Mary Barra

I am happy that GM chose Mary Barra as CEO and I hope she does well.  Still I feel obliged to cold shower the media frenzy to anoint her the next great mile stone in feminism making headway into the business world. 

First, it is hardly indicative of women's progress to tick off CEO jobs going to women.  There are precious few CEO jobs out there.  If we measured women's progress by this alone, we could severely miss the mark in terms of assessing the conditions on the ground for most women, which is what, I believe, the best intentions of the women's right movement is all about, no?

Secondly, I would caution people to celebrate the female CEO as an icon because, frankly, too many have sucked been disappointments.  Andrea Jung.  Indra Nooyi,  Carly Fiorina,  Irene Rosenfeld, Brenda Barnes.  That is not to say that there aren't successful, world-class female CEOs out there.  It is just to say, wait for performance.  It is no virtue to have a crappy female CEO over a crappy male CEO.  Place too much meaning into these appointments are you are sure to be disappointed.  The true signs of progress are that we don't have to write effusive articles when women get CEO jobs, that we don't have to refrain from writing about their failures when they fail.