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What Girls Need: How to Raise Bold, Courageous, and Resilient Women
A former White House strategist and fighter jet pilot now at the helm of one of the premier schools for girls in the country illuminates the ways parents and educators can support audacity and ambition in girls everywhere
What do girls really need to succeed?
As a student at the all-girls Baldwin School outside of Philadelphia, Marisa Porges was raised in a community designed to produce strong, independent women. After earning a BA in geophysics from Harvard, she fulfilled her childhood dream of flying jets off aircraft carriers for the US Navy and served as a counterterrorism expert in Afghanistan and the Obama White House. In 2016, in an unexpected move for someone whose ambitions had taken her so far from home, Porges returned to head The Baldwin School. In doing so, she began to see with great clarity how small moments and turning points in her early education gave her the tools she would eventually sharpen and deploy to excel in areas that were traditionally perceived as being part of "a man's world."
What Girls Need combines lessons Porges learned along her career path with the practices she and her colleagues are developing at The Baldwin School to help today's girls cultivate the skills and traits they need to become tomorrow's leading women. The traditional means of commanding a room have often been dubbed "unfeminine" and women of previous generations were pressured to behave like a man in order to win the day. But the ways we define leadership are changing, and the women now stepping into leadership roles are mapping new paths to inhabiting traits such as grit, resilience, audacity, and self-confidence. Porges is writing to prepare the next generation to confidently hold their own later in life in whatever fields they enter, whatever challenges they face, and to celebrate and own the ways that traits which might have been undervalued in the past--empathy, collaboration, and an evolving mind-set--can and will define the future's leaders.
What do girls really need to succeed?
As a student at the all-girls Baldwin School outside of Philadelphia, Marisa Porges was raised in a community designed to produce strong, independent women. After earning a BA in geophysics from Harvard, she fulfilled her childhood dream of flying jets off aircraft carriers for the US Navy and served as a counterterrorism expert in Afghanistan and the Obama White House. In 2016, in an unexpected move for someone whose ambitions had taken her so far from home, Porges returned to head The Baldwin School. In doing so, she began to see with great clarity how small moments and turning points in her early education gave her the tools she would eventually sharpen and deploy to excel in areas that were traditionally perceived as being part of "a man's world."
What Girls Need combines lessons Porges learned along her career path with the practices she and her colleagues are developing at The Baldwin School to help today's girls cultivate the skills and traits they need to become tomorrow's leading women. The traditional means of commanding a room have often been dubbed "unfeminine" and women of previous generations were pressured to behave like a man in order to win the day. But the ways we define leadership are changing, and the women now stepping into leadership roles are mapping new paths to inhabiting traits such as grit, resilience, audacity, and self-confidence. Porges is writing to prepare the next generation to confidently hold their own later in life in whatever fields they enter, whatever challenges they face, and to celebrate and own the ways that traits which might have been undervalued in the past--empathy, collaboration, and an evolving mind-set--can and will define the future's leaders.
272 pages, Hardcover
Published August 4, 2020
55 people are currently reading
808 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
January 14, 2021
4 // WHAT GIRLS NEED is a book that combines research, personal stories, and practical advice on the skills girls need as they grow up to be the next generation of women. @marisaporges served as a Naval aviator and also in the Obama White House and is currently Head of School at an all-girls school in Philadelphia. each chapter combines personal stories from her fascinating background with relevant research, making the chapters really enjoyable and easy to read. the chapters cover topics like empathy, adaptability, and collaboration, as well as other vital skills needed to thrive in our fast-changing world. every chapter ends with really practical tips for how to grow these traits in young girls, and those sections were my favorite. I’d recommend this one for parents of daughters or for educators! thanks to @momsdonthavetimetoreadbooks for bringing this book to my attention! 4/5⭐️—I liked it!
August 16, 2022
Giving our girls what they need early on is as important as ever, especially as they grow up in the twenty-first century, when new skills and ways of being will be more essential to success. Their natural talents for competing, collaboratively solving problems, leading with empathy, and adapting will make the biggest difference and be the greatest advantage at home and work, as leaders and caregivers, and during the inner dialogue that we all have during periods of self-reflection.
This book was given to me by a dear friend. I look forward to passing it on to others who are important in the life of our girls.
This book was given to me by a dear friend. I look forward to passing it on to others who are important in the life of our girls.
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September 13, 2022Interesting connections between life story and message about what girls need to be successful, but I cannot stand audio book narrators who make girls voices squeaky and adopt foreign accents.
July 20, 2023
Started off really great until the section on competitiveness. Not all kids play sports and the examples of successful people today who did sports then was discouraging. A few more examples of non sports competitive success stories would have been great to see. Also the audio books change the tone of the younger girls voices was incredibly frustrating. You’re reading a book about raising strong girls, why are you making them sound so awkward and squeaky. By the end it seemed like the author used this book to talk about herself and her military success stories a “Back Door Brag”. Lady write an autobiography don’t use our daughters and our want to better their lives as a way to talk about yourself. This audiobook would have been about two hours shorter if she stayed on topic of the title on the cover.
November 13, 2020
I have a young daughter who I pray will be bold, courageous and resilient so I when I heard Marisa Porges speak about her book on a podcast I was immediately interested. In it, Porges describes six skills girls need to learn, provides statistics to support the benefits, tells stories as examples, and gives ideas for parents to aid in the skills development.
The six skills and chapter titles are:
1. Help Her Find Her Voice
2. Turn Her Voice into an Influential ask
3. Cultivate Her Competitive Spirit
4. Nurture Her Collaborative Problem-Solving Skills
5. Make Empathy Her Natural Advantage
6. Her Ability to Adapt Will Be Key
All of the stories were relevant. Two stories made my eyes well up. In Chapter 2, Savannah wants a hedgehog and ends up gathering a petition and writing her state representative. The lesson is to that asking matters even when the answer isn’t what you desire. In Chapter 3, Sophia gives a speech about her “nonexistent athletic career” and how she turned her confidence and resilience into bold action. Both of these stories drive home the point and remind me of how capable our girls are and give me hope for their futures. I liked the “What’s a Parent to do” sections of each chapter and the encouragement to take small steps in daily conversation to encourage our girls in their natural aptitudes and gifts.
My mind was shifted, especially by Chapter 3. Porges quotes a school director about our role in helping. “If you set it up right, if you do it right, learning to compete helps them decide which of their internal goals matters most, practice dealing with disappointment and defeat, and figure out how to play real-world games.” Porges also tells us that a healthy competitive spirit opens up an area of our personalities the we need to succeed. She’s right. I often forget this and wrongly focus on the fact that my daughter won’t be a gymnast or soccer player as an adult (so why is it so important now). From this book, I was made aware that my daughter will be able to use the competitive spirit and skills she has developed in the gym and on the field in the game of personal and professional life.
The six skills and chapter titles are:
1. Help Her Find Her Voice
2. Turn Her Voice into an Influential ask
3. Cultivate Her Competitive Spirit
4. Nurture Her Collaborative Problem-Solving Skills
5. Make Empathy Her Natural Advantage
6. Her Ability to Adapt Will Be Key
All of the stories were relevant. Two stories made my eyes well up. In Chapter 2, Savannah wants a hedgehog and ends up gathering a petition and writing her state representative. The lesson is to that asking matters even when the answer isn’t what you desire. In Chapter 3, Sophia gives a speech about her “nonexistent athletic career” and how she turned her confidence and resilience into bold action. Both of these stories drive home the point and remind me of how capable our girls are and give me hope for their futures. I liked the “What’s a Parent to do” sections of each chapter and the encouragement to take small steps in daily conversation to encourage our girls in their natural aptitudes and gifts.
My mind was shifted, especially by Chapter 3. Porges quotes a school director about our role in helping. “If you set it up right, if you do it right, learning to compete helps them decide which of their internal goals matters most, practice dealing with disappointment and defeat, and figure out how to play real-world games.” Porges also tells us that a healthy competitive spirit opens up an area of our personalities the we need to succeed. She’s right. I often forget this and wrongly focus on the fact that my daughter won’t be a gymnast or soccer player as an adult (so why is it so important now). From this book, I was made aware that my daughter will be able to use the competitive spirit and skills she has developed in the gym and on the field in the game of personal and professional life.
February 22, 2021
Dr. Marisa Porges, known for her work on leadership, education, and national security wrote clearly in the book, “What Girls Need: How to Raise Bold, Courageous, and Resilient Women,” how we can best prepare girls for the future. She provides lessons learned from her time in the Navy, serving in national security at the White House, and now, as she heads The Baldwin School, how to prepare girls to be leaders and changemakers. In her book, Dr. Porges references the importance of competition and why collaborative problem-solving skills are critical for the future workforce. She referenced academic research on empathy and the importance of this key skill. Lastly, Marisa's best chapter is saved for last where she makes great points on why cognitive flexibility remains pertinent to our adaptability quotient and how we handle uncertainty. Enjoy the great tips on how to better parent and raise courageous women. If you want to hear our conversation check it out: https://colonelcandid.com/candid-lead...
December 31, 2020
I found this book to be validating and inspiring, as a woman and as a mother. I currently have a son and my daughter is due in a couple months. I was hoping to gain insight on practices that I could implement in my home that foster the character and skill sets to set my children off on a strong foundation. Dr. Porgies offers this through genuine compassion, life experience, connections with others, and scientific research. My father told me that I am combative, this was something that frustrated me in the past, but this book helped me accept that my truth, passion, willingness to stand for others, and unabashed personality traits are something that I can be proud of and honored to share with my children. I hope that they are as stubborn and opinionated as I am, they will challenge and delight me.
January 2, 2022
I really liked it. As a father of a 10-year old girl, preparing her for the world ahead is one of my main concerns every single day, and this book gave me new ideas and/or reinforced some others to help us help our girl be ready. But reflecting on the main strengths that girls need to develop - Speaking her voice, adaptability, empathy, collaborative problem solving, healthy competitiveness, knowing how to ask - these are some of the most critical skills in today's marketplace, skills that I look for everyday when hiring. So, in my perspective, this book not only gives very useful tools for parents, but also makes a very compelling case of the need of really diverse teams for organizations to be able to succeed in today's business world.
December 21, 2020
This is definitely going into my top 5 parenting books. Not just for parents of girls, this is a work that I will be adding to my personal library. I know I will refer to it time and time again as my children go through different life stages. The author brilliantly combines personal anecdotes with real, workable solutions. My only dislike was the actor who read the audiobook--her voice often came across as fake rather than relatable.
March 19, 2021
I really enjoyed the format and information in this book. The author takes different topics, explains why it's important to teach our girls these lessons, then describes how to do so in an actionable way. She puts lots of eye opening facts, every day examples, and scientific studies into each topic. I read a chapter a day and discussed with my husband the chapter after at the dinner table. Led to great conversations. It was very pleasant and I learned a lot! Hope to see more books from her.
April 16, 2021
Author's note: what girls need
Introduction: Challenges and opportunities awaiting our girls
chapter 1: Help her find her voice
Chapter 2: Turn her voice into an influential ask
Chapter 3: Cultivate her competitive spirit
chapter 4: Nurture her collaborative problem-solving skills
Chapter 5: Make empathy her natural advantage
Chapter 6: Her ability to adapt will be key
Conclusion: Why it matters, take two
Introduction: Challenges and opportunities awaiting our girls
chapter 1: Help her find her voice
Chapter 2: Turn her voice into an influential ask
Chapter 3: Cultivate her competitive spirit
chapter 4: Nurture her collaborative problem-solving skills
Chapter 5: Make empathy her natural advantage
Chapter 6: Her ability to adapt will be key
Conclusion: Why it matters, take two
November 10, 2020
This was such an insightful book, that weaves the authors own incredible experiences with lessons that she has learned through her life, along with stories of inspiring girls who help frame the lessons that she is teaching. I’m very inspired and proud to be raising a great daughter!
July 3, 2023
Finished over a weekend. Felt inspired after finishing this book. Gained momentum after being reminded to utilize my female brain --a great communicator, good at collaborative learning, and also tap into my competitive spirit.
October 1, 2020
Just wasn't what I thought it would be when I picked it up.
November 24, 2021
Very well put together, very valuable experience to be privileged to receive.
November 16, 2020
Terrific lessons from a terrific role model!
Dr. Porges communicates plainly great ideas about how to raise our children to be successful leaders. Her personal stories are incredible and very engaging — my favorite parts of the book.
Dr. Porges communicates plainly great ideas about how to raise our children to be successful leaders. Her personal stories are incredible and very engaging — my favorite parts of the book.
July 19, 2021
An eye-opener! Though the title says "What Girls Need", I think this book is for everyone irrespective of age or gender - parents with daughters, parents in general, educators, and any individual who wants to prepare themselves to lead in the future workplace.
Having said that, the book inherently focuses on the key life skills that we as parents can imbibe in our kids, especially our girls; skills that are necessary to be future leaders but are found to be severely lacking in girls when they are faced with the real world.
The biggest bombshell that the author drops on us is that most girls naturally have these foundational skills at a very young age. Sadly, these skills are not further developed, and to make matters worse, they are repeatedly told at home and by societal institutions to diminish such behavior.
Speaking up - authoritatively, respectfully, and effectively; effective asking - pitch, influence and negotiate; building a healthy competitive spirit; collaborative problem solving; empathy and adaptability are crucial traits that future leaders must master and most girls already possess preliminary versions of these at an early age.
What the author does effectively is show us how to identify & encourage such behavioral traits and consciously develop them into mature life skills through simple exercises.
This one will definitely lead to furious note-taking!
Having said that, the book inherently focuses on the key life skills that we as parents can imbibe in our kids, especially our girls; skills that are necessary to be future leaders but are found to be severely lacking in girls when they are faced with the real world.
The biggest bombshell that the author drops on us is that most girls naturally have these foundational skills at a very young age. Sadly, these skills are not further developed, and to make matters worse, they are repeatedly told at home and by societal institutions to diminish such behavior.
Speaking up - authoritatively, respectfully, and effectively; effective asking - pitch, influence and negotiate; building a healthy competitive spirit; collaborative problem solving; empathy and adaptability are crucial traits that future leaders must master and most girls already possess preliminary versions of these at an early age.
What the author does effectively is show us how to identify & encourage such behavioral traits and consciously develop them into mature life skills through simple exercises.
This one will definitely lead to furious note-taking!
April 19, 2021
This book touches on the things we should be giving our next generation of girls, our daughters, and our kids. One of the principles I responded to in the book was the message about "how do we make sure our daughters have a voice?" and "how do we help them build and hone that voice? It's about finding simple ways to encourage our girl's voices and reinforce that their voice matters in an age-appropriate way. It's not about speaking out inappropriately but ensuring they know that we want to hear from them. Make them practice asking for things, so they know it's okay.
The author also talks a lot about fostering the competitive spirit and how sports play a significant role for girls. It's about thinking a little differently about what they do - the games they play, the books they read, the movies they see, and even the interaction around the dinner table. It's about finding the small things we can do to reinforce critical skills for our kids, but especially our girls.
To listen to my interview with the author, go to my podcast at:
https://zibbyowens.com/transcript/mar...
The author also talks a lot about fostering the competitive spirit and how sports play a significant role for girls. It's about thinking a little differently about what they do - the games they play, the books they read, the movies they see, and even the interaction around the dinner table. It's about finding the small things we can do to reinforce critical skills for our kids, but especially our girls.
To listen to my interview with the author, go to my podcast at:
https://zibbyowens.com/transcript/mar...
May 22, 2021
Well-organized and worthwhile. (And not too long!) The author generally does a good job illustrating her discussion of broad concepts (e.g., empathy, confidence, competition) by providing suggestions, examples and tactics to help parents to support and encourage their daughters.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews