Lean In

vice president and above are hesitant to have a one-on-one meeting with a more junior woman. For their part, half of the junior women avoided close contact with senior men. 8 This evasiveness must end. Personal connections lead to assignments and promotions, so it needs to be okay for men and women to spend informal time together the same way men can. A senior man and junior man at a bar is seen as mentoring. A senior man and a junior woman at a bar can also be mentoring … but it looks like dating. This interpretation holds women back and creates a double bind. If women try to cultivate a close relationship with a male sponsor, they risk being the target of workplace gossip. If women try to get to the top without a sponsor’s help, their careers will often stall. We cannot assume that interactions between men and womenhave a sexual component. And everyone involved has to make sure to behave professionally so women—and men—feel safe in all settings.
    At Goldman Sachs in the late 1990s, management committee partner Bob Steel recognized this perception problem and came up with an admirable solution. The father of three daughters, Steel told a training class that he had a “breakfast or lunch only policy” with employees because he felt uncomfortable going out to dinner with female employees and wanted to make access equal. Sharon Meers worked at Goldman at the time and said Steel’s decision caused a bit of a stir, but she thought his candor was heroic. Anything that evens out the opportunities for men and women is the right practice. Some will get there by adopting a no-dinner policy; others may adopt a dinner-with-anyone policy. In either case, we need practices that can be applied evenly.
    Many companies are starting to move from informal mentoring that relies on individual initiative to more formal programs. When taken seriously, these formal mentorship/sponsorship programs can be remarkably successful. Structured programs also take the pressure off junior women from having to ask the difficult “Are you my mentor?” question. One study showed that women who found mentors through formal programs were 50 percent more likely to be promoted than women who found mentors on their own. 9 The most effective formal programs help educate men about the need to mentor women and establish guidelines for appropriate behavior. These programs can be a great way to help normalize the senior man/junior woman model.
    Official mentorship programs are not sufficient by themselves and work best when combined with other kinds of development and training. Deloitte’s Leading to WIN Women’s Initiative is a good example. Deloitte had already established a program to support female employees, who still remained underrepresented at the highest levels of the company. Thisprompted Chet Wood, CEO of Deloitte Tax, to ask, “Where are all the women?” In response, Deloitte launched a leadership development program in 2008. The program targeted senior women in the tax division who were close to promotion. The women were assigned sponsors, received executive coaching, shadowed members of the executive committee, and took on global assignments. Of the twenty-one members of the inaugural group, eighteen have since been promoted.
    As helpful as these formal programs can be, they are not always offered, and in some situations, senior people are not available to give guidance. The good news is that guidance can come from all levels. When I first joined Facebook, one of my biggest challenges was setting up the necessary business processes without harming the freewheeling culture. The company operated by moving quickly and tolerating mistakes, and lots of people were nervous that I would not just ruin the party, but squash innovation. Naomi Gleit had joined Facebook right out of college several years earlier. As one of Facebook’s earliest employees, she had a deep understanding of how the company worked. Naomi and I became close. I bet most people, including Naomi herself, probably assumed that I was mentoring her. But the truth is she mentored me. She helped me implement the changes that needed to be made and jumped in to stop me from getting things wrong. Naomi always told me the truth, even if she thought it would be hard for me to hear. She still does this for me today.
    Peers can also mentor and sponsor one another. There is a saying that “all advice is autobiographical.” Friends at the same stage of their careers may actually