Co-Producing Success: How Mentoring Encourages Developing Leaders

iStock_000004797699XSmallBy Ileanna Santiago Ruiz, Licensed Industrial Psychologist, Gen Yer and Mentee

What would happen if we linked generations by co-producing scenarios of success? What if corporate training programs developed blemish free and customized curriculums? These are just some of the questions that come up as part of a discussion with colleagues while talking about our career hopes and dreams.

We all agreed there was something simply unaccommodating about the workforce we belong to. Something doesn’t quite “click.” Most of our coworkers are already comfortably reaching retirement. We were still “finding ourselves” and deciding what way to go.

As Generation Y, subject matter experts with social media presence, we represent a new phenotype of employee with markedly different goals. This sample of employees will become 2020’s leading men and women. We will need guidance to get there.

Enter mentorship. But how can we ensure it is truly effective?

As noted by Helen Colley in her thought provoking paper, “Exploring Myths of Mentor,” most mentoring proposals have become a response to young people who feel excluded in the workplace. Her appraisal (much like a mentoring exposé) finds any discovery purely anecdotal, calling mentoring yet another training and development typology in a sea of solution surplus. Others of course, find great value in having a VIP pass to an experienced person’s range of wisdom. But despite the debates, open mentoring programs can target younger employees’ needs by connecting them with seasoned veterans. Who can argue with that?

In my experience, mentors are not self-proclaimed messiahs. In fact, they’re more like compelling and talented individuals with volumes of information to learn from. Therefore, mentors are much more like co-producers of success. Can you think of something more memorable or powerful than having someone directly, and positively, impacting your career?

Here are 5 abiding principles aspiring mentors and mentees should make good use of in their pursuit of affirmative impact in the workplace.

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Navigating Your Career: Proven Strategies for Ambitious Women

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Women-working-on-tablet“I continue to be humbled by being in the company of women,” said Cynthia Fryer Steer, Executive Vice President and Head of Manager Research and Investment Solutions, BNY Mellon. “We can learn so much from each other.”

Steer was speaking at The Glass Hammer’s latest career management event “Navigating, Negotiating, and Building Your Strategic Network” last week. Our panelists shared their advice and wisdom (based on their combined “150 years of experience” said moderator Kathleen McQuiggan, President of Catalina Leadership) on how to get to the next level in the investment management industry.

In addition to Steer, our panelists included Nicole Arnaboldi, Managing Director and Vice Chairman of Alternative Investments, Credit Suisse; Nanette Buziak, Managing Director, Head of Equity Trading, ING Investment Management; Ingrid Dyott, Managing Director and Associate Portfolio Manager, Neuberger Berman; and Paula L. Rogers, President, Institutional Capital.

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He Said, She Said: Recalculating the Gender Wage Gap

iStock_000003482002XSmallBy Tina Vasquez (Los Angeles)

There is a 23 percent wage gap between men and women in the US – women working full time still earn just 77 percent of what men earn. For years now we’ve been told that the gap narrowed considerably in the 1980’s due largely to women’s progress in education and workforce participation and that progress has since stalled, but a new study from the University of Georgia’s Jeremy Reynolds and Jeffrey Wenger has revealed some shocking results.

While writing a paper about how couples deal with health insurance arrangements when sick, Reynolds came across an interesting fact: when a spouse reports on the health of their husband, they tend to say their husband is less healthy than their husband believes himself to be and the same is true for husbands reporting on the health of their wives. This unexplainable quirk got the professors wondering about what other issues self-reporting affected.

As it turns out, it’s made much of the data about the gender wage gap seem unreliable at best.

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Voice of Experience: Kelly Williams, Group Head and Managing Director, Customized Fund Investment Group, Asset Management Division, Credit Suisse

KellyWilliamsBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Kelly Williams, Group Head and Managing Director of Credit Suisse’s Customized Fund Investment Group, believes that networking is critical in the private equity business – especially for women.

“Too many people focus solely on doing deals, and not as much on being part of firm building,” she said. “Networking and relationship development with both entrepreneurs and investors are equally important for building a sustainable career. That’s where women need help in this industry.”

Williams, whose group manages over $28 billion of assets on behalf of clients globally, is the founding chair of the Private Equity Women Investor Network, and believes that by playing a bigger role in generating business, women can raise their profile across the industry.

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Pursuing an MBA: When it’s Appropriate and When It’s a Pass

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HurryContributed by The Runaway MBA

I can’t really remember when I decided that I wanted a MBA. In college, I believed that it was the next step after my first five years of work. However, my career progressed because of what I achieved. My salary was quite high without the degree. I could not see how derailing up to two years of work experience plus the investment of a small house could lead to career advancement. When I heard the word “MBA,” I saw professionals that were overpriced, inexperienced, and ungrounded.

With the onset of the financial crisis, my career stalled at the Vice President level. Although times were difficult, there were meaningful roles to which I was being passed up for. I lost track of the number of times in which I was told “But you don’t have a MBA.”  I examined the biographies of over 500 CIO’s, and of all the leaders that I admired; all had earned an MBA or JD from a leading institution. “Could there be something to this?” I thought. I gave in, applied, and enrolled.

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Own Your Thought Leadership to Advance Your Career

Businesswoman Giving a PresentationBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Recently the Women’s Media Center released its latest report, and whether or not you work in the media, the report’s data is alarming.

The study, “The Status of Women in the US Media 2012,” refers to a number of studies, revealing how few stories are being told about women in the news, and how few women are being positioned as experts.

For example, it mention’s last year’s Media and Gender Monitor study, which says only 24% of news stories are about women. And it discusses American University School of Public Affairs Women and Politics Institute statistics that say women were only one-fifth (21.7%) of guests on Sunday morning talk shows. Women were only 26% of sources at National Public Radio, which is considered an “industry leader in engaging female correspondents and hosts.”

Who we see and hear from in the news goes a long way in shaping our view, as a society, of whose voice matters. As the report says, “By deciding who gets to talk, what shapes the debate, who writes, and what is important enough to report, media shape our understanding of who we are and what we can be.”

The dearth of women in the news can influence opinions about what an expert or leader looks like – which can impact women’s career advancement and opportunities as well. Fortunately, this situation can be changed.

Jamia Wilson, Vice President of Programs at the Women’s Media Center, leads training programs for women and girls, so they can be prepared to speak publicly to the media. She said, “It’s very important for women to amplify their voices to change the volume in the media. Right now our voices are underrepresented.”

And she says, preparing to speak out as a thought leader can change the conversation on the air and at the table of power in your own organization.

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Movers and Shakers: Jane Newton, Partner and Wealth Manager, RegentAtlantic Capital

janenewtonBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Jane Newton was drawn to Wall Street fresh out of her graduation from Tufts University. “What better place is there for an econ major who wants to learn about business in the Big Apple?” she asked.  “I wanted to learn from the smartest people around.”

Newton joined JP Morgan, working in investment banking for 12 years, then moving to private banking for another six. “Switching to work with high net worth clients was probably the best strategic decision I could have made – having that direct impact on the important people I work with and their families.”

She continued, “And moving to RegentAtlantic Capital seven years ago was the other best decision I’ve made professionally. The firm has fostered my leadership and created an environment where I can hone my focus and skills toward a specific market.”

Now Partner and Wealth Manager at RegentAtlantic, Newton is also an enthusiastic advocate of networking, especially for women. In 2010, she launched the annual Wall Street Women Forum®, an event designed specifically for high-level women on Wall Street to help them continue their professional success. “Conceiving of the Forum takes me totally out of my comfort zone. I created something from scratch to meet a need I identified. The Forum changes women’s lives in a way I didn’t expect from the beginning and it has touched a nerve. There’s a gap we’ve been able to fill for these professionals,” she explained.

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Which of Your Strengths is Holding You Back?

Contributed by CEO Coach Henna Inam

You’re an achiever. You can put in long hours without burning out. You have a great ability to get started on new tasks and take on new challenges. You set new goals and levels of productivity for your group or work team. This has made you successful throughout your career. Keep doing what you’re doing because it’s all good, right? Wrong. Our achievement drive applied in the wrong situations can cause us to be blind to the needs of others and drive our teams to exhaustion. Many of the strengths we have can also be sources of derailers in our career. Does this mean we abandon our strengths? How do we truly leverage our strengths AND prevent them from becoming derailers?

The following are three leadership practices that can help.

1. Fully Understand Your Strengths. I am a big fan of Strengthsfinder 2.0 and recommend it to all of my executive coaching clients. The first step to success in our careers is to fully own and understand our strengths and to look for opportunities to exercise these strengths in our work situations. Research indicates that our success comes from fully developing our strengths rather than focusing on our weak points. So take a moment to:

a.) Discover your strengths. You can take Strengthsfinder 2.0 or use performance reviews and other 360 feedback tools to discover your strengths.
b.) Look for situations in work and life where you can bring these strengths to drive success.
c.) Proactively plan your career toward those kinds of roles where your strengths will help you stand out.
d.) Proactively think about how you can further develop these strength areas.

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One Year After the Davies Review: Progress for Women in the Boardroom

Cheerful business woman with blur team in meetingBy Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

This week marks the one-year anniversary of the report by Lord Davies of Abersoch on women in the UK boardroom, which argued that companies should take action now to increase the number of female board directors. The report called for a target of 25% women on boards by 2015. In order to do this, it suggested, 33% of board appointments would have to go to women over the next year. The Davies report catapulted the issue of boardroom gender diversity into public discourse and for the past year, companies have been urged to diversify their table of power.

This week Lord Davies released “One Year On,” a review of progress made over the past year, in conjunction with Cranfield School of Management’s annual “Female FTSE Board Report,” revealing that many UK companies have stepped up to the challenge.  Davies wrote:

“In the three years prior to my report the number of women on boards had effectively plateaued, stalling at less than a single percentage-point rise year-on-year. Over the past year, however, we have seen the biggest-ever reported increase in the percentage of women on boards.”

Research produced over the past year had shown that companies were not making progress fast enough to meet Davies’ 2015 target – but a twist in the data indicates that the UK may just meet that goal. He added, “…should we maintain this momentum we would see a record 26.7% female board representation by 2015. This is great news, and demonstrates how a voluntary business-led approach can work.”

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Real Advice from Active Mentors

iStock_000012062382XSmallBy EJ Thompson (New York City)

Navigating office politics can be tricky – but there are tactics women can employ to avoid playing games and climb the corporate ladder successfully and graciously.

Jamie Parrot, Managing Director, Investor Relations and Marketing at Perry Capital, points out, “The most rewarding thing about seeing women succeed is knowing how far we’ve come from our grandmother’s generation to now…my generation has an abundance of opportunities to choose from…and not because we’ve finally been given a shot but because we’ve earned our rightful place beside the men who have dominated certain industries.”

A success for one woman, in any industry, is a success for all women striving for equality in the workplace. So let’s celebrate other’s success, because when your turn comes, you’ll want others to celebrate for you. Here are five pieces of advice from women who frequently mentor others.

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