Happy Holidays from The Glass Hammer

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

As the end of the year approaches, The Glass Hammer will be taking an editorial break for the holidays. We will return Wednesday, January 2 with new articles to inform, empower, and inspire you for the year ahead.

In the meantime, we hope that you will also take brief pause to reflect on the year gone by. What did you hope to achieve in 2012? What did you successfully accomplish? What new strategies did you learn for career advancement this year that you hope to leverage or amplify in 2013?

Please share your successes and challenges in the comments space below – we would love to catalogue how you have advanced in 2012!

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Women Leaders Share Wisdom at Second Annual Toigo Groundbreakers Summit

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By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Last week, the Toigo Foundation held its Groundbreakers Summit for female leaders. While this was just the second annual summit, the Foundation has worked for over two decades to bring diversity to the financial sector.

That’s why Toigo Alumna Nicole Pullen Ross, Managing Director and Mid-Atlantic Region Head at Goldman Sachs, said with a laugh during her welcome remarks, “Stand back and be prepared for what is in many ways a homecoming. You may get in the way of a hug.”

Ross, the first African American to become a managing director at Goldman’s Private Wealth Management business, said she wasn’t sure where she would be without the Toigo Foundation’s guidance. “Outside this room, we’re very accustomed to being the first or the only. But today, we are collectively one of the many,” she said.

The goal of the summit was to share insight into how and why women break through to leadership in the financial industry and in the broader business community. Speakers shared their advice and experience with guests at the sold-out conference.

Here are a few key insights by leadership speakers Lisa Garcia Quiroz, Chief Diversity Officer at Time Warner; Gwen Ifill, Moderator and Managing Editor at Washington Week and Senior Correspondent and Co-anchor at PBS Newshour; Janet Hill, Principal at Hill Family Advisors; Abigail Disney, Filmmaker and Philanthropist; and Debbie McCoy, Director of the SEED Institute at Stanford University.

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Leadership and Authorization: Our Publisher’s 2012 Year End Review

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By Nicki Gilmour, Founder and CEO of The Glass Hammer

Last week saw a flurry of activity around women’s progress at work. It was a fitting end to a year that has been coined the Year of the Woman, due to increased female political representation here in the US and perhaps due to a few high profile appointments in the business world, such as Marissa Mayer as CEO of Yahoo and Virginia Rometty as CEO of IBM.

But before we start celebrating that our work is done here at The Glass Hammer, I would like to suggest that excessive media coverage of one or two appointments of women to top spots does not gender parity make.

Good Conversations

Last week, the 2020 Women on Boards campaign produced a series of events across the US on 12/12/12. 2020 WOB ’s mission is raising awareness to help get more women on boards – 20 percent by 2020 to be precise. I attended one of these events hosted by the Forté Foundation and Ernst & Young in New York.

I was impressed by the event’s dialogue, which recognized that corporate practices needed to change if women are to be recruited onto boards. I was encouraged by the poignant discussion around systems and policies being reviewed – such as terms limits for board members and retirement ages, which average 75 years old.

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Fast Contributors Make More Money than Fast Learners – Which One Are You?

Contributed by Melissa Llarena

Conversations with 15 executives, many who earn more in one hour than some employees make annually, revealed that progressing toward important goals commands more money than simply being a fast learner. I find that many aspiring career changers focus on their ability to quickly learning complex subjects while hiring managers unanimously say that no one cares about fast learners.

As a finance professional, you risk career suicide if you cannot prove you are a fast contributor to a hiring manager. Why? Thousands of finance professionals are being involuntarily s-q-u-e-e-z-e-d out of work. For example, the US finance sector contracted by 200K jobs in 2011, according to a Bloomberg article. Preparatory skills for a career transition matter more if you are a Gen X-er because you are on the cusp of your highest income earning years. Outstanding debts and family needs do not permit unemployment outside of your sector. Therefore, you must attract a strong job offer wherever you land.

If you have worked in finance, then being a fast learner is a given. When banks consolidated, you quickly adapted to post-merge cultures. Alternatively, to survive the finance industry’s ever-changing regulations, you figured out on-policy ways to maximize profit.

Instead, hiring managers want to know that you are a fast contributor.

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Say “No” with Power and Grace

Contributed by CEO Coach Henna Inam

I have a confession to make. I am not exactly an expert in saying “No.” I spent the entire day recently running from one meeting to another. It was Sunday. I was taught early on that it’s impolite to say “No.” A lot of my executive coaching clients have a hard time saying “No” too, yet it’s a critical skill we need to succeed and keep our sanity. Saying “No” is hard because it’s inconsistent with the beliefs we have about ourselves (we’re supposed to be collaborative, empathetic, care-taking), and the expectations others have of us. I often catch myself resenting a woman establishing boundaries when I would never think twice about a man doing it. So how do we as women leaders establish boundaries with both power and grace?

In order to be able to say “No” powerfully, we have to switch our own belief system first.

We need to align our beliefs with our goals if we are going to be powerful. Here are three possible belief systems that prevent us from saying “No” and ways to switch them.

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Women Explore New Derivatives Landscape at First Annual WILD Symposium

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By Jessica Titlebaum, President, Women in Listed Derivatives

The derivatives industry will come out stronger from the past year’s challenges. Dodd Frank legislation was keeping people up at night, MF Global failed, and then the industry was hit with Peregrine Financial Group. It’s enough to shake anyone in their boots, some of them even high heeled!

This was the backdrop of the first annual Women in Listed Derivatives’ WILD Symposium: Industry in Transition. Hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, the Symposium featured high caliber speakers like Carol Burke, the woman tasked with implementing Dodd Frank at the Federal Reserve, and Terry Savage, one of two women on the CME Group Board of Directors, who discussed how the industry was changing and how women could prepare for surfacing opportunities.

Women in Listed Derivatives, or WILD, was founded in 2009. It is managed by a group of women that work in an “old boys club” known as Chicago’s derivatives industry. Now a global community, the not-for-profit WILD organization is dedicated to helping women in the listed and over-the-counter derivatives space advance their careers, find mentors, and learn how to network effectively. This was the group’s first half-day conference.

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Voice of Experience: Stephanie Breslow, Partner & Co-Head of Investment Management Group, Schulte Roth & Zabel

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

“You really have to take charge of your career,” began Stephanie Breslow, Partner & Co-Head of the Investment Management Group at Schulte Roth & Zabel. The reason, she explained, is because while partners or senior people may take an interest in you, you have to leverage that interest into advancement.

She continued, “It’s like the television show Downton Abbey – the people who work downstairs know so much more about the people upstairs than the other way around. You know that your firm is going to try to train you, but you will be much more aware of what you need and what you are pursuing than the partners.”

Breslow advised junior lawyers not to be timid about seeking more responsibilities or experience from those at the top. Also related, she continued, is knowing when it’s time to start doling out responsibilities to people who are more junior.

“It’s human nature that people will be happy to let you handle work if you are happy to do it. But you have to learn when to start to delegate or to hand off tasks to someone else so you can get to the next level.”

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A Conversation with Young Women in Business

Contributed by John Keyser, Founder and Principal of Common Sense Leadership

I had the privilege two weeks ago of conversing with Georgetown Women in Business, a club formed by women in the MBA programs at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business. They all had worked at least four years in the corporate world before coming back to complete their graduate studies. They are a highly global group, which is true of the university itself, as students are from countries around the world.

Among the topics we discussed was leadership without authority.

As one works her way up, she will frequently be in a position to lead without authority. It is important to recognize that leadership is helping others do the right things well. We may influence 1,000 people, or 100, or even one other person, that team member or colleague who needs inspiration or direction.

Be helpful. Be encouraging, be a friend and a coach. Help others. It’s good for everyone, and for your career!

A woman can do this so effectively by using her natural leadership skills, as the best leadership comes from the heart. These skills include:

  • asking purposeful questions
  • listening to understand, and with care
  • having meaningful conversations
  • developing important relationships
  • caring about the village – the team – not being self consumed.

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5 Tips to Handle Stress During the Holidays

By Robin Madell (San Francisco)

You know the drill: the holidays are here again already, and not only must you keep up with everything already on your plate, but you must somehow add another long list of holiday-related deliverables. The combination of everyday stressors (like juggling end-of-year work projects and client meetings) with seasonal-specific ones (like holiday parties, gift shopping, and extra cooking) can add up to some overwhelmed emotions.

To help readers of The Glass Hammer more successfully navigate the busy weeks until New Year’s, we asked therapist and author Diane Lang, who is an adjunct professor at Montclair State University and Dover Business College, for five stress-busting tips that will help you stay cool when it’s cold outside.

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Make Your Voice Heard: How Can Companies Help Women in Tech Achieve Their Career Goals?

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By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

We are pleased to announce the next phase of our research on women in technology. Help us develop innovative solutions that help women advance while also enabling companies to get the most out of all their employees. Click here to begin our confidential and anonymous 10-minute survey.

At our recent women in technology event last month, our panelists discussed the important ways they managed to climb to the top. Our speakers, all senior women in Managing Director or C-level technology roles, shared their strategies for advancement – like finding male allies, developing an appetite for risk, and showcasing problem solving skills.

Their stories were interesting and inspirational. But afterward, during our networking segment, discussions between panelists and event guests turned up even more questions. Most notably, women wanted to know: “how?”

  • “How do I make sure division leaders remember my name when we’ve gone through three re-orgs in the past three years?”
  • “How can I fulfill my dream of becoming an entrepreneur if I don’t know anything about sales?”
  • “How do you develop rapport with colleagues when all they talk about is sports?”

Certainly, these questions all have very different answers. But a deeper analysis shows that they are really all about the same thing – navigating obstacles.

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