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Let It Go: My Extraordinary Story - From Refugee to Entrepreneur to Philanthropist

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I did find this a contradiction to how she comes across in person and some of her philanthropy such as the school (not so much the cure research), so I am giving this a lot of thought. But I have to judge the book as it is written. Offen und ehrlich berichtet Dame Stephanie Shriley von Selbstmordgedanken, Nervenzusammenbruch, Selbstzweifel und schweren Zeiten. As a half-Jewish child during the beginning of World War 2, Shirley was saved from the horrors of Nazism by escaping on a train as a child refugee. In England she would build a new life, and build a software consulting company. Freelance Programmers (later F International) employed female programmers who were under-appreciated and discriminated against by the business world at the time. Many of these women worked from home part-time or while raising children in a world that wouldn’t allow them to work otherwise. They would work on large technical projects for some of the largest companies in Britain. Let It Go is a strong feminist treatise drawn from reality, not abstractions.

A child refugee builds the first wholly female software company, putting feminism into practice, and goes on to become one of the most noted philanthropists in her country. It’s a story fit for Hollywood. Stephanie Shirley tells it with gusto, raw honesty, and compelling writing in her autobiography, Let It Go.To give them a better life, she and her sister were given up by their parents (her father was Jewish) at an Austrian train station right before Nazi occupation. They were sent off to England to start a new life with new parents. I stood by my decision and soon realised that this letting go was one of the smartest things I could have done." Shirley was a pioneer in many ways. Creating a software company in and of itself was still a new idea in 1962 when she got started. Creating a company of freelancers decades before “the gig economy” was an innovation. Employing almost all women in a technology company (although women were many of the first programmers) was unheard of. In Let It Go Shirley takes you through the early struggles of building Freelance Programmers. The reader receives a strong understanding of how the company operated, how it acquired clients, and the challenges that it faced as it grew from her cottage into a multi-million dollar enterprise. While Shirley covers the early period in the right level of detail, the company’s later growth is not as well recounted in the book. However, I would warn readers that their are a lot of possible triggers here for neurodiverse people. As someone with 3 diagnosed family members (2 non verbal, 1 with a rare form of epilepsy) I found this very upsetting. By the early 1960s, now a British citizen and married with a new name, Stephanie Shirley was becoming frustrated with the low expectations, inequality and sexism that women faced in the workplace. She decided to start her own company, selling software. It was called Freelance Programmers, and it was staffed by women working from home, blazing a trail for flexible working practices for women with caring responsibilities. 297 of the first 300 staff were women. At the time, when a woman couldn’t open a bank account without her husband’s permission, this idea was truly revolutionary.

I wasn't expecting to give this a low rating, I've seen Dame Shirley speak and she is inspirational. Most of this book was 4 star. Her early life as a refugee and the founding of her freelance company and it's growth are fascinating. This engrossing story of an extraordinary life is filled with lessons in what it means to be human' - Financial Times Co-written with Richard Askwith, the former Executive Editor of The Independent and the award-winning author of seven books in his own name, including biographies of Emil Zátopek and Lata Brandisová. There are a few poignant quotes which spoke to me in this book. Some your typical stirring speech.... Shirley empowered a generation of women in technology, giving them unheard of freedom to choose their own hours and manage their own workloads. The business thrived and Shirley gradually transferred ownership to her staff, creating 70 millionaires in the process.

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Das Konzept von Mrs Shirleys Firma ist simpel: Home Office und Teilzeit sowie auf Selbstständigen Basis. Modern eben. Und das in den 60igern. Let It Go is also a deeply personal book. Shirley goes into detail about her relationships, her family life, and her struggles taking care of her child, Giles, who is affected by a severe form of autism. She weaves the personal stories well into the business narrative, making it a more “full picture” story than most business books. Her personal life affected her business and vice versa. That’s true of almost anybody, and to think otherwise is a folly. Yet many business memoirs almost completely exclude personal details.

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