On Thursday, March 14, Cleary Gottlieb hosted its Women’s History Month Celebration: Decoding Bravery, with Reshma Saujani, founder & CEO of Girls Who Code.
Over 250 guests attended the event, held at Cleary’s New York office, which included legal and professional staff, clients, law students, alumni, and minority bar organization members.
Reshma discussed her remarkable career and the insights she gained along the way, from her days as an attorney and activist, to her foray into the political scene in 2010 as the first Indian American woman to run for a seat in the U.S. Congress. During the race, she visited local schools and saw the gender gap in computing classes firsthand, which led her to start Girls Who Code—a national nonprofit organization leading the movement to inspire, educate, and equip young women with the computing skills to pursue 21st century opportunities. She also served as Deputy Public Advocate for New York City and ran a spirited campaign for Public Advocate in 2013.
Reshma’s TED talk, “Teach Girls, Bravery Not Perfection,” has more than four million views and has sparked a national conversation about raising girls. She is the author of three books, including Brave, Not Perfect, the New York Times bestseller Girls Who Code: Learn to Code and Change the World, and Women Who Don’t Wait in Line, in which she advocates for a new model of female leadership focused on embracing risk and failure, promoting mentorship and sponsorship, and boldly charting your own course, personally and professionally.
Reshma has been named one of Fortune’s World’s Greatest Leaders, Fortune’s 40 Under 40, a WSJ Magazine Innovator of the Year, a Future Lion of New York by The New York Times, a Harold W. McGraw, Jr. Prize in Education winner, one of the 50 Most Powerful Women in New York by the New York Daily News, CNBC’s Next List, Forbes’s Most Powerful Women Changing the World, Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People, Crain’s New York’s 40 Under 40, Ad Age’s Creativity 50, Business Insider’s 50 Women Who Are Changing the World, City & State’s Rising Stars, and an AOL/PBS Next MAKER.