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Tuesday, September 14, 2021

Review: Machiavelli for Women by Stacey Vanek Smith

Machiavelli for Women
by Stacey Vanek Smith

Publisher: Gallery Books
Pages: 224
Format: eARC
Buy the Book: Amazon

Goodreads:  Women have been making strides towards equality for decades, or so we’re so often told. They’ve been increasingly entering male-dominated areas of the workforce and consistently surpassing their male peers in grades, university attendance, and degrees. They’ve recently stormed the political arena with a vengeance. But despite all of this, the payoff is—quite literally—not there: the gender pay gap has held steady at about 20% since 2000. And the number of female CEOs for Fortune 500 companies has actually been declining.

So why, in the age of #MeToo and #TimesUp, is the glass ceiling still holding strong? And how can we shatter it for once and for all? Stacy Vanek Smith’s advice: ask Machiavelli.

Using The Prince as a guide and with charm and wit, Smith applies Renaissance politics to the 21st century, and demonstrates how women can take and maintain power in careers where they have long been cast as second-best. Based on the latest research, tips from successful women across many industries, and experiences from Smith’s own life, Machiavelli for Women is a powerful, entertaining, and inspirational guide for a new generation of successful women.


Kritters Thoughts:  A women's empowerment book that uses the book The Prince for inspiration to create lessons to show women what they can do to move the needle to more of an equitable society.  (Not that women should be doing all the work) But lessons for women to ask for what they want and need in a way that uses the skills that women typically possess to get the outcomes they want.  

While the author includes the references needed from The Prince to show her points, for me, I wish I had recently read it and was a little more educated in the source material and I think the book would have been a smoother and more enjoyable read for me.  

The thing I loved about this book was the moments where the author used general traits about women and flipped the script to show women how to use these general traits that we typically have because we are women and use them to our advantage.  The chapters that I will be referencing a lot in the future are two and three with money and confidence.  It was so eye opening to read why women don't ask for a promotion as we want to be 100% ready for that next step in the career and I can understand that and that we will accept less pay because sometimes we are just darn happy to be employed!  

While The Prince references were great and an interesting way to present the material in a new way because I am not familiar it didn't quite do it for me, but as said before I could see myself enjoy that if I was more aware of the material.  


Rating: enjoyable, but didn't leave me wanting more

Ebook2021 Challenge: 110 out of 100

Disclosure of Material Connection:  I received one copy of this book free of charge from Simon and Schuster.  I was not required to write a positive review in exchange for receipt of the book; rather, the opinions expressed in this review are my own.


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