by Bill Klump | @TheKlumper | Photo by Margot Duane | January 25th, 2012
Earlier in the month one of our esteemed writers, Lori Morgan wrote an article titled: “Wait a Minute; Women Are Building Disruptive Companies, Too!”. Lori points out that there have been many articles written about the difficulties and unfairness towards women in tech, in particular when it comes to raising money for startups, and for good reason, it’s an issue that needs to be changed. She also mentions that for the multitude of articles pointing out these difficulties, in comparison there is not enough attention and or praise given to the women who are building amazing organizations, technologies and essentially changing the way we live our lives, or what we like to call “Disruptors”!
In taking Lori’s advice, I’d like to present to you our “Disruptor of the Day”, Tara Sophia Mohr, a true “Disruptor”, who is blazing a trail for women leaders everywhere!
Tara tells a story of when she was fourteen years old, how she listened to her high school English teacher explain that her class would read a variety of books centered around the theme “Coming of Age.” The teacher passed out a list of the books the class would read over the course of the year: Black Boy, A Separate Peace, Lord of the Flies, and others.
She looked at the list and saw: all the books were about boys coming of age. All were written by men. She knew, from her own experience, that the story of girls coming of age was very different from that of boys. She says, she understood the class would only be learning half the story of “coming of age” if they only read books by men and about boys.
What did Tara do about it? Well much like she does today on a larger scale, she led the way. She spoke to the teacher, then the principal. Then created a committee, raised funds, lobbied the school board, and a few years later, many works by women were added to my high school’s English curriculum.
Tara says she tells this story because it was her foundational experience following a calling that continues to be at the heart of her work: to restore women’s voices where they are missing, to amplify women’s impact in the world – both for the wellbeing of women and for the wellbeing of our civilization.
This calling has led Tara to create two anthologies of Jewish women’s writings about the Passover holiday, giving thousands of families a way to add women’s perspectives to a religious ritual where women’s voices had been entirely absent. That same calling inspired her to work on women’s issues in the nonprofit world, and to lead the Women in Management organization at Stanford Business School.
It drives much of the work she does now: coaching women leaders, leading the Playing Big global women’s leadership program, and leading The Girl Effect Blogging Campaign, through which hundreds of bloggers write about the importance of investing in girls’ education in the developing world.
During the summer of 2010, she wrote an article called “10 Rules for Brilliant Women.” The article talked about 10 principles Tara saw “brilliant” – smart, creative, visionary women not acting upon - to their detriment. The article struck a huge chord, first at Huffington Post, then at More Magazine.com, and soon all around the web.
“Most brilliant women don’t see their own brilliance and are “playing small” and they know it: not speaking up, doubting themselves, seeing themselves as “not yet ready” to launch the big idea, the organization, to put themselves at the table. The 10 Rules, and the other work I do with women leaders are about learning how to quiet self-doubt, clarify purpose, and become comfortable with taking bold action in the workplace and in the world. That is what I teach, and I love to teach it because I’m still learning it myself.“
“I believe the task of our time is not just to bring more women into positions of power, but to empower women to transform the institutions they are part of by bringing their wisdom, critiques, perspectives and solutions to the fore.” – Tara Sophia Mohr
To learn about our “Disruptor of the Day”, you can visit her website at www.taramohr.com
