Voices of Experience at the Columbia Women in Business Conference: “Success….Your Way”

nametag.jpgThere is one word that describes why I go to the Columbia Women in Business (CWIB) conference every year: inspiration. Every year, I leave the day-long event feeling invigorated, thrilled, exhausted, and tremendously inspired by the wisdom shared by the experienced women in finance who speak at the conference. This year was no exception.

Columbia Women in Business, an organization for women business students at Columbia University in New York City, sponsors the annual conference. The organization helps their members with networking and access to resources that can help their professional careers. The conference brings together Columbia students, alumnae, and other professionals for a day of networking, workshops and panel discussions, all designed to help attendees address various career and life issues.

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Top 10 Hispanic Women in Business

Contributed by Pamela Capalad

businesswomen.jpgIn the last ten years, there has been a growing trend among women in finance. The number of Hispanic women taking high-powered roles in the business and financial sectors has increased significantly. Since 1997, the number of Hispanic-owned businesses has grown 82 percent, making it one of the “fastest growing business segments in the nation” and more than one third of those businesses are owned by Hispanic women. Between 1990 and 2000, the number of Hispanic women earning bachelor’s degrees has increased 150 percent and Hispanic women earning master’s degrees has grown 164 percent. This increase in education and business ownership has translated to increased opportunities for Hispanic women in business, law and finance in the last decade.

From a CFO of the ad agency responsible for those relaxing Corona commercials to a high-powered attorney with a heart of gold to the president of a microfinance firm, this growing force of Hispanic women in business proves that these top ten women are not only eclectic and talented, but take pride in giving back to their communities as well.

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Voice of Experience: Suze Orman, Personal Finance Guru

suze_orman1.JPGContributed by Heather Cassell, Glass Hammer contributor and freelance writer in San Francisco.

As many of you loyal Glass Hammer readers know, we love the practical and down-to-earth financial advice for women offered by personal finance guru Suze Orman. In a recent interview with a Glass Hammer contributor, Orman explained that she didn’t buy into gender differences regarding how men and women think about and handle their money until five years into her Emmy Award-winning financial show, The Suze Orman Show, on CNBC. After listening to five years of callers’ questions and observing her own friends’ relationships with money, she began examining the differences in how women and men handle money.

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Up, Up and Away! Reviews of Two Business Books to Inspire Women

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cimg2998.JPGFor this second installment of business book reviews, our editorial staff has reviewed two of their recent favorites:

  1. Trade Up! Five Steps for Redesigning your Leadership and Life from the Inside Out, by Rayona Sharpnack
  2. Spiral Up: and other Management Secrets Behind Wildly Successful Initiatives, by Jane Linder.

As you might imagine from their upwardly mobile titles, both books provide advice and encouragement to women looking to move up in the ranks at work, and harness the power and confidence to succeed in life. Sort of like the literary version of buying a coveted handbag or treating yourself to some full-fat ice cream, both of these books are a great start to a career pick-me-up.

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Voice of Experience: Julia Mord, Hedge Fund Analyst

julia-pic.JPGFor this Voice of Experience article, The Glass Hammer focused on Julia Mord, a young woman on the rise at a New York-based boutique investment management firm.

Julia is an Investment Analyst at a private investment office that manages money for a high net worth family. The firm manages two alternative investment portfolios that invest predominantly in both private equity and hedge funds. She is one of five investment professionals in the small office, which includes a fund manager, two analysts, an accounting manager and an intern. Read more

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Poker: Not Just For The Boys Anymore

In the return of The Glass Hammer’s Intrepid Women series, we sent our own Kathryn Nilsson Reichert to learn how to play poker well enough to beat the gentlemen at their own game. Here, she describes the results…

564143766_45929e0bc2_m.jpgCard games were never interesting to me. In fact, aside from an occasional game of solitaire while traveling, the last time I remember playing cards was a game of “go fish” with my grandmother when I was in junior high school. I have never owned a deck of cards nor felt the need to buy one.

Naturally, I was less than enthused when a girlfriend called me recently and said, “Come with me to a women’s poker party tomorrow night!” My first thought was, why? It’s cold outside and it’s already been a long week at work. Besides, thinking about poker conjured up images of men in cheap suits in Vegas casinos hunched over tables for hours, slowly burning through wads of cash. “Don’t be a wet blanket,” my friend said. “Poker is the ‘game du jour.’ We can learn how to play and do some quality business networking at the same time.”

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Voice of Experience: Wanda Wallace, CEO of Leadership Forum, Inc.

wanda_wallace_mg_0020_higherrez.jpgWanda Wallace, Ph.D. is President and CEO of Leadership Forum, Inc. The firm specializes in working with organizations to enhance corporate capability in leadership including strategic thought, customer insight, people and inclusive cultures.

Dr. Wallace has worked with many firms in the financial arena, including Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Ernst and Young, and PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Prior to founding Leadership Forum, Inc, Dr. Wallace was Executive Vice President of Duke Corporate Education, Inc, which she helped found after her tenure as Associate Dean of Executive Education and professor of marketing at The Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.

What prompted you to use your psychology background in the financial arena?

I believe the best strategies succeed or fail based on engaging hearts and minds in the opportunities and the requirements for success. To do so, one must understand people – how they think, how they react, how they make sense of their world, what communication style is best, and so forth. To me, this is the essence of what I bring from my psychology background.

Five years ago, the financial world was interested in high quality coaching, strategic planning and teamwork development. They still are, but in the last year there has been an increasing focus on improving the ability to manage people in a business where numbers count for everything. As an industry, I see financial professionals placing an increased emphasis on retaining the great talent they worked so hard to recruit. Improving retention requires improving management practices. Even in diversity efforts, which are critical for financial services firms, better management practices increase the chances of developing and retaining diverse talent.

What I enjoy most is the ability to go into an organization, identify and clarify the issues and present solutions, using training and development activities and/or coaching.

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Voice of Experience: Linda Descano, COO of Citi’s Women & Co

businesswomen.jpgFor our Voices of Experience series, The Glass Hammer interviewed Linda Descano and asked her about her experience in financial services and her advice for young women in finance.

Linda Descano, CFA, is President and Chief Operating Officer of Women & Co., a division of Citi that provides women with educational resources for navigating life transitions and planning their financial future. Prior to joining Women & Co. in 2003, Linda was a Director and Portfolio Manager in Citi’s Private Portfolio Group, where she co-managed customized investment portfolios for individuals and institutions and oversaw the firm’s socially responsible investment program. Before that, she served as Senior Vice President and Director of Environmental Affairs for Salomon Inc., which she joined in 1994 Linda holds a B.A. from Temple University in geology.

Linda is also a sought-after public speaker. She has spoken on personal finance and investment topics at major conferences for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), United Nations Development Program, Environmental Bankers Association, and Cambridge University, among others. For two years, Linda chaired the steering committee of the United Nations Financial Institutions Initiative on the Environment. She has received a Human Rights Leadership Award from Church Women United and an Environmental Leadership Award from the United Nations Environment Program, North America. She is a member of the New York Society of Security Analysts, Financial Communications Society, Corporate Advisory Council of the Center for Environmental Leadership in Business, and the Financial Literacy Committee of Dress for Success in New York.

In honor of her grandmothers, Nina Gaspari Pennachietti and Anna Fortunato Descano, Linda recently endowed the National Organization of Italian American Women with the Nina Anna Scholarship, a needs-based scholarship for an Italian-American woman pursuing higher education.

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Top African American Women in Business …Other than Oprah

When you think of successful African American women, unless you have been living in a media-free cave for the last 20 years, Oprah springs to mind. While we acknowledge and admire the accomplishments of the talk show host, media mogul and self-made billionaire, it’s a shame that many of us are not equally familiar with other black women who have made a big impact on the world of business. Here we briefly profile ten fantastically accomplished African American women in finance and business. If you don’t know their names yet, you should!

  1. Ursula Burns, President of Xerox. As a Fortune 500 company, Xerox has a great track record of promoting women executives to the highest management positions. Next in line after CEO Anne Mulcahy, Burns has driven efforts to improve the line of products offered by Xerox and supported R&D of new technologies, including Xerox’s new emulsion aggregate toner plant in upstate New York. Under her leadership, Xerox grew by 20% in 2007. Burns was named to her position in April 2007, and also holds a seat on the Board of Directors. Burns joined Xerox as a summer intern in 1980, and worked her way up at Xerox after obtaining a B.S. from Polytechnic Institute of New York and a Master’s in Engineering from Columbia. She also serves on the boards of American Express Corp., Boston Scientific Corp., CASA – The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, National Academy Foundation, National Association of Manufacturers, and the University of Rochester.
  2. Susan Chapman, Global Head of Operations, Citigroup Realty Services. Chapman manages the day-today operations for Citigroup Realty in 96 countries. She holds the No. 2 spot in the business unit, and is responsible for overseeing mergers and acquisitions, retail branch development, real estate administration, strategic projects and global business relationship management.Chapman sits on the Dean’s Advisory Board for the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business, where she received her MBA in 1998. She was named to Black Enterprise magazine’s Hot List for up and coming businesspeople under 40.
  3. Edith Cooper, Head of North American Hedge Fund Distribution, Fixed Income, Currencies & Commodities, Goldman Sachs. Cooper was promoted to managing director in 1998, after only 2 years at Goldman Sachs, and made partner in 2000. In London, she co-led the company’s commodity business for Europe and Asia, and in 2004, she co-headed the company’s global clearing and execution in the equity division. Cooper headed the company’s global futures business before rising to her current position. Before working at Goldman, Cooper worked at Banker’s Trust. Cooper graduated from Harvard College and received her MBA from Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Business. Read more
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Movers and Shakers: East Coast Round-Up

The summer may be the time when things tend to slow down, but for women in the top industries, things have been heating up. Here are some of the women who’ve recently made their way along the executive path:

Financial Services

Suzanne B. Schiavelli was hired as a principal in specialty finance to Bank of America. The only woman in this class of nine new hires, she will serve as a senior member of the equity research platform at Bank of America. According to the Bank of America announcement, Ms. Schiavelli joins from Morgan Stanley where she most recently covered emerging specialty finance stocks. Prior to Morgan Stanley, she worked as an investment banker in the financial institutions group at Lehman Brothers. Ms. Schiavelli received a bachelor of arts in economics from Providence College and a master’s degree in business administration from The Stern School at NYU.

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