Voice of Experience: Petra Van Hoeken, Chief Risk Officer – EMEA, RBS Global Banking & Markets

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“Make sure you enter your career excited, that you have a desire to do the job and that you want it,” advised Petra Van Hoeken, Chief Risk Officer – EMEA, RBS Global Banking & Markets.

Van Hoeken, whose career has spanned decades and has worked in different roles around the world, has stayed true to this mantra herself. Part of her success, she explained, has to do with her openness to new opportunities.

She continued, “It’s amazing what kinds of opportunities there are. I see so many youngsters coming into their careers and they want to plan everything. My advice is to be open minded and learn.”

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Advice for Ambitious Women

iStock_000004699538XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Last week, BritishAmerican Business Women’s Network hosted a discussion on how women can access promotion opportunities in the tumultuous economic atmosphere. The panel, hosted by KPMG, featured Ana Duarte McCarthy, Managing Director and Chief Diversity Officer, Citi; Claudia Saran, Practice Leader – People & Change, KPMG LLP; Lareina Yee, Partner, McKinsey & Company; and was moderated by Leann Balbona, KPMG Network of Women Leader, Managing Director, Tax – International Executive Services, KPMG LLP.

Yee opened the event event with an overview of McKinsey’s Women Matter [PDF] report, which measured the views on gender diversity of about 1,500 business leaders globally. “There are enormous reasons to be very proud of where we are and be happy with the progress we’ve made.”

But, Yee said, we shouldn’t rest on our laurels just yet. For example, she explained, without the advances women have made in the workplace since the 1970s, today’s GDP would be 25% smaller. How much bigger could it be if we achieved gender parity in leadership? Considering the current economic circumstances, this question is growing ever more salient.

“The contribution of women undoubtedly matters,” she said. “If we’re going to get out of this economic funk, we’re going to need them. And we’re going to need them for a long time.”

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Five Ways Working Moms Can Own the Juggle

iStock_000000909343XSmallBy Elizabeth Bales Frank

Work-life coach Amber Rosenberg recently released a survey citing guilt as a top challenge for working mothers. Fast on the heels of this not-so-happy announcement came a story in the Wall Street Journal detailing a study conducted by a graduate student in sociology which concluded that working mothers who accept that they can’t do it all are less prone to depression.

Although it’s easy to tell a working mother to accept that she can’t do it all, it might be more effective to deliver that message of acceptance to her boss, clients, spouse and children. In the meantime, how to deal with all that multi-tasking and all those expectations?

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Why Companies Need More Women to Compete

Successful group of business colleagues working on a laptopBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

A new study has revealed what many of us already knew – on average, women really like working as part of a team. Not only that, but men would rather compete alone than pair up with someone else.

But the Loyola Marymount University study, “Can Teams Help to Close the Gender Competition Gap?” [PDF] revealed more than the (often true) gender stereotypes we hear again and again, that women are collaborative and men are overconfident. It revealed yet another subtle way that corporate cultures stack the deck against women. When corporate cultures are built on individual competition, women are discouraged from participating. But companies can reverse this trend and possibly improve their performance by engendering a more team-based approach to the competitive environment.

The study showed that women were more willing to engage in competition when paired with a teammate – and conversely, the percentage of men willing to participate in competition decreased when working with a partner. And according to the researchers, economists Andrew Healy and Jennifer Pate, that’s a good thing.

While research has shown women often unwilling to take career risks, and men all too willing to engage in risky behavior on the job, narrowing the gender competition gap could help companies perform better. And according to Healy and Pate, introducing the element of teamwork narrowed that gap by two-thirds.

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Intrepid Woman: Amanda Steinberg, Founder and CEO, DailyWorth

AmandaSteinbergBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“Our mission is to transform women’s relationship to self worth and money – to empower women to increase their net worth,” said Amanda Steinberg, Founder and CEO of DailyWorth. “There is a lot of media attention around increasing savings and salary potential, but increasing net worth – you don’t hear a lot about it.”

“We want to really understand what the particular issues are around money, and provide engaging and interesting financial information,” she continued. DailyWorth is a web community for women to learn about personal finance in a more engaging, empowering way.

“It’s about freedom of choices in life,” Steinberg explained. “The endgame for many women – even successful ones – is this ideal of the ‘full scholarship.’ So many women still strive toward this husband/provider construct. It’s like some sort of princess rescue fantasy.”

She continued, “But for far too many women, it doesn’t work out that way – and it’s an antiquated idea that lives in our subconscious.”

“The next level of the women’s movement is knowing that you have a choice. You don’t necessarily have to be the breadwinner or the CEO – but you can choose to be.”

“It’s about liberation. Or it is for me, anyway,” Steinberg added.

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Voice of Experience: Joanna Cound, Managing Director, Government Affairs and Public Policy, BlackRock

joannacoundBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

According to Joanna Cound, Managing Director of Government affairs and Public Policy at BlackRock, a critical career juncture for women is the move from director level to managing director.

“I made MD in 1994, before there were a lot of [women’s leadership] programs in place. It’s amazing how robust the program that BlackRock has set up is,” she said. BlackRock Women’s Initiative Network (“WIN”) was launched in April 2010 and currently has seven regional chapters with over 1,800 members. She advised that women begin to build a supportive network early, to help navigate and seek mentorship throughout their career.

“Networks are hugely important to your career,” she said. “Women know this but often neglect networking for more immediate priorities. Seeking guidance from senior executives, both from mentors and more informally from colleagues, is also critical. They say ‘feedback is the food of kings’ and it’s true. Ask for feedback and act on it.”

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Cracking the UK’s £15 Billion Glass Ceiling

iStock_000017129414XSmallBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

A recent report out of the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission has revealed that at the current rate of advancement, it will take 70 years before gender parity is reached in the boardrooms of the FTSE 100 – and that’s just parity by numbers. It doesn’t even measure the rate of advancement when it comes to pay, power, or responsibilities.

The report, Sex and Power 2011, analyzed the UK’s top 26,000 positions across business, government, media, the arts, and the public sector. According to the Commission, there are about 5,400 ‘missing’ women from influential positions in Britain.

This amounts to “the squandering of talent,” says the report. It continues, “We are losing out on what women can contribute, with the Women and Work Commission estimating that unlocking women’s talent in the workplace could be worth £15 billion or more.”

This glass ceiling is an expensive one – and the report provides a few key reasons it’s still in place. Here’s why.

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Across Boundaries: What the UK can learn from Australia about Women on Boards

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A Happy business woman with other colleagues in the backgroundBy Cleo Thompson (London), founder of The Gender Blog

As the debate around the use of quotas to increase the number of women on UK boards continues, so does the need to look at what’s working around the world to shift the gender diversity needle.

Earlier this month, the European Professional Women’s Network invited Claire Braund, co-founder of Women on Boards, the leading advocate for improving gender diversity on Australian boards, to a London event to speak about the Australian story and outline Australia’s track record of success around women gaining access to board positions in business, government, community and not-for-profit sectors.

Braund co-founded Women on Boards – which now has 11,500 members – in 2006 and she is currently in the UK as part of her Churchill Fellowship award, a bursary with which she is examining the impact of boardroom quotas in Norway and the progress of the public policy debate in the UK and France.

Hosted by investment services company Mercer, the EPWN audience was welcomed by Mercer’s UK CEO Alan Whalley, who also serves as the executive sponsor of the Vine, the company’s network for women. Braund outlined the introduction and impact of the new Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) regulations, announced in December 2009 and described by Australian federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick as “the first structural intervention we’ve had”. The plan will force companies to publish a gender breakdown of directors and senior employees and to set both objectives and targets for gender diversity.

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Voice of Experience: Monica McConville, Partner, Practice Leader, English Law Equity Capital Markets, Shearman & Sterling

Monica_McConvilleBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“It’s important for women, when first starting out, to remember that you have a right to a seat at the table, even if you’re the only woman in the room,” said Monica McConville, a London-based partner and leader of Shearman & Sterling’s English law equity capital markets practice.”

She added, “Opportunities will come your way. Always try to embrace them.”

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Voice of Experience: Natalie Horton, Head of Synthetic Equity Trading for North America, Deutsche Bank

nataliehortonBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Natalie Horton, Head of Synthetic Equity Trading for North America at Deutsche Bank, has spent seventeen years learning the business. And her biggest piece of advice comes down to building relationships.

“Network – I could say it a thousand times. It’s so important. Above you, around you, and below you,” she said. “Get to know everyone. That’s how you learn. If I have any sort of problem, maybe I don’t have the answer, but I know who does,” she explained.

Horton has built her career by taking risks and making connection with others – and, she said – she wants more women to feel comfortable doing the same.

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