How Sheryl Sandberg Is Turning Feminism Into a Tech Brand

Sheryl Sandberg’s 2013 book, “Lean In,” zagged into the cultural lexicon with stunning velocity, and quickly sprouted an organization of the same name, to maintain its ideals and to do its good deeds. On Wednesday evening, LeanIn.Org launched its major public initiative for the year, #LeanInTogether. This is 2015’s version of #BanBossy, which aimed to empower future female leaders by eliminating the word ‘bossy’ from schoolyards and offices. While “Lean In” focused on women lifting up women, #LeanInTogether reaches its arms out to men. The campaign, its promotional literature states, “will emphasize how men benefit from supporting women at home and at work—happier marriages, more successful children, and better team outcomes—and provide practical information on how men can do their part.” It furnishes a lifestyle magazine’s worth of practical, downloadable tips for “Men at Work, Men at Home, and Managers,” as well as videos on “Getting to 50/50,” developed in conjunction with Stanford’s Institute for Gender Studies. On one page of a press release, a mock-up #LeanInTogether "social gallery" shows Aziz Ansari praising “amazing female coworker” Amy Poehler, and a father who is “with the kids watching mommy lives her dreams of being a Rams cheerleader (while working and being an amazing mother!).” On another page, a photo of a father leading two small children by the hand—girl in pink, boy with collar popped—watermarks a message: “When men lean in for equality, they win—and so does everyone else.” Hillary Clinton, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Condoleezza Rice, and Lena Dunham appear in a promotional video to make this case, speaking with gratitude of the men who have supported them. The Lean In Together initiative is also partnering with ESPN and the NBA/WNBA, and has released a PSA with players including LeBron James, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, and Stephen Curry. Everyone's invited.

Rachel Thomas, the co-founder and president of LeanIn.Org, told me that this drive is a direct extension of Sandberg’s book, and that Sandberg is “very active” in Lean In Together, as she is “in everything we do." (Of course, Thomas added with a wink, “she has a day job.” Sandberg is the Chief Operating Officer of Facebook. This role may have something to do with the massive list of companies partnering with Lean In Together.1425513969652) Sandberg will be speaking about the new campaign, Thomas told me, and will soon publish a New York Times op-ed on the matter, part of the series on women and work that she’s written with Adam Grant, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Speaking by phone from her home in California, Thomas said that there’s no way “we can get to true equality if men don’t actively participate.” She said that “women face pushback when they take the lead, and men often face pushback when they nurture,” and that we need to twist that around.