Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. So as probably a lot of
Speaker 1: our listeners know, I know Jasin Kelly knows this. I'm
Speaker 1: a big fan of all girls and all women education.
Speaker 1: Um my daughters in it, all girls upper school. I
Speaker 1: went to all Women's college. So I'm very excited about
Speaker 1: our next guest, Dr Marisa Marissa Poor Jess. She's head
Speaker 1: of the Baldwin Schools and all Girls K through twelve school.
Speaker 1: She's got a new book out today. It is entitled
Speaker 1: What Girls Need, How to Raise Bold, courageous and Resilient Women.
Speaker 1: And she man her background. She's a former U. S.
Speaker 1: Naval officer and former senior advisor to the White House
Speaker 1: during the Obama administration. And she joins us on the
Speaker 1: phone from Pennsylvania. Very impressive. But I have to say
Speaker 1: I look forward to a day when we don't say
Speaker 1: that about a women because all women have your backgrounds.
Speaker 1: It's just a given. Yes, exactly, We're all awesome and
Speaker 1: we are all bold, and that's the story we want
Speaker 1: to tell our next generation. Well, we'll tell Marissa tell
Speaker 1: us about you know, what is the biggest difference between
Speaker 1: girls and what girls need and what boys need, especially
Speaker 1: when it comes to learning in their early years, that's
Speaker 1: going to pay off big time later on, especially when
Speaker 1: they're out in the work world. Yeah, I think it's
Speaker 1: the sense that we need to give our girls earlier
Speaker 1: and earlier some of the key skills that will differentiate
Speaker 1: them when they are adults, things that came to me
Speaker 1: later in life. You may have your own stories about that.
Speaker 1: When you learn to negotiate, when you learn to self advocate,
Speaker 1: These things that you know, by large come more naturally
Speaker 1: to young boys um social norms the way they're raised.
Speaker 1: But we meet our girls who have those strong voices
Speaker 1: to be able to step into a room and negotiate,
Speaker 1: haven't ask, and have it be effective in a way
Speaker 1: that feels personal to them. It's also interesting to think
Speaker 1: about some of the key skills that are very natural
Speaker 1: to our girls, how they emphathize and communicate, and if
Speaker 1: we can lean into those strengths that will be their
Speaker 1: competitive advantage when they're older too. So it's both, you know,
Speaker 1: bridging the gap and helping them lean enter their strength.
Speaker 1: Well and Messa, it's interesting to have this conversation as
Speaker 1: Carol pointed out earlier in the show, like we're having
Speaker 1: this series of conversations almost by accident. I mean we
Speaker 1: totally planned it. On the show today, around education, we
Speaker 1: were speaking with the dean of the business school down
Speaker 1: at Fuqua uh Fuqua Business School at Duke University, and
Speaker 1: he was talking about sort of this three three layered
Speaker 1: approach to some extent around leadership, which I'm guessing you
Speaker 1: would agree with because he talked about I Q and EQ,
Speaker 1: which we talked so much about, but also d Q,
Speaker 1: which I would say is dairy queen, but he would
Speaker 1: say is the decency quotation, which I think is so
Speaker 1: interesting to think about as we try and raise empathetic
Speaker 1: young people, and I wonder, how do you teach something
Speaker 1: like that or how do you nurture it? Well, it's
Speaker 1: such a critical part of how we need to raise
Speaker 1: the next generation, and this idea that it can actually
Speaker 1: be taught. It's a learned skill that can be reinforth
Speaker 1: even in how in what books you choose to be
Speaker 1: your no kids, we learn empathy by taking other people's perspective,
Speaker 1: is by stepping into other people's shoes and then thinking, well,
Speaker 1: not just how would we want to feel, but how
Speaker 1: would they want to feel? So read fiction, Read fiction
Speaker 1: where the protagonists, especially for young girls, is someone who
Speaker 1: is a young girl themselves but has a different background.
Speaker 1: You know, It's something that we leave into our curriculum
Speaker 1: at Baldwin and I know, Carol, I'm sure your daughter
Speaker 1: school does as well. But when you think about this
Speaker 1: for all our girls and there are boys too, especially
Speaker 1: these days when we're really trying to bridge gaps and
Speaker 1: understand different perspectives, and so that is a key way
Speaker 1: you can actually teach the skill of you of excuse me, empathy, um,
Speaker 1: alongside these other skills that we've know, we've talked about
Speaker 1: already so far. Right, So I do want to ask you,
Speaker 1: I mean not to take this in too much of
Speaker 1: a turn, but Carol mentioned your background, and I do wonder,
Speaker 1: I mean, give us the one minute version of you know,
Speaker 1: sort of how you touch those different things and end
Speaker 1: up um doing what you're doing leaving in school. Well,
Speaker 1: I think it's uh one of the things who want
Speaker 1: to teach our girls to risk a getters and all
Speaker 1: their follow their personal passions and see where it gets them.
Speaker 1: And I had the good portion of going to Baldwin,
Speaker 1: myself by too, and I'm a lung of an all
Speaker 1: girls school. And when I was young, my dream job
Speaker 1: was to fly just for the Navy, and I pursued
Speaker 1: that passion and then it took me different directions and
Speaker 1: one day was given the opportunity to give back to
Speaker 1: the community that gave me so much and set the
Speaker 1: stage for the next generation. And so it's one of
Speaker 1: those moments where we take risks in new ways and
Speaker 1: learn to lean into leadership. So it's it's both the
Speaker 1: fact that I had my own uh chance, and then
Speaker 1: I'm ready to give it to the next generation to
Speaker 1: make sure they're set up for success. To what was
Speaker 1: your experience so uh in the in the U. S. Military,
Speaker 1: in the U S. Navy, because I feel like that
Speaker 1: can be such a difficult world for women still. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's uh part and parcel of having
Speaker 1: navigated a lot of male dominated fields and for everyone
Speaker 1: who's listening, and it's been a tech industry, on a
Speaker 1: corporate industry and finance, it's still a place where there's
Speaker 1: so many barriers that we see in a daily basis
Speaker 1: that you get used to them. Um, it's the moment
Speaker 1: when you put on your equipment and you realize the
Speaker 1: equipment was made for a man of a different size,
Speaker 1: in different shape and doesn't really sit me. So I
Speaker 1: actually had a final waiver saying if anything happened, idea,
Speaker 1: okay with it and want through the US military. And
Speaker 1: yet um, Yet it was you know what I wanted
Speaker 1: to do when I had a good portion of having mentors,
Speaker 1: male mentors as well, who set the stage for me
Speaker 1: and allow me to pursue that passion. But I do
Speaker 1: think that it does take a certain um resilience, a
Speaker 1: certain uh competitive spirit. I mean that was for me
Speaker 1: something that really made a big difference, um. And that
Speaker 1: we want to make sure our girls have those core
Speaker 1: skills they can pursue these fields no matter um, you know,
Speaker 1: when they get older, no matter what the gender bias
Speaker 1: looks like. Then well, I'm thinking about your book too,
Speaker 1: and I'm wondering what the Marissa today would tell the
Speaker 1: younger Marissa, UM, based on what you've learned. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's interesting. I Um, I came to my
Speaker 1: voice despite my all girls upbringing, um, and despite a
Speaker 1: lot of what I was told, I think, um, and
Speaker 1: in some ways I came a little bit of my
Speaker 1: voice late. I mean, there's one story in the book
Speaker 1: where I had the most pivotal moment of my career
Speaker 1: at some level. UM was sitting around the table in
Speaker 1: the West Wing with the President of the United States.
Speaker 1: That moment we all dream about, where you're like stuff,
Speaker 1: you know, literally, you know, asking talking about national security,
Speaker 1: talking about my area of expertise, and it was the
Speaker 1: cliche of tat got your tongue? And I watched other
Speaker 1: people around the table UM speak to my issue set,
Speaker 1: and I left just thinking, Wow, I missed my opportunity.
Speaker 1: I had the good fortune of being able to sit
Speaker 1: down with UM the President later and speak to him
Speaker 1: about Um al Qaeda and is this in my issues?
Speaker 1: And so I did recover UM. But I do think
Speaker 1: those moments when I too realized that there was just
Speaker 1: a hurdle I had to overcome and I had to
Speaker 1: still train myself even as a young adult, to do
Speaker 1: these things. And I think we want to the next
Speaker 1: generation not to have those moments. Right, Let's get back
Speaker 1: to our conversation with Dr Marissa Porches. She is currently
Speaker 1: the head of school at the Baldwin School. Former U
Speaker 1: S Naval officer former senior advisor to the White House
Speaker 1: and Marissa. I wanted to pick up kind of where
Speaker 1: we left off because Carol asked a great question about
Speaker 1: what you would tell your younger self. And what's interesting
Speaker 1: is you have, like I guess, a few hundred of
Speaker 1: your younger selves that you're talking to all the time.
Speaker 1: And so I do wonder when you came into this job,
Speaker 1: what was one thing or a couple of things that
Speaker 1: you changed or adapted or or did differently based on
Speaker 1: your experience there as a student, but then your later
Speaker 1: experience in the military and then uh in the government. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well on you know, on one hand, we have such
Speaker 1: expert teachers and administrators that I you know, have the
Speaker 1: good portion of letting them. We invent the curriculum, daily basis,
Speaker 1: and things that go on in school these days. It's
Speaker 1: just it blows your mind. So, um, you know, on
Speaker 1: that level, I was walking into a really wonderful situation. Um.
Speaker 1: And yet I always think we can do more to
Speaker 1: talk to our girls and really be honest with them
Speaker 1: about what takes for um, for young women to grow
Speaker 1: into their best leadership self. And so we did start
Speaker 1: a leadership course for our seniors and we talked very
Speaker 1: directly about some of the challenges that both face, particularly
Speaker 1: as women, not just in college, but as they leave
Speaker 1: and enter the real world. And I think as the
Speaker 1: system is changing, there's still a lot of barriers to
Speaker 1: entry and things that we want our girls to know
Speaker 1: about before they meet these situations so they can face
Speaker 1: them head on. And I think it's also about UM
Speaker 1: teaching really how our girls want to, you know, learn
Speaker 1: from failure, how they should be taking risks, how they
Speaker 1: need to be resilient. And that's part of this book
Speaker 1: as well, is really what we can do to teach
Speaker 1: the skills of resilience, the skills of risk taking UM
Speaker 1: from an early age so that you know they're ready
Speaker 1: to be the entrepreneurs that we know they need to
Speaker 1: be and want to be when they get older. I
Speaker 1: have to say, Bam, Marissa Man, when you said about
Speaker 1: this idea of taking risks, like I mentor a lot
Speaker 1: of younger women, and I constantly am saying, and I
Speaker 1: say this to my daughter who's seventeen, you know, make
Speaker 1: yourself uncomfort ball and don't be afraid and and take
Speaker 1: those risks, because I do think that there is a
Speaker 1: big difference between men and women. And I know that
Speaker 1: there are studies out there that even for jobs that
Speaker 1: women feel like they have to take the boxes on
Speaker 1: everything and men are like, yeah, I got most of them.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm perfect for the job there. I don't
Speaker 1: know whether it's just the d NA what it is,
Speaker 1: but I feel like that's something that women and young
Speaker 1: girls have to be more comfortable with, and studies show
Speaker 1: exactly what you're saying. And I think every woman listening
Speaker 1: to the show can can remember a moment when they
Speaker 1: realize they let some guide take an opportunity that could
Speaker 1: have been there is if only they were a little
Speaker 1: more of a risk take or put themselves forward. Um.
Speaker 1: And I think if we can talk about this from
Speaker 1: an early age and there are things we can do
Speaker 1: concretely to push all girls to to practice feeling uncomfortable
Speaker 1: used to those moments and they build a muscle that
Speaker 1: later on when there are bills, will be like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know I got this. I'm okay with that moment
Speaker 1: because when I was little, my parents, my teachers, by
Speaker 1: family members encourage that in me. And there's tricks and
Speaker 1: skill and strategies that work for that. And that's for
Speaker 1: the book of it out. I have to follow up Jason.
Speaker 1: I I'm like pointing at him. I'm like, yeah, see
Speaker 1: it's you man. But no, I don't really mean that,
Speaker 1: But I mean there is something about you. Do mean that,
Speaker 1: You're just hopefully not talking about me. But now I
Speaker 1: was around. I have a lot of nieces and they're
Speaker 1: in their mid you know, or young twenties. But this
Speaker 1: whole idea of like women are so quick to say
Speaker 1: sorry and back off, and and I do think that
Speaker 1: there is something in society that has yet to change
Speaker 1: to accept women who are powerful and strong and aggressive
Speaker 1: very much though. And there's interesting studies that show about competitiveness, right,
Speaker 1: and how we nurture this healthy competitive nature we think
Speaker 1: competition is. You know, I thought of as bad for
Speaker 1: a lot of our young girls. They think, No, it's
Speaker 1: about I don't want to beat my friend, I don't
Speaker 1: want to stand out at the spelling be or on
Speaker 1: the soccer field. And need our girls to thrive in
Speaker 1: a competitive environment because it's a good thing. You know,
Speaker 1: Guys don't when we know that it takes that to
Speaker 1: get to the top in any industry. Um, and it's
Speaker 1: healthy too. It's not a malad adaptation. So you know,
Speaker 1: it's about that, it's about how we own our best
Speaker 1: self and you know, and and have a little fightyness
Speaker 1: with it. You know, you could call it aggressiveness, but
Speaker 1: you could also describe vicenis too. Right, Yeah, and be
Speaker 1: in the game. Right. I have one last question, and Jason,
Speaker 1: I will let you talk at some point, but let
Speaker 1: so you're gonna have to come back. What do you
Speaker 1: think a female vice president? If that's what we got,
Speaker 1: what I was I was going to go to politics next,
Speaker 1: because we've heard this criticism of a lot of the
Speaker 1: people who are vying for this job. She's a little aggressive. Like,
Speaker 1: what do you think a female vice president might bring
Speaker 1: to a ticket and really more importantly an administration, a
Speaker 1: White House and ultimately our nation. Well, I think it's
Speaker 1: such an important moment of the country. And I think
Speaker 1: one thing we have seen that UM women bring to
Speaker 1: the table the diversity of perspectives and willingness to see
Speaker 1: from lots of different perspectives, how to solve a problems,
Speaker 1: how to lean into a moment and really collaborate UM
Speaker 1: to find a solution. And I think that comes with
Speaker 1: how we communicate naturally, how Um, we emphasize and how
Speaker 1: that's we enforced throughout our lives. And I think it's
Speaker 1: something that will, you know, sort of the next administration,
Speaker 1: well if if it goes that direction. But I'm excited
Speaker 1: to see that play out, and hopefully we're all ready
Speaker 1: for it, right, And that's that part of the conversation.
Speaker 1: We're so ready. In fact, it's a way over exactly.
Speaker 1: We feel very very ready for that. All right, Really
Speaker 1: good to catch up with you. Congratulations on the book.
Speaker 1: We appreciate your time and your efforts around this. Dr
Speaker 1: mer support just She is the current head of the
Speaker 1: Baldwin School and the author of What Girls Need, How
Speaker 1: to Raise Bold, Courageous and Resilient Women, a really important read,
Speaker 1: timely to say the least. She's a former U. S.
Speaker 1: Naval officer senior adviser to former President Barack Obama. Carol, Yeah,
Speaker 1: she's another one we have to come come back to.
Speaker 1: And she's been grappling too with having to shut down
Speaker 1: her school. I was kind of checking out some of
Speaker 1: the videos that she has been posting online for her school,
Speaker 1: and UM, you know, it's tough for anybody who's in
Speaker 1: education right now and and trying to find the way forward,