Nevertheless, She Persisted: True Stories of Women Leaders in Tech

by Pratima Rao Gluckman

It is no secret that the technical world is a male-dominated space. From the cultural belief that Computer Science is a "subject for boys," to the assumptions and discrimination women experience in the field, it can be challenging for women at every stage to thrive in tech careers.

Nevertheless, some high-performing women persist and succeed as leaders in tech despite the gender biases pitted against them. Pratima Rao Gluckman-a female leader in tech herself-embarked on a project to collect stories of the leadership journeys of such women. She wanted to know the details of these women's stories, and how they accomplished their achievements. What influenced them during their childhoods? Who were their mentors? What successes and failures did they experience? What magical ingredients helped them thrive in a male-dominated industry?

These questions and more inspired Gluckman to interview nineteen women leaders in several levels of technology industry, including VPs, CEOs, and directors, all of which are collected in this groundbreaking book, Nevertheless, She Persisted. Whether you are a young woman thinking of a career in software, a middle-career or executive woman, a parent, or a man curious about the role gender plays in tech, this book reveals the secrets, successes, and hidden struggles that women have endured to become both highly accomplished in their technical skills and effective senior leaders in their organizations. Their stories are illuminating, intended to inspire generations of women and help free our society from the limiting belief that ability is somehow linked to gender.

Genres: Nonfiction, Business

330 pages, Paperback

Published April 17, 2018

Reviews

[Clare O'Beara · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found this an interesting and lively book, the interviews with nineteen women warning us that the glass ceilings in America have yet to be overcome.

As most of the women ended up as managers and executives, I don't think this is specifically a reflection of the high tech industry. The fact that so many of them succeeded so well and had varied careers is heartening; they can be good examples for younger women, even if they don't consciously undertake to fill that role.

I noticed that most of the women had very expensive degrees, more than one, and from very expensive universities when they got started. The majority of women can't do this. The degrees practically assured them of well-paying jobs. Since they are ahead of 95% of women already, complaining that a man got paid better or that the boss didn't want them to have children seems overdramatic. But equal work should get equal pay. And equal opportunities for promotion. I run my own business, so that is always an option. But your own business won't pay you as well, and you'll work longer hours.

I recommend this well-produced book to women at work. Everywhere.

An e-ARC was kindly sent to me by an agent for the author. This is an unbiased review.

[Sherri · Rating 4 out of 5]

To write Nevertheless She Persisted, Pratima Rao Gluckman interviewed nineteen women who hold high level positions in the field of technology. She explored what such a career meant for each of these women, their experiences, and advice they have for other women pursuing tech careers, as well as advice for organizations to improve their environments for women.

The women interviewed held positions as engineers, programmers, and senior leaders for organizations like LinkedIn, Intel, VMWare, AT&T, Microsoft Research, and startups. They talked about their schooling, jobs they have held, people who encouraged them along the way, what they had seen, mistakes and successes.

These women’s stories provide a wealth of information that is useful to women in tech, or even just women in leadership in other businesses. There is a lot to learn among these pages including discussions about mentors vs. sponsors, whether meritocracies actually exist, having a voice in the workplace, the importance of a strong team, and the ways in which gender affects children’s choices in the United States compared with other companies, among many other topics.

I didn’t expect to learn as much from this book as I actually did. I thought reading interview after interview might get a little boring, but the women’s stories were engaging and left me walking away with all sorts of ideas for improving my own interactions at work.

Speaking as an editor, I think this book could have used a little more work (not a lot, just a little). Overall, it has a lot of great information and the profiles were written in a compelling way. There were some moments that stuck out as needing more polish, such as the overuse of the word “invaluable” and the moments when the author would insert herself in the narrative; for example, “I was curious about.... .” Because quotes in each story included “I” perspectives from the person being interviewed, it took an extra second of recognition to realize when “I” outside of quotes was the author and not the person being profiled. The book isn’t poorly written by any means; it could just use a touch more smoothing.

My other critique is that I wish this book had a different title. The popularity of this phrase can lead to certain ideas like feminism and politics, whereas this book is specifically about women in tech (which I love!), and I wish the title would have better captured that notion.

All in all, Nevertheless She Persisted is worth a read. It’s a book you can dip in and out of, reading one chapter at a time.

[Lynne Spreen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A helpful, enlightening collection of profiles illustrating the various paths to success taken by women in the tech industry. While one can learn from the examples set by others, I was frankly discouraged by how little things have changed. The women who were interviewed acknowledged the obstacles (still) blocking women from success: glass ceilings and cliffs, the delusion that most workplaces are meritocracies, unconscious bias (this was evidenced by some of the women themselves, who felt certain THEY hadn't suffered bias although they knew it existed), the wrenching need to both give a career one's all but still care for children and home, women's special struggle with imposter syndrome, failure to self-advocate, and failure to negotiate. This book is a fine representation of the pitfalls and barriers still blocking women from success, as well as a playbook for how to, perhaps, negotiate those hazards. Ms. Gluckman has done us a favor by writing the book, and I recommend it for every woman about to set out on her career path, regardless of whether her preferred industry is tech or anything else.

[Niki Livingston · Rating 5 out of 5]

I automatically gravitate toward leadership books, but this one was especially interesting for its focus on the challenges and gender barriers for women in the tech industry. I loved every single one of their point of views and the struggles they faced, while rising above them in their own ways. The author's decision to interview key women in this industry and bring to light the many challenges women face while striving to be a leader, has brought new perspective to the subject and I appreciate all that I've learned from them. Great insight and fantastically written.

[Deedi Brown (DeediReads) · Rating 4 out of 5]

All my reviews can be seen at https://deedireads.com/

Thank you to the author and publishers for providing me a free copy of this book so that I may have the opportunity to review it!

This was a really interesting book with a great concept. Gluckman, who works in the tech industry herself and found herself really waking up to the gender issues within it, set out on a mission to interview some tech powerwomen. She was looking to tell them world about their experiences, including both how they got to where they are today and how they feel about gender issues in the tech industry.

It took me a little while to settle into this book and allow it to claim my attention, but once I did, I found myself intrigued by these women. Each chapter features a different interviewee (19 in total) and follows roughly the same format. This got a little tedious after a while—I wish Gluckman had varied the structure a bit from chapter to chapter—but not enough to make me put the book down. I also liked how Gluckman provided these women in a story style rather than a question-and-answer style, and I liked that she inserted her own thoughts, opinions, and reactions along the way.

One of my biggest pieces of discontent about this book has to do with intersectionality. There were white women, Asian women, Indian women, and even Israeli women, but no black women. There were also no LGBTQIA+ women/individuals. There was plenty of talk about husbands and finding a supportive partner, but nothing inclusive there. Not even an throwaway admission that heterosexual couples aren't the only type. I understand that Gluckman chose these women largely out of her own network, but a little effort here would have gone a long way.

All in all, I liked the book and found myself interested and motivated by it. I'm not sure whether it will reach or engage it's target audience, but I would encourage young women interested in or just beginning a career in tech to give it a shot.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I applaud the author for writing this book and bringing these issues to light, it is very dry reading for anyone not already enmeshed in this field. It has the quality of a report, almost as if the author had several points she wanted to make and gathered case studies to support her theory.
After reading, I am not as motivated as I would like to be. I am not believing younger women who should read this content would like to slough through it. In that respect, it may be counter productive.
I applaud the intent behind this book and the women whose stories are included.

The further I read into the book, or the more time I invested in it, I did begin to feel I was getting more out of it. Perhaps the author's writing style matured with each chapter.
Dahlia's story has some very good points about finding your FIT, persistence, other biases to consider, and discovering your personal reasons to succeed.

While each example is wonderful to learn about, I would have preferred the author to make each point (or interview question) as a chapter and build the responses into that, siting examples.
She could then give a brief CV of each woman as an appendix.
As it is presented, I found much of the book repetitious and as stated above, dry.

I would rate this between a 3 and 4 star read, 4 because I feel it does present issues that should get more notice, and because the content has value, but 3 because I didn't feel it served its purpose as well as it could. I don't think it will reach the desired audience and get the impact it could and should.

I did read an uncorrected version of this book. I did read it in its entirety.

[TammyJo Eckhart · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an important book if you are looking for information about what women in tech have gone through and how successful women work that old-boys-network. Author Pratima Rao Gluckman interviews and writes about 19 other women in this book and through her descriptions of those conversations we also learn about Gluckman's own experiences. Those experiences may seem familiar to readers and there seems to be commonalities but how the book is organized and the points made varied between chapters and over all.

Each chapter has Takeaways, or highlights, from the experiences of the woman covered. I really wished that in the conclusion, an overall Takeaway was pulled together to emphasis the common experiences and mechanisms for dealing with challenges. Some chapters (11 of 19) also have a section that tackles a topic in a bit more depth but the topic did not always align with the first time this subject came up so it sometimes felt weird.

Within the chapters there were repetitive phrasing that felt cut & paste in nature. I wish the exact words from the interviews and the questions asked had been shared as well to give us more context. Why are phrasings and subjected repeated within chapters? Are the questions repeated or are these reflective if the words for the interviewee or repeated experiences of the woman interviewed.

The resulting book is a nice collection of women's experiences but lacks a solid narrative to tie them together as role models.

[Debra Schoenberger · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Gender bias is so insidious and powerful".

The author has really taken the subject of gender bias and its related issues and succinctly delineated it in her book "Nevertheless She Persisted".  Together with 19 "case studies", she has described in detail the challenges women face, not only in the tech world, but in pretty much any profession where men fill power or dominant positions.  The autobiographies we find in this book represent the real  and diverse struggles each one of these extremely talented women went through to achieve their goals.

Some of the issues she examines are:

- imposter syndrome
- the importance of a mentor
- the importance of having a sponsor who advocates for your career growth
- learning by taking risks (and failures)
- the mediocracy myth

I can appreciate the determination and resolve these women needed to overcome barriers in the tech world.  However, in my personal opinion, I have to ask myself, "at what cost"?   I wonder if the small periods of "quality" time one spends with one's child is really is enough to produce an emotionally balanced child?  What effect does an all-consuming career have on family life?

Overall an interesting and informative look at the challenges women face in the workforce.

[Cathryn Wellner · Rating 5 out of 5]

With three granddaughters all growing toward the time they will decide on career paths, I was particularly interested in reading the book. The tech field is still male dominated. These women needed grit to carve out places for themselves.

What fascinated me was not only the considerable struggles the women faced but also their mixed responses. Some were clear eyed about the barriers that discourage most women from considering tech careers. Others didn't appear to recognize the bias, unconscious or otherwise, that keeps many women out of the field or relegates them to lesser positions. Every story was worth reading and inspiring, as were the author's observations and personal experience.

The variations in experience are part of the strength of the book. It belongs in every high school and university library. Parents can use it to expand their daughters' sense of possibilities. Girls growing up with role models like these are more likely to see the potential in themselves. And men in tech would do well to read the book, which can help them understand the role they can play in creating more opportunities for women in tech.

[Adan Hidrogo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book covers the story of multiple women and how they entered the space of tech and overcome the system that favors them less. In total about nineteen women are interviewed and written about in this book. I like this book because it covers so many different stories and focuses on the barriers these women had to overcome, it’s inspiring for people and proceeds to set the example of just how capable women are. The thing I didn't like about this book is one of the same reasons I somewhat dislike the stories of people like Bill Gates and that is the fact that a lot of these people have degrees from top notch expensive schools and that doesn't set a realistic standard for the regular woman who can’t go to those schools. I would recommend this book to those who feel discouraged about the obstacles set before them to prove to them that it is possible to overcome them and to rise through the ranks.

[Emiie Hudson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nevertheless, She Persisted was a book that helped me realize that I’m not alone in my struggle with imposter syndrome. It opened my eyes to the struggles of women in tech and all that they go through to get to where they are, and stay there. It was full of both amazing quotes and inspiration for female entrepreneurs everywhere. A must read for any girl boss, and anyone in the tech industry.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found it to be a very interesting book, especially as a female engineer in the making. However, I did feel that much of the book was somewhat repetitive and sometimes the same point was reiterated so many times it became a little less poignant. I do truly believe that it was a very important book to read and will be recommending it to many of my STEM/technologist friends.

[Kina C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this book. I'm so glad the women in the book shared their stories on how it truly is working in a male dominated field as I too work in the IT world.