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successful, even if their achievements are the same. Sandberg also points out that men ascribe their success to their own skills, whereas women ascribe their success to outside sources.
    “So if you ask a man, ‘Why were you successful?’ the man will say, ‘You know, because of myself,’ ” Sandberg says. “And the women will say, ‘Because I got lucky and these great people I work with helped me.’ So think of the situation in which men are getting it wrong slightly high, and women slightly low. Men think it’s them; women don’t. So why does that matter? It matters because I think a lot of getting ahead in the workplace has to do with being willing to raise your hand and say I want that job, I’ll take on that challenge—or better yet, I see that problem and I’m going to fix it. That comes back to self-confidence. So when men feel more confident they raise their hand; when women feel less confident they take their hand down.”

    “A lot of getting ahead in the workplace has to do with being willing to raise your hand.”
    —SHERYL SANDBERG

    Knowing your value means owning your success. Owning your success means acknowledging your achievements. By acknowledging achievements you build confidence.
    Sandberg gives me a striking example from her own experience. She was giving a talk about owning one’s success to 150 or so Facebook employees, and she mentioned the GPA experiment. At the end of the talk Sandberg told the audience she had time for two more questions. She answered them, but hands were waving so she continued to call on people.
    Afterward she went back to her desk and found a young woman waiting for her. Sandberg asked if she’d learned anything from the talk, and the young woman said, “I learned to keep my hand up.” Sandberg asked what she meant, and the woman told her, “After you took those two final questions, I put my hand down and all the other women put their hands down. A bunch of men kept their hands up and then you took more questions.”
    The men ignored the question limit and went for it, keeping their hands in the air. What did they have to lose? Nothing. Sandberg saw more waving hands and took their questions.

    Sandberg admits she didn’t notice that only women had taken their hands down, because after all, why would she have noticed what wasn’t there? She says that proved her point right there: “If we as women don’t raise our hands in the workplace, we’re not going to get the same opportunities men do. Because men keep their hands up.”
    Despite her many achievements, Sandberg tells me a story of how she herself failed to raise her hand and how it almost cost her a lot of money.
    “I was getting a new position. I got an offer to do the job, and I thought the offer was really great, and I was going to take it,” Sandberg says. “My brother-in-law kept saying, ‘You gotta negotiate. They want you to take on all this responsibility—ask for more compensation.’ My response was, ‘This is such a great opportunity. I’m so lucky to get it, and it’s such a generous offer, I’m not going to negotiate.’ ” But Sandberg says her brother-in-law kept pushing: “He said, ‘Goddamn it, Sheryl, why are you agreeing to make half of what any man would make to do this?’ ”
    Finally, that motivated her. Sandberg says that after her brother-in-law convinced her to ask for more, “I went in and asked, and they moved up considerably. Had I not asked, they wouldn’t have. But the reason I wouldn’t have asked is because I just felt lucky to have the opportunity.” Her story sounded all too familiar to me. I’ve always been in awe of Sandberg, and the idea that she and I shared a common failing was cracking the superhero image I had of her. I appreciate her honesty. And I realize now that women must get over feeling lucky. The time has come to turn the page.

    Sandberg sent my daughters and me some Facebook T-shirts. I wear mine feeling a kinship with this