As this book will show, traits like overconfidence and self-absorption should be seen as red flags. But instead, they prompt us to say, ‘Ah, there’s a charismatic fellow! He’s probably leadership material.’ The result in both business and politics is a surplus of incompetent men in charge, and this surplus reduces opportunities for competent people—women and men—while keeping the standards of leadership depressingly low.

Expertise increases self-knowledge, which includes awareness of one’s limitations. Conversely, the less you know, the less aware you are of your limitations and the more overconfident you will be.

Women’s self-reports of confidence had no correlation with how others saw their confidence.

...we choose leaders by how confident they appear rather than by how confident or competent they are, we not only end up choosing more men to lead us but ultimately choose more-incompetent men.

As a consequence, organizations often assume that a leader’s career success reflects his or her performance—the more senior a leader, the more talented the person must be.