[khawkins]

The author makes a lot of good points until the last paragraph:

>We can’t expect more women to succeed in the startup world until we’re able to talk honestly about how much harder startups are for those who want to spend a lot of time with their kids...We’ll never reach our potential as female founders until we acknowledge that each woman’s attitude towards children is different.

The idea that just "talking honestly" will change the inescapable realities of everything discussed before this paragraph nearly dismantles the point she's trying to make. She acknowledges that "on the whole" women want their time to be consumed more by kids than by career success. She acknowledges that even she herself has turned down a position that would grant her more success and power, but did so for a cause she deemed valuable and does not regret it. The logical conclusion of her argument and personal life experience is that not all women are the same, but that women are more likely to decline more successful positions, not because of discrimination or some systemic barrier, but because they'd rather focus on their family.

But instead of suggesting that we accept that fewer women are going to succeed in the startup world, she's suggesting that "honest talk" about how hard it is will magically increase their success. How would "honest talk" have changed her totally rational and uncompelled decision to decline a CEO position? How would recognizing that the potential of some female founders is limited by their priorities towards children help other, possibly childless, female founders reach their potential?

The last paragraph reads as an apology for what would have been the natural conclusion of her argument, but which she dare not say because suggesting that we accept anything less that full parity of success between men and women in positions of power is forbidden. She should have stuck to the idea that people need to be treated like individuals with different priorities and not to the idea that women need to be treated like a group collective.

[wcarss]

Read it again, it's phrased as being necessary but not necessarily sufficient. You're arguing it's not sufficient -- and okay, it doesn't have to be.

Without a true and open reckoning of the costs of a path, people can't make good decisions about the path. Will a true and open reckoning of the costs of a path make the path one people choose? No, not on its own. But it's part of it.

[khawkins]

She's still accepting the premise that more female success, as a whole, is something she values. But validating that it is okay for women to choose to be less successful in order to focus on their family is clearly going to result in less female career success.

Deep down I think we all agree that both startups and involving yourself in your children's lives take a lot of time and effort, and that we should respect an individual's free choice to determine what balance works for them. But many are struggling with an opposing ideal that necessarily cannot coexist. For example, by declining the CEO position, she's actively working against the ideal of having an equal number of female CEOs to male CEOs.