#41: Reinventing after taking down your boss (Gretchen Carlson)

Every night her mother put her to bed, telling her she could be anything she wanted as long as she was willing to work hard for it. That support created a girl who knew how to stand up and speak for herself—even in grammar school when she was put into the wrong (remedial) reading group; speaking up got her moved.  So when the former Stanford grad, Miss America and CBS and Fox anchor found herself suing her boss for sexual harassment, it was that “ability to know I worked very hard that carried me through it.” Listen to CoveyClub founder Lesley Jane Seymour’s intimate discussion with the woman who gave others the guts to launch a thousand #MeToo lawsuits. Carlson explains why making the leap over 50 made it even harder to reinvent and offers solutions beginning with the observation that "women need to stop being so damn nice.” 

 

Episode notes: Help Gretchen keep the pressure on members of congress for passage of the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Harassment Act of 2017 (https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2203/cosponsors) by writing or calling your member of congress to get him/her to sign on. (Arbitration is what keeps harassment secret and abusers in power).  Follow her leadership tour (https://www.gretchencarlson.com/) and find her on facebook (https://www.facebook.com/GretchenCarlson/?fref=ts) and twitter (https://twitter.com/GretchenCarlson) and instagram (https://www.instagram.com/therealgretchencarlson/). 

Carlson also suggests “developing a passion for reading about others who have reinvented.” Her personal reading list includes: Daughter of Destiny: An Autobiography (Benazir Bhutto) (https://amzn.to/2MP7X9g), Can’t Is Not an Option: My American Story (Nikki Haley) (https://amzn.to/2GpeI0v), Becoming by Michelle Obama (https://amzn.to/2GbfxuA), and her own two books, Getting Real (https://amzn.to/2t2BKlU) and Be Fierce: Stop Harassment and Take Your Power Back (https://amzn.to/2t9xWz2).