Tips on Building on Your Company’s Commitment to Diversity

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Guest contributed by Karina DeLaCruz, Diversity Executive at CSAA Insurance Group, a AAA Insurer

diversity

Image via Shutterstock

Companies that embrace diversity can better reap the economic benefits of a diverse and inclusive workforce — and increasingly diverse markets. Our growing diversity as a nation and the impacts of globalization underscore why it’s critical for companies to embed the value of diversity and inclusion in their policies and practices for long-term success.

Diversity has an impact and is proven to drive engagement, innovation and profitability – all of which have very real bottom-line impacts:

Diversity drives engagement. Organizations that capitalize on the strengths of all employees – and leverage their differences and unique values – have the most engaged employees. Employees with the highest level of engagement perform 20 percent better and are 87 percent less likely to leave the organization than employees with low levels of engagement, according to a study by the Corporate Leadership Council. Engaged employees are more satisfied at work and more productive, and are more likely to stay with an organization and contribute to its success.

Diversity drives innovation. By bringing together different backgrounds, skills, and experiences, businesses are better positioned to develop innovative solutions needed to succeed in an increasingly competitive economy. Forbes Insights conducted a survey of more than 300 senior executives: among companies with more than $10 billion in annual revenues, 56 percent strongly agreed that diversity helps drive innovation.

 Diversity drives profitability. Numerous studies have demonstrated a business benefit to diversity. Deloitte highlighted research of 506 U.S. organizations showing that organizations with greater racial and gender diversity performed better in terms of sales revenues, number of customers and market share. Catalyst looked at Fortune 500 companies with the highest representation of women board directors and they attained higher financial performance, on average, than those with the lowest representation of women board directors.

 How do we get started?

If not approached strategically, diversity can feel like “just one more thing” employees are asked to take on. Consider these three key components in building out your diversity and inclusion strategy:

  • Get clear on the business outcomes you’re looking to drive through diversity and inclusion. Make sure you fully align those outcomes with company strategy.
  • Secure C-suite commitment — and their active, visible engagement with your efforts.
  • Embedding diversity in your company’s core values helps ensure that it is considered in strategy development and execution, and considered when critical decisions are made.

Launching a diversity and inclusion program – or expanding efforts – may require having difficult conversations to break through unconscious biases and educating leadership on how the program supports company goals and can benefit the employees and customers. Only when that foundational work is complete can you fully implement a successful diversity and inclusion program and reap the benefits.

How do you measure success?

No matter how much value you believe the program brings to the company, it’s important to track results. We look at metrics focused on key initiatives in each of the four pillars of our diversity and inclusion strategy. These include:

  1. Workforce: reflecting the diverse communities we serve
  2. Workplace: influencing company culture through diversity and inclusion
  3. Community/Marketplace: strengthening our brand in the marketplace through outreach, philanthropy, volunteerism and business partnerships with organizations that have similar values
  4. Members/Customers: weaving diversity and inclusion into the fabric of our business strategy and using it to better understand our customers’ needs and expectations

We developed a scorecard to measure success. For example, for the workplace pillar we look at our workforce representation, as most companies do. We also have a diversity index within our annual employee engagement survey that allows us to measure our effectiveness in providing an inclusive work environment. When it comes to community and marketplace, we evaluate how we’re doing in the area of supplier diversity and whether we’re increasing our community presence in terms of volunteer hours and community events hosted by the diversity and inclusion team.

The future of diversity and inclusion

Twenty years ago when we talked about diversity, the focus was on race, ethnicity and in some cases, sexual orientation. More companies are shifting their focus from diversity to inclusion or belonging. Diversity is a fact. Inclusion is a practice. Equity is the goal.

Ultimately, diversity and inclusion is a journey with no finish line. We all can play a role in helping create a more welcoming environment at work, while also enjoying the competitive advantages of inclusion.

Karina DeLaCruz is the Human Resources Consulting and Diversity Executive at CSAA Insurance Group based in Walnut Creek, CA.  She has extensive background and expertise in Human Resources, Diversity and Inclusion, Leadership Development, Business Operations and Customer Service.  In her role at CSAA Insurance Group, she is responsible for the design and execution of the company’s diversity and inclusion strategy and oversees all of their diversity and inclusion initiatives and programs.

Disclaimer: The opinions and views of guest contributors are not necessarily those of theglasshammer.com

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Voice of Experience: Mary O’Hara, Partner, Human Resource Services, PwC Ireland

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By Cathie Ericsonmary

There is great value in being able to simplify complex problems, says PwC’s Mary O’Hara, but it’s something you might not realize when you’re starting out and are impressed by technical talk and “consultancy speak.”

“Technical excellence is a prerequisite in my role, but the trick is you have to be able to talk about it in simple terms so that you bring everyone in the room along with you so they feel like they can engage with the issue and aren’t excluded. You have to learn to eliminate jargon to get your message across.”

One Firm, Many Roles

And certainly her technical expertise is vast. During her younger years, O’Hara developed a love of STEM subjects, studying applied mathematics, physics and accountancy. Upon graduation she looked into options in engineering, actuarial and accounting, and was delighted to receive a job offer from PwC to join its training program.

Although she has spent her entire career there, she notes there’s never a feeling of sameness, as both the firm and her role have transformed immeasurably and been reinvented numerous times over the years.

Since she built her career there, being named partner is the professional achievement she is most proud of so far, along with raising a family. And she has overseen remarkable growth in her business division, which started with just a handful of people and has since grown to more than 120 professionals. She’s also proud of the gender balance – of the six partners in her division, half are women.

Her work now entails supporting multinational companies in rewarding and mobilizing their workforces — work that is changing along with the ability to work anywhere and be connected by technology. But while technology assists in many kinds of work, it can block engagement with coworkers and clients if you’re not thoughtful about it. “Email is great, but you still need to breathe the air with them,” she says. “You have to make technology work for you without interfering with relationships.”

As with most industries, her clients are affected by megatrends and technological breakthroughs, such as robotics and AI, as well as the proliferation of data and the importance of leveraging analytics to help companies to make better business decisions.

These advances, which are fundamentally changing the environment in which we all work, will be especially important to the coming generations and will present both great challenges and great opportunities, she notes. “To succeed, businesses must adapt to the changing ways that people work and help companies navigate them to have an engaged workforce.”

As the speed of change has accelerated over the past five years, it has instilled a desire in younger generations to know the purpose they serve and focus on development, through new experiences in new places. And, these new generations want to be part of an organization that has strong value systems, so she finds it an exciting challenge to help employers navigate these new waters.

Helping Women Achieve and Advance

O’Hara believes that any conversation about gender equity starts with making sure that the business case is properly understood — for all stakeholders to realize why a diverse gender pool is important. Then you can examine the culture in your organization and identify what biases exist.

While it can appear to be a benign bias, if women are not given opportunities to advance their careers, you have to break down what the issues are.

Sometimes it’s a need for a sponsor who can accelerate exposure for women. It’s important to embrace the effect that sponsorship can play in a career trajectory, when women have someone early in their career advocating for them and bolstering their career progression.

“You have to take ownership of your career from day one, and seek out opportunities to enhance your experiences, build a strong professional network and collect and act on feedback,” she says.

She believes it’s important for women in her position to talk about issues and get them out in the open. “It’s not a mystery how we got to where we are, but those of us in senior positions need to remember that the climb itself can be so hard that it might dissuade talented women. While our senior roles might be challenging, they are often more doable because of the autonomy we now have, which is often a well-kept secret that might encourage others.”

O’Hara is heartened by the fact that gender diversity is on the PwC agenda, starting from the top. If they are not bringing through equal numbers of men and women, they have a conversation about why and how to fix it.

PwC in Ireland has also established a diversity council around four pillars: international, gender, GLEE and generational, with people throughout the organization at different levels helping to figure out what can make a difference on the ground. “Our focus is on engaging with our people, valuing differences and helping everyone to be the best they can be” she says.

Outside of work, her time is devoted to her family, which includes her husband, young son, and five step children, as well as a close-knit circle of friends.

And she brings her focus on gender diversity outside of her immediate firm, serving on the steering committee of the 30% Club in Ireland as one of the founding members in 2014. The 30% Club is a group of Chairs and CEOs committed to better gender balance at all levels of their organisations through voluntary actions.

“It’s been a phenomenal journey to see what can be done within leading organisations, including professional services firms, to promote gender balances as we share ideas and best practices.” But she notes that while it’s been a way she can give back to the wider business community, she ends up being as much a receiver, given the wide network she’s earned through her time with the group. “It’s very rewarding to be part of something that’s making a difference,” she says.

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Not to Be Missed Articles

Did you miss these popular articles? Take a look at the articles below previously published on theglasshammer.com

breakup

Why it’s a Bigger Issue than Work-Family Conflict

By Aimee Hansen

The culture of chronic overwork isn’t working in many ways, but there’s one way it works too well: upholding gender inequality.

Professor Robin Ely of Harvard Business School, co-author of a recent study released by the Gender Initative, tells us “It is the culture of overwork—not women’s work-family conflict—that locks gender inequality in place.”

According to Ely and her co-authors, the focus on work-family conflict is a gendered diversion from the bigger 24/7 work week problem that deflects long hours as a women’s issue.

We spoke to Ely about the dilemma, what needs to change and what women can do.

Career Progression – Moving Sideways and Diagonally to Move Forward

By Nneka Orji

Most of us will be familiar with the typical career path within big corporates; the graduate entry role, the progression to middle management, and for a few who meet what are deemed to be the prerequisites, the senior management and leadership positions are within grasp. Career progression – in the traditional sense – has been valued by the pace at which individuals make it the top of the organisational hierarchy, and any move off the ladder or taking a non-traditional route has until very recently been viewed as detrimental to achieving the end goal. However things are changing; with technological advancement, evolving needs of the workforce, and a more diverse talent pool, the perception of a successful career is being challenged and new forms of career paths are being introduced. Could an unconventional career path lead to a more fulfilling and sustainable career?

 

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Working Women: It’s Time to Take Charge of Your Career

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women working mentoring
Guest Contributed by Lexie Dy (readyjob.org)
There is something within a woman that dares to defy the odds of limitations. Where there is a giant, she silences it. Where there is a mountain, she moves it. Where there is a glass ceiling, she shatters it. She carries a remarkable strength and unmistakable determination to meet her goals. She is brave and she is successful. “She” is you.
 
Sometimes all that it takes to reach our full potential is a reminder of who we are and what we can accomplish. It’s time we stop chasing our dream career or position and start taking charge of them. It’s time to shake up the business norm and not only achieve your dream career, but excel in it.
 
The positive influence women can have in the workplace is undeniable. Research shows that the presence of women (and other minorities) at the executive level of companies and in the boardroom can have what’s called a “panel effect.” When women bring their perspectives and experience to the C-level, they are able to influence white male executives on diversity, fairness, pay equality, and more. By reaching for the stars and obtaining a position of leadership, you earn the power to re-shape women’s role in business by hiring CEOs, setting executive pay, investigating discrimination, and approving executive promotions. Your success and that of those around you should be based on skills and talent, not gender and ancient stereotypes.
 
Whatever you envision as your ideal career, you can get there if you work for it. What is that thing you daydream about? You have talked about it for a while now and you would be doing it full time if only you knew how. This is how you do it: study other successful people in your field. Rub elbows with other women in positions of leadership who are where you want to see yourself and build a network. Pick their brains and discuss the ways in which they overcame the obstacles they most certainly faced.
 
 When you are up-close and personal with your own plan, it is easy to miss the 360-degree view of the rest of your world. Stay up to date with current events in your field, and learn from the people who are succeeding in unprecedented ways. Not only will you be able to apply the insight you’ve gained from other success stories, but you might impress your colleagues with a well-informed understanding of your industry.
 
To all of the women who feel like they are at a disadvantage because of their gender, be proud of who you are as a woman and as a valuable employee. Women are advancing into leadership roles, managerial positions, and business owners, yet are not always compensated equally. There is a noticeably large number of industries that haven’t fully stepped up to the times we live in. Be one of the women who help to make a lasting impression on the future of the world marketplace. Don’t shy away from the opportunity to offer your opinion on business matters. Speak up if you are overlooked for a promotion, and be bold enough to comment on your wages if you notice a discrepancy. You have the same level of importance as the men in the field, and you make a world of difference for the company the same as they do.
 
Show your supervisor that you have potential for more responsibility by setting a high standard for the rest of the team. Arrive to the job early and ready to hit the ground running. Consider how you can accomplish more than what was asked of you. Once your assignments are finished, offer to assist your co-workers with theirs. Build relationships with your teammates out of genuine interest in your future with them and the company.
 
Sure, there are going to be discouraging days, but remember: you are not your mistakes.

You will make a few errors along the way, but that is to be expected. Mistakes are often the best way to learn. If you handle them with grace, you might even be surprised by how well your positive attitude will impress your boss. Rather than hang your head and apologize, own up to it and ask how you could have done things differently and what skillsets you need to work on in order to be adequately prepared for future opportunities. Count your mishaps as a blessing in disguise and move forward.
 
Silence your giants, move your mountains, and shatter those glass ceilings. You are your very own success story waiting to happen. Be bold and take charge of your dream career. It’s time to take charge.
 
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What Would Oprah Say?

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 By Nicki Gilmour, Executive Coach and Organizational PsychologistNicki Gilmour

Advice giving is a tricky business and when I thought up the title of this week’s column, I actually googled the sentence “What would Oprah say?” to find out she is the modern day Plato. No one can argue with her words of wisdom as she is a mentor to us all in that respect and a glass breaker in so many ways. I watched her as a girl from my TV screen in Northern Ireland not knowing that my own destiny would bring me to the USA to help people be their best selves.

My point? As useful as anyone’s advice is in this life, what matters is how you use it and integrate it. To do this, it’s key to know yourself and the constructs that you have built over time. What beliefs do you hold? How does that affect how you to take on new beliefs? Do those new ones confirm old biases or transform you? How can you check for validity in a meta-universal way so you can escape subjectivity of just adding to the pile of assumptions that may or may not be true? What beliefs are so implicit that they are hidden to you, yet create competing agendas to your espoused goals?

Oprah can tell you to go higher, Sheryl can tell you to lean in and all of that has truth in it. It’s good advice, but its just advice. Only you can dig deep into your own paradigms and figure out what you believe in and why you do what you do.

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Voice of Experience: Vidya Lakshmi, Managing Director, Head of Human Capital Management, Goldman Sachs, Bengaluru

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Lakshmi

By Cathie Ericson

“A senior leader once asked me asked me about which seat I would choose when I enter a conference room and I promptly responded that I’d like to be seated in a quiet corner. The advice I received was to take a central position in the conference room to ensure that I was heard.” Vidya Lakshmi says she encourages women to be deliberate about their career by building technical expertise and firmly being rooted in one’s passion.

An Illustrious Career Spanning Functions and Locations

Born in India, Vidya spent a large part of her childhood in Kenya. She moved back to India and enrolled in college to complete her bachelor’s degree in economics.  She then earned her Chartered Accountancy degree (CPA equivalent), and began her journey in the corporate world.

In her first job as an auditor with PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Vidya gained exposure to clients across different industries, had the opportunity to travel and strengthened her technical skillset as an auditor.

Vidya joined Goldman Sachs in 2004 and with no background in banking, her foray into the world of investment banking was one of the risks she took early on in her career that paid healthy dividends. Looking back on this decision, she encourages women to step out of their comfort zone, learn to say an emphatic ‘yes’ to opportunities and be vocal about their ambitions.  

She spent her first five years at Goldman Sachs in banking, initially in India and then relocated to New York in 2007. Working in investment banking in the middle of the financial crisis in New York was a key learning moment in her career. “The New York stint taught me resilience, the need to make tough decisions and pushed me to strive for excellence in everything I do,” says Vidya.

Since then, Vidya has relocated back to India and has held multiple roles, including serving as the Chief of Staff to the CEO of Goldman Sachs Bengaluru, building the analytic and quantitative capabilities in the Securities Division and running a myriad of functions within Human Capital Management.

In 2016, Vidya assumed her current role as head of Human Capital Management in Bengaluru. Currently, she is excited about engaging and hiring top engineering talent from engineering campuses across India to address cutting-edge areas such as machine learning, process automation and workflow digitization. Another key aspect of her role is responding to the needs of a millennial talent pool, as 85 percent of the Bengaluru office is composed of millennials.

Helping Overcome Cultural Norms and Other Challenges for Women

 Vidya observes that Indian women typically step back from their careers in order to balance family life, and are likely to quit jobs mid-career due to the “double burden syndrome,” a culture in which both men and women feel family and household duties are primarily a woman’s responsibility. Due to these social norms, she says organizations play a critical role in fostering an environment that supports and retains women in the workforce.

“My husband is a CPA, and given the strong career trajectories we both have had, the traditional roles expected to be played by husband and wife have become blurred. We have supported each other through the highs and lows of our careers. For example, my children recently spent two years in Zurich with my husband while he was on assignment, while I stayed in Bengaluru to continue working at Goldman Sachs.”  She believes that one of the biggest decisions a woman makes in her life is the partner she chooses to spend her life with.

  In her career, Vidya has learned that women need to be wary of understating their own abilities and that one way to bolster their career is through sponsorship. “Unlike mentors, sponsors go beyond career advice and are invested in one’s career,” she notes. “Finding sponsors for women within an organization and investing in those relationships can help create a strong pipeline.”

Vidya is involved in a number of initiatives, including Women Emerging in Finance, which aims to dispel myths young Indian women may have about the financial services industry, particularly regarding work/life balance, that may keep them from pursuing a finance career. Every year, they aspire to speak with at least 1,000 young women across engineering and management campuses, to provide them with more information to make an informed decision and encourage them to join the financial services industry – and ideally — Goldman Sachs.

Vidya understands the challenges women face in the workplace throughout various life stages.  She has experienced the benefits of leveraging the infrastructure the firm provides to continue to pursue her career. An example that stands out is Goldman Sachs’ on-site Children’s center, which she is proud to oversee in her current role.

“Life throws us many curveballs. I have learned to stay the course, build resilience and in moments of doubt, to reflect on my own journey,” Vidya recommends.

A Full Life Outside of Work

Vidya loves learning new languages and is currently learning German on the weekends. “It was a passion I left behind when I got busy in the corporate world, and I am thrilled that I have intentionally carved out time to do something I enjoy,” she says.

She also loves spending time with her two boys, Harsh and Aditya, and enjoys traveling with them. In the last two years Vidya and her family have traveled extensively across Europe.

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Mover and Shaker: Katherine Ferguson, Vice President, Marketing, WEX

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By Cathie EricsonKatherine Ferguson

When considering the path of your career, one factor that WEX’s Katherine Ferguson always suggests younger women focus on is sponsorship. She says it’s vital not only to have someone who is supportive of your path, but is willing to take risks to advocate for you and pull you up. “Find that person and build a relationship, and it will serve you well throughout your career,” she says.

For her part, she says she has been fortunate to have had experience working with amazing leaders who have served as models as she attempts to emulate the qualities she admires, including a calm presence, authenticity and supportive leadership.

“I have learned how important relationships are, and how you have to take the time to nurture them, whether they are colleagues, peers, team members or those in senior roles,” she says. “Often when you enter your career, you are focused on getting the work done, but you have to remember to take the time to network and develop relationships that will be instrumental in your path for years to come.”

Searching For and Finding Her Passion

After completing degrees in art history and accounting, Ferguson began a career in accounting, including a stint at the Smithsonian that tied her two interests together. She soon decided that she wanted to move out of accounting and realized marketing appealed to her, with the balance of creativity, data and analytics.

Ferguson joined American Express out of graduate school and spent 14 years there serving different customer and geographic segments. She then decided she wanted to take her experience to a company that was smaller, but growing fast, where she would have an impactful role transforming the brand and customer experiences.

WEX was a perfect fit, particularly due to its culture. Having grown up with a father who was an executive, she had some sense of what the corporate world would be like, but over her career she has grown to appreciate the fact that each company has a different culture that impacts your career and working environment. That has helped inform her path along the way, as she assesses the culture of various roles and then strives to build a great culture among her team.

Right now, she is enjoying challenging her team as they elevate marketing into a best-in-class organization, including launching new products, new partnerships and new customer journeys.

One of her secrets to success is to hire people who are smarter than you, set them up for success, then get out of their way, she says.

A Focus on Mentoring Women

Currently, Ferguson is working with two senior executives on a recently launched women’s network. “I’ve been so impressed by WEX in general and the importance it places on supporting women, from our female CEO, cascading down to numerous senior female executives and beyond. This emphasis really speaks to our community and culture,” she says.

The network is designed to help build a community of women throughout the organization who will support each other and collaborate through common challenges. “It’s a concept that’s near and dear to my heart,” Ferguson says.

Aside from the many hats she wears at work, Ferguson makes time to find balance in her life — from spending time with her family to nurturing friendships and giving back to the community.

A recent newcomer to the Portland area, she has jumped right in, joining the boards of the Portland Museum of Art and United Way. She is also very proud of the time she spent mentoring a refugee student from Somalia at Portland High School last year. Although the woman spoke four languages, English was not one of them until she arrived in the United States, so Ferguson helped her with her school work and the college application process, celebrating the fact that she is now a student at the University of Southern Maine.

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You Should Reconsider What You Think About Creative People in Leadership

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Though “creativity” is almost always included on lists of mandatory qualities of good leaders, creative people or “creatives” are rarely seen as the leader type.Group-Of-Women-Meeting-In-Creative-Office

Instead, creatives are revered for their originality, their resourcefulness, and their spirit. But to be successful, creatives need to be perceived as more proactive, risk-taking, problem-solving, and communicative which are the perceived traits assigned to leaders.

Why Creative Types Aren’t Often Leaders

In a study from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, researchers asked workers and students rate their peers’ potential for creativity and leadership. Neither group rated the most creative people among the most likely to become leaders.

Yet, the most popular stories of leadership focus on those with ingenuity. We love to hear tales of CEOs and politicians who solve problems not with determined effort or underhanded maneuvering but rather with imagination and resourcefulness. There are few people more inspirational than those with innovative ideas who change the course of an entire industry. Why do we collect stories of creative leaders while ruing the idea of being led by them?

The researchers of the Wharton study, psychologists Jennifer Mueller, Jack Goncalo, and Dishan Kamdar, have discovered that leaders are often expected to uphold structure and order within an organization, while creative types tend to think laterally, outside typical paths and boundaries. Additionally, creatives are often depicted as isolated or at least introverted, but leaders necessarily must be comfortable with near-constant interactions. Further research refutes these suppositions. Most notably, a Wharton study by Adam Grant discovered that introverted leaders outperform extroverted ones, disproving the conception that a leader must be gregarious to be productive.

In another study led by Jennifer Mueller, participants consciously argued for the power of creative ideas, asserting that they want more creativity in leadership, but subconsciously, those same participants rejected more creative concepts when exposed to uncertain situations. It seems that we are primed to deny creative leadership, even despite evidence of its potential.

How Creatives Use Leadership Skills

Creative people and leaders share some traits and behaviors in common:

  • Leaders and creatives communicate well. Creative types imagine original concepts and they must be able to explain their ideas clearly and effectively.
  • Leaders and creatives are enterprising and dynamic. Creatives must often pursue their ideas on their own, forcing them to become self-motivated and driven.
  • Leaders and creatives solve problems. No novel idea emerges fully formed from a creative’s mind. Instead, creatives must tinker with their designs before they are viable.
  • Leaders and creatives take risks. Coming up with something new is inherently riskier than following the old way. Creatives must be willing to make leaps of faith, or else they fail to earn the label “creative.”

Given that creatives innately boast the most important qualities of leaders, it seems obvious that creatives would be good in leadership positions. The stereotype of creatives types is not the same stereotype of traditional leader types. This is just a stereotype but one that remains in place for now. One way to prepare oneself for business positions, regardless of one’s past work experience or identity as a creative person, is to continue to be creative while learning traditional business skills. By doing an MBA online, or in-person creatives can hone their leadership skills and gain new knowledge that is useful in guiding teams of workers. Even more importantly, advanced credentials almost guarantee management positions, ensuring creative types access to entry-level leadership roles. Just as the theory goes more women in leadership positions increases the likelihood of female-friendly workplaces, more creatives in leadership positions could help to build businesses that are friendly to creative thinking.

Disclaimer: The opinions and views of Guest contributors are not necessarily those of theglasshammer.com

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5 steps to take ownership of your career

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happy working womenGuest Contributed by Jennifer Davis

I spend a lot of time speaking to early career professionals who are looking for advice or wanting to further their development. And one of the pieces of advice I find myself giving all the time is “Don’t ask permission”. But taking ownership of your own career path is easier said than done. Here are five steps you can take today to start making progress.

1. Write Your Future Resume

What do you see yourself doing in the future? Write it down. I find it useful to write it in the format of a resume or a bio. Something that walks back through your experience from the fictional and aspirational future (written in present tense), backing all the way to the current job and role that you are in today. Write the final job first and then think about what experiences you might need to get that job and make that your second-to-the-last role. Repeat that until you have walked back through a progression of roles or companies that take you where you want to go. Don’t forget to add in education, training, non-profit involvement, or anything else that will be a part of your future, idealized career. There is something powerful about writing it down.

2. Invent Your Path

One of the things you will notice about your resume activity is that you might struggle naming some of the roles that you might want to have. Sometimes getting experience and being seen as ready for promotion isn’t a matter of title (marketing specialist leads to marketing manager leads to marketing director), but rather of actual job contents. And of course in the future, the contents of the job are going to be different. 30 years ago, who have thought we’d pay to take rides with strangers or spend a significant part of our marketing budget on pay-per-click advertising? So, you have an opportunity to invent a job or two along the way. Take advantage of the blank sheet of paper to design a job or role that would give you that experience. And remember, some of that experience might come from volunteer work or even entrepreneurial efforts. Don’t limit yourself. You are writing fiction, so make it worthy of a New York Times best seller award.

3. Research and Network

Look at that fictional resume you wrote for your future self. What questions arose when writing it? Did you wonder what people had done before they became a Chief Marketing Officer? Did you invent a position, but now you wonder if that role exists in some companies today? Are you curious how much education a financial analyst needs to work on a big merger and acquisition agreement? These things are knowable and worth researching. Look up people on LinkedIn in the roles to which you aspire and look at their career progression. Contact people in your network who might know the answers or have ideas of where to look. They could be people that work at your company (check out the leadership page on your company website, if you don’t know people outside your own team or group), or people in the community at large. When asked for their expertise, most people will be generous.

4. Tell Someone

Just like there is power in writing something down, it is amplified in the sharing. This is why sites like BucketList.org exist. They figure you are more likely to do things, even crazy things like climbing mountains or learning Mandarin, if you share your dreams with others. Find people who will be supportive and share some of your ideas with them. If you don’t have people in your immediate circle of friends and family who are likely to empathize, find a group, like HeartSpark, or a professional coach to help you listen and refine your ideas. Or join a networking group, like BizWomen or your local rotary to find a group of like-minded folks to help you grow.

5. Believe

At the heart of all of this is believing in your potential and what you have to offer a potential employer or entrepreneurial opportunity. I’m a big believer in positive affirmations and visualization. By affirming yourself and visualizing where you will go, you breathe belief into yourself. This starts the wheels of destiny in motion. Believe that your career is something you get to build.

So let your imagination run wild and see where it takes you. Be deliberate and bold. Don’t settle for the next rung on your chain of jobs or tasks. Take ownership of your professional story. It can be refined by experiences and reshaped when you want it to be. It may have imperfections, but at the end it will be yours.

Jennifer Davis is CMO and VP of Product Strategy at Planar, a Leyard Company

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Op-Ed: How Seed Crowdfunding is Unleashing Female Entrepreneurial Potential

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Guest contributed by Aoife FloodAoife Flood Crowdfunding

I recently had the privilege of being part of an exciting PwC research project undertaken in collaboration with The Crowdfunding Centre culminating in the release of our Women Unbound: Unleashing female entrepreneurial potential report.

The report explores the experience of women in achieving finance raising success through seed crowdfunding compared with more traditional finance raising routes and brings to the fore a lot of powerful and scary insights and opportunities. For example, while challenges like the gender leadership gap and the gender pay gap receive widespread media attention, the barriers that female-led businesses and entrepreneurs face in accessing finance have been much less visibly reported. For me personally being part of this research process was certainly somewhat of a rude awakening.

The fact is most decision makers in the venture capital industry are male, and research shows that male entrepreneurs are 86% more likely to be venture capital funded than their female counterparts, and 59% more likely to secure angel investment. Meanwhile, a $300 billion financing gap exists globally for formal, women-owned small businesses, and 70% of women-owned small and medium sized enterprises have inadequate or no access to financial services.

One thing is clear, female entrepreneurs receive less than male entrepreneurs through traditional funding channels and this funding gap is a missed opportunity. Investing in or supporting women-led business has the potential to deliver some of the highest-returns – for investors and societies. Take for example the UK, if they could match US levels of female entrepreneurship they could potentially add £23 billion gross value add to their economy.

What the data in this Women unbound report shows clearly is that when women choose to access crowdfunding they are more than capable – and very often more capable than men. Thanks to crowdfunding, female entrepreneurs can now access the market directly – and this makes a huge difference because when they do, female crowdfunders are 32% more successful than their male counterparts.

The report analysed data from over 450,000 seed crowdfunding campaigns, from nine of the largest crowdfunding platforms globally over a two year period.

What the analysis told us is that men clearly crowdfund more than women, 72% of crowdfunders globally were male compared with 28% who were women. Yet, globally, women are more successful at crowdfunding than men: 22% of campaigns led by a women reached their target, compared to 17% of those led by men. And this is not a collective anomaly, women-led campaigns performed better (in terms of securing their funding goals) than campaigns led by men when we segregated the data for every sector and every territory.

Even in what are considered more masculine sectors, for example technology where just one in every ten crowdfunders is female, 13% of women were successful in achieving their funding goal compared to just 10% of men.

So despite their clear underrepresentation, women are more successful at crowdfunding than men. But why is this?

The main factor seems to be because crowdfunding attracts, enables and empowers far more female decision makers as project backers. In essence, just like the dominance of male representation in traditional financing channels can create barriers for women, the more gender-level playing field of the crowd provides one explanation for why women are more likely to succeed at crowdfunding than men.

Female crowdfunders also tend to use more emotional and inclusive language in their videos and pitch descriptions than men.  This language is more appealing both to female and to male backers and positively correlated to funding success. While the use of business language, the style typically favoured by male crowdfunders, has been shown to be negatively correlated with money raised irrespective of what product or service is being pitched.

Yet, while women are outperforming men in achieving their funding targets across the board, the fact remains that significantly more men are crowdfunding than women, and as result, men raise substantially more finance via this channel. Men are also more ambitious in establishing higher funding goals than their female counterparts and we see them dominate in the highest funded campaigns by sector.

In fact, while there were 63 campaigns that raised over $1 million, only seven of these were led by women (11%), with the most funded campaign created by a woman placing number 18 on the list. However, progress is being made, 2014 data illustrates that only 7% of campaigns raising over $1million were led by women, and the most funded campaign created by a woman placed 37 on the list. On another positive note, on average female-led campaigns receive 5% more per individual pledge globally than male-led campaigns.

Despite this, significant opportunity still remains for women to become more active and represented in crowdfunding and to be more ambitious when establishing their finance raising goals.

I truly hope that the success of female crowdfunders highlighted in this report inspires and motivates more budding and established female entrepreneurs to explore crowdfunding.

Overall, the findings of our Women unbound report pose a strong challenge to existing entrepreneurial and business norms by seriously questioning whether there are deep-rooted biases that are preventing greater access to funding  by female entrepreneurs. It is extremely positive to see that the growth and global reach of seed crowdfunding presents several major opportunities, each with the potential for major social and economic impact. Including the understanding and acceptance that seed crowdfunding is now a well-established environment through which women can thrive.

Learn more about these opportunities by reading our Women unbound report or visit our data explorer to check out the geographical and sector crowdfunding trends for yourself

Contributed by Aoife Flood. Based in Dublin, Ireland, Aoife is Senior Manager of the Global Diversity and Inclusion Programme Office at PricewaterhouseCoopers International Limited. A version of this op-ed was originally published in PwC’s Gender Agenda Blog. 

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