I've had several female understudies that seemed destined for rising to the top. None of them, except one, have. They've come close, but backed out here and the

I've had several female understudies that seemed destined for rising to the top. None of them, except one, have. They've come close, but backed out here and there. For reasons that seem unrelated to male influence. I'm very skeptical of some cries of conspiratorial male oppression. (Though not all.) However, I do think there is something in the structure of our society which acts as a powerful disincentive to women at a certain point. I did an architectural walk-through awhile back, and spoke to the CEO/architect of the small company that designed that building. My take-away from her was that, in order to "have it all," she basically had to build a smaller company that dealt more on a personal level with clients with doing smaller projects, as opposed to a larger company which could take on much higher-profile projects. I think there is a significant element of the communal which is vital to human well-being and high functioning, and that this missing element has something to do with what seems like unreasonable demands placed on working mothers and the frequent decision taken to reduce career emphasis to raise children.