall lesson encourages readers and women in the workforce to never doubt their abilities.
When you allow yourself to wholeheartedly believe in yourself and execute your strengths, big changes can be made in the world. In relation to women in the workforce, we can all make a huge change by being like the foxhound and being leaders that can stray from ordinary, and become extraordinary powerful leaders.
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