June 22, 2018

Mayor Emanuel Interviews Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg On Chicago Stories Podcast

Mayor's Press Office    312.744.3334

On this week’s episode of Chicago Stories, Mayor Emanuel was joined by Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg to talk about training Chicago’s students for the future, female empowerment, and making the world a better place through technology, as well as some of the hard lessons learned along the way.

To start off the conversation, the two Clinton Administration alums wasted no time in addressing the need to create policies that support both a successful career and a nurturing family. It’s a choice Americans are all too often forced to make through limited — or the outright absence of — paid maternity leave, family care leave, and much more.

“The goal is that we don’t force people to choose between the job they need and the family they love,” Sheryl said.

But it doesn’t stop there. As Sheryl told Mayor Emanuel, that choice isn’t just a false one, it’s also counter-productive, and corporate leaders and policy makers are catching on.

“Businesses and cities are increasingly recognizing that when we support people, they do better work,” Sheryl said. “So these things don’t trade off against each other, they build upon each other.”

Sheryl and Mayor Emanuel also talked about some of the sobering lessons she and Facebook have had to learn over the past two years about their platform and the long-reaching power of social media.

“When you build technology and believe so much in the good you’re seeing, you also have to be prepared and prevent the bad-use cases,” Sheryl told Mayor Emanuel.

That’s not to say Sheryl’s pessimistic about technology’s power to create positive change.

“We have to continue to believe in technology,” Sheryl said. “There are still really big [global] challenges, and those of us who work on building technology need to build technology that helps meet those challenges.”

It’s that fundamental belief in technology that brought Sheryl to Chicago this week, where she joined Mayor Emanuel and City Colleges of Chicago to announce two collaborations to expand digital technology training to students across the city.

“We know that people need jobs,” Sheryl said, “ and when we ask people what’s important in hiring people, today they will say that digital skills are more important than where you went to school.”

Be sure to listen to the rest of the episode as Sheryl and Mayor Emanuel talk about creating female empowerment, the #MeToo movement, navigating new regulatory environments, and the growth of Lean In Circles around the country.

Listen and subscribe to Chicago Stories podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify


###