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[quote=Anonymous]Sheryl Sanberg's argument in her book is that one should not lean out in anticipation of kids, and often that is something that holds people back in the workforce and makes it paradoxically harder to juggle it all.  You can agree or disagree with this assessment, but if you are going to use her terminology,you might as well understand her take on it.

She claims that women self-sabotage by scaling back too early, before there is even a kid in the picture.  She claims that it is actually harder to go back to work if you feel like what you are doing is not fulfilling to you/you have said no to the most interesting projects/you are completely stagnant in your career, and actually it is much easier to be motivated to figure out a workable situation if you like what you are doing.  If you feel meh about your job, then you are more likely to leave all together.

On top of that, she claims that you never know how long it is going to be from the time you decide you want kids to the time that kid actually happens.  The average amount of time it takes to get pregnant is about six months, but for some people it can take a year or two or more.  Then once you are pregnant, you have another nine months before you take maternity leave, given that you have a healthy pregnancy.  You might not be super functional while pregnant if your pregnancy is difficult, but who knows if it will be?  This means that for most people, you are talking a year and a half-2 years or so between when you decide it is time to have a baby and when you actually need to step back from work.  A lot professionally can happen in a couple years, and you are holding yourself back by not taking advantages to pursue challenging professional opportunities before a kid is in the picture.

Of course, if you have the unicorn job that provides great professional fulfillment and reasonable monetary compensation while providing work life balance, good for you!  If you are just not that ambitious and don't really care about job fulfillment and professional advancement, then good for you too!  The lean in/lean out discussion doesn't really apply to you.[/quote]

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