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let's start with a brain exercise I'm
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going to ask you to visualize three
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scenarios the visualization part is very
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important so please close your eyes take
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a deep breath and imagine you're late to
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catch a flight you rush through the
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airport you make it through security you
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run to the gate you make it down the
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jetway you step on the plane just as
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they close the door behind you and the
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pilot steps out of a cockpit to say hi
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you get to your destination you go to a
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local restaurant and you have the best
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meal of your life and really enjoy this
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there's no calories and visualization
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and at the table next to you is a couple
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happily celebrating their anniversary
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the next morning you go to the biggest
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technology conference in the world and
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the CEO of this year's hot hottest tech
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startup just took the stage to speak now
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you should have a solid picture of all
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of that so open your eyes because I have
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some questions for you in your mental
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image was the pilot black was the
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married couple
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two men did the tech CEO on stage look
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like me it's okay if one or all of your
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answers is no your brain creates images
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of what's familiar it's less of a fan of
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what's not familiar the things I
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mentioned are generally less familiar
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the black pilot the same-sex married
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couple
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the female tech CEO no matter how much
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you might love the idea of those things
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when immediately confronted with them
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the amygdala that's the most ancient
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part of your brain signals the
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hypothalamus to fire up the hypothalamic
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pituitary axis which is where the brain
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and the endocrine system intersect so at
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this point your adrenal glands release
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cortisol into your bloodstream which
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triggers your stress response this is
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the physiology of stress
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according to the Dartmouth undergraduate
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Journal of science and it happens in a
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matter of milliseconds long before you
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have the chance to consciously think I'm
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so happy these two men have the freedom
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to marry who they love as dr. Susan
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Fiske explains when it comes to
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unfamiliar social situations there is
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ample evidence that encountering
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something fundamentally different from
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what we expect elicits a stronger
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activation in the amygdala and
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encountering something or someone we
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proceed as the norm this is what kept
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our species alive for millions of years
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this instantaneous instinctive response
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triggers fight-or-flight which is what
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kept us from being eaten by
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saber-toothed Tigers or killed by a
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member of a foreign tribe but in modern
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society our brains still do this when we
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encounter the unexpected our heart races
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slightly our blood pressure goes up we
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sweat a little and for no discernable
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reason we just feel stressed out there's
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a Chinese blessing that doubles as a
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curse may you live in interesting times
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I am the CEO of a tech company right now
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which makes these some very interesting
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times I recently had a call with a
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potential investor in which everything
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clicked he got the concept he loved what
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we were building he had key insight
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about our tech and so we agreed on a day
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to speak again and he said great
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why don't you ping me then and I said
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you got it and then he said oh wait is
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that one of those phrases I'm not
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supposed to use with you because he's a
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man and I'm a woman and in the tech
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world right now
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careers are being destroyed and entire
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venture funds collapsing because some
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men have behaved incredibly
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inappropriately towards women he was
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afraid of using the phrase ping me now
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that might seem ridiculous but we now
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live in a world where words and phrases
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rapidly take on new meaning if you need
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proof just look at the Facebook post of
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any guy who got a text from his mom that
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says hi honey if you want to come over
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tonight we can Netflix and chill
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if you don't understand why that's funny
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google netflix and chill' he asked is
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that one of those phrases I'm not
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supposed to use with you and there it
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was I could practically hear the
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cortisol coursing through his
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bloodstream no matter how well we
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clicked or what he thought of my company
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it was still in his brain that I'm not
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just a CEO I'm a female CEO and working
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with me might be a minefield of
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dangerous he has to think about not
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because of anything he would ever do or
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anything I would ever do but because men
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neither of us had ever met couldn't
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control their bro havior
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and women we both respect bravely chose
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not to remain silent
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because speaking up is the only way
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we're going to make progress so in
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addition to all the risks inherent in
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investing in an early-stage startup
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company there's an added layer of much
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scarier risks that come from working
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with me the irony is that while some
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investors might feel that way for
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another cohort because I'm over 40 they
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don't even see me
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I am simultaneously both highly
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dangerous and invisible
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[Laughter]
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who knows that at this stage in my
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career I'd become a ninja is that one of
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those phrases I'm not supposed to use
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with you I am so grateful that he asked
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I'm happy that he felt safe enough to
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ask and know that I wouldn't pummel him
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for it
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if we're going to get anywhere close to
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equality
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let's stop attacking our allies when
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someone is willing to admit and discuss
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that there might be a problem with their
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own behavior
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we can't penalize them for that how
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would any of us feel to be excluded from
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the Equality conversation because of
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what we visualized at the start of this
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talk by asking the question I knew this
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man was willing to examine his own
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behavior and I believe that the biggest
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stumbling block to achieving true
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equality is unexamined behavior when men
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in the startup world start to wonder if
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I work with women am I going to someday
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be the subject of an incendiary blog
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post the answer is no just continue to
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examine your behavior when working with
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female founders and colleagues and
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executives ask yourself if this was a
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man would I gently stroked his shoulder
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as I suggest we meet again
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what I comment on how well his t-shirt
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flatters his figure would I place a
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higher value on his appearance and his
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experience in determining his
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probability of success if not don't do
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it to her it's that simple
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sadly the much simpler response to the
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female threat is no you will not be the
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subject of an angry blogpost just don't
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work with women of course no one would
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ever say that out loud but somewhere in
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that amygdala a synapse fires towards
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flight in the face of an unnamed
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potential danger and stress hormones
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flood the bloodstream can't explain it
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don't know why but whatever makes you
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feel happy and comfortable around people
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who look and act like you is the same
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thing that makes you come up with
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logical explicable totally defensible
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reasons not to work with someone you
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just don't click with and when it comes
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to equality examining our own behavior
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applies to women too I started my career
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as a securities lawyer in the Silicon
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Valley at the dawn of the Internet era
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it was an insane time to be there as a
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first-year associate I build twenty
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eight hundred hours one night I left the
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office around 2 a.m. which was typical
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and so I left my timesheets for my
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assistant to process because she got in
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in the mornings before I did so the next
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day when I got to my desk about five
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minutes later and my assistant walks in
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holding my timesheets and she said would
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you like me to show you how to enter
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these into the billing system I mean
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sweet as pie and I sat stunned for a
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moment then politely declined her kind
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offer but that question really started
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to bother me why would my assistant ask
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the attorney she works for if I want to
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learn how to do her job so I started
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asking around of the 14 male attorneys
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in our group none had ever been asked if
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he wanted to learn how to use the
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billing system
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we had a partner who didn't know there
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was a billing system but of the six
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female attorneys I was the only one who
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had never entered her own timesheets
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some of them did it regularly in some
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just once or twice but they all knew how
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so again I asked why why would you spend
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a resource as precious as your time on
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work someone else is already getting
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paid to do one answer was oh it's not
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that hard
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women do this to ourselves a lot we do
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work that someone else's job because
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we're capable and we just want it to get
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done if a task is on someone else's
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to-do list please don't be the first
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person in line to do it for them not
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only does that hurt you it sets an
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expectation that hurts all other women
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the other answer to my question was it's
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just easier the knowing laugh
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translation it's just easier to do my
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assistants work than to make my
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assistant do it when we talk about
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gender disparity in the workplace we
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discuss the different treatment women
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receive in performance reviews and
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promotions
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or in hiring and salary negotiations but
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we rarely discuss the treatment women
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receive from subordinates we fail to
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acknowledge how exhausting it is to not
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get the basic level of support needed to
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do our jobs and that our male colleagues
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enjoy without even thinking twice about
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it or to get it but only because we
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demanded it and risk being labeled a
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certain word or two so we give in we
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pile more on our own plates because in
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the short term it's just easier and in
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the long term we burnout and leave and
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in hindsight everyone wonders why there
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aren't more women in higher ranking
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positions because no one ever examined
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the behavior
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the funny thing about my situation is
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that if you asked the assistants in that
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group if they treated male attorneys and
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female attorneys differently I'm pretty
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sure every one of them would have said
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no way and yet no male attorney had ever
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been asked if you wanted to learn how to
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do administrative work and every female
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attorney had that's the real danger of
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unexamined behavior the beliefs that
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we're treating everyone equally when in
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reality were not when we stop and
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examine our own behavior we can catch
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ourselves having different reactions to
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and expectations of people simply
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because they don't look like us or worse
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because they do the human brain is a
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remarkable achievement in evolution the
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prefrontal cortex evolved itself into
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existence when we needed more processing
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capacity how amazing is that
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but the amygdala that's been there since
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the earliest records of human existence
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when an encounter is the unexpected it
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floods your system with stress stress
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hormones fight-or-flight is what kept
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our species alive for millions of years
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none of us in 100 lifetimes will ever be
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able to change that trigger inside our
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brains so our only solution is to change
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what's outside our brains to consciously
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turn the unexpected into the expected so
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that we don't have unconscious hormonal
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reactions that keep our society from
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moving forward how do you do that how do
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you change the unexpected to the
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expected well there are three things you
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can try one as you go about your day
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visualize situations before they happen
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the meeting you're about to walk into
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the new doctor you're seeing the driver
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you just pulled over for having a broken
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taillight and whatever mental picture
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you get change it open yourself to
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different possibilities
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the second thing when we do encounter
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the unexpected have the courage to
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examine your own behavior ask yourself
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is this how I would handle this
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interaction if this person looked like
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me or if this person didn't look like me
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third make a conscious effort to expose
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yourself and your children and others to
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that which is currently unexpected and
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doesn't need to be higher the employees
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patronize the businesses vote for the
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candidates who have earned the position
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and are also challenging the norms there
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are enormous and long ranging
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consequences when we can change the
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unexpected to the expected consider this
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we have two entire generations in the
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world whose first visual image of a
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United States president is black it
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doesn't matter what kind of hate or
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ugliness might have been spoken in their
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homes that picture is always within the
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realm of the expected for them we
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normalize things by making them expected
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that is the first step towards keeping
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all women from being seen as higher risk
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investments and women of a certain age
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from becoming ninjas
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let's do another visualization once
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again please close your eyes and take a
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deep breath now imagine you're sitting
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in a college class on computer
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programming and the professor just
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walked in picture the Facebook post of a
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friend congratulating a couple who just
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adopted a baby visualize your state
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swearing-in a new governor now open your
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eyes and raise your hand if your mental
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image differs substantially now than it
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did at the beginning of this talk that
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earlier brain exercise we did is
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something I do at the start of most
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investor meetings it's my way of
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tricking them into examining their own
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behavior but it's also how I consciously
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turn the unexpected into the expected
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before we get to the point in my pitch
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where I share with them that when we
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complete a series a round of venture
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financing the chief financial officer
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we're bringing on board is black and the
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story of my company starts with two
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happily married men and the CEO of this
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year's hottest tech startup looks
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exactly like me
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you