Today you will play a part in several small stories at the office. Each one will be made up of a setting, characters, dialogue, context, and a scenario in play.
What you may not have noticed is that in each of these interactions, meaning is being negotiated by one or more people who are simultaneously building their leadership identity. Is one of them you?
Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant have written in the New York Times about the challenges of “speaking while female”, which holds women and companies back – such as being manterrupted, having male co-workers take the words from your mouth and run with them, being penalized in competency ratings for talking as much as male executive peers, or witnessing your contributions not being allotted equal weight in strategic discussions. Clearly, more is at stake than share of talk time.
According to the discursive leadership approach, “leadership is a language game in which meaning is managed.” When women’s voices are undermined, their ability to create meaning, and therefore leadership identity, is likely too.
Small Stories and Identity Creation
Discursive leadership says that leadership identity is achieved through influencing the meaning within everyday interactions in an organization, where the players predominantly framing conversations are reinforcing their positioning as leaders.
Research from Jonathon Clifton at the Universite´ de Valenciennes in France suggests that we too often overlook the importance of everyday “small stories” in developing leadership. We often look at leadership identity through narratives where leaders stands back and reflect on their lives.
In contrast short stories are short, happening all the time in everyday settings, told within the purpose of interaction, and aren’t necessarily about the speaker – and it’s those moments in which leadership identity, viewed as more “fragmented, fluid, and dynamic” – is constructed. Echoing Herminia Ibarra’sperspective on leadership identity, identity isn’t something we have or are – it’s something we do.
If we look at leadership more as a practice and process, and less as a quality, then the upcoming briefing meeting, the strategic discussion, and the next conflict resolution are moments in which we can “perform leader identities.” At any moment, we can “do identity” in interactions.
Being a Meaning Maker
Clifton’s research focuses on observing how we “do leadership” through our daily discourse by managing meaning in the “here-and-now” moments of interaction.
Citing previous research, Clifton notes that at any point a narrator (speaker) manages meaning and position herself or himself as leader by:
- positioning characters (co-workers) & the collective (eg. organization) relative to each other in a story
- positioning self as leader by being the one to convey that story right now
- positioning self relative to the organization and certain master narratives (eg an organizational priority)
Any time we talk about anything, we position it in one particular way and not another, which privileges one version of organizational reality while pushing aside others. By influencing the meaning through which discussions are framed, a speaker positions himself or herself as leader through the interaction.
The “fine-grained” discursive techniques of leadership are not necessarily conscious because meaning is always being influenced in conversation. Once observed, certain techniques can be sharpened with awareness and practice. Here’s examples of language plays the researcher pointed out in recorded meetings:
- leading the verbal briefing of a situation at hand
- speaking on behalf of players when summarizing a situation and the various perspectives
- being the speaker framing the situation as news in the here & now, while perhaps conveying an insider viewpoint
- initiating assessment of a situation, challenging a previous assessment, or upgrading it to a stronger assessment
- judging or affirming another’s assessment to assert greater expertise
- bringing in stories or information to justify a certain way of looking at things
- returning the conversation to an angle of topic after intervening conversation
- speaking on behalf of the organization, animating its perspective and giving it voice through “we”
- authoring a (selective) organizational landscape through which dynamics are then interpreted and decisions framed
Resources and Power Imbalance in Managing Meaning
According to the research, the dance of leadership discourse is not strictly defined by hierarchy, but open to resistance, negotiation, or acquiescence and is often distributed and negotiated among different participants in any given discussion. As observed in previous research, “management of meaning does not take place in a social vacuum and rights to assess are constantly being claimed, challenged, and policed as participants jockey for influence…” But not everybody holds equal resources or power in the game.
What each person perceives as their “allowable contribution” to any discussion (eg opening, guiding, assessing, & closing it) is affected by where they sit, and if we bring Sandberg & Grant’s article into consideration – potentially by their experiences of speaking in a specific context in their organization as a man or a woman.
Though not addressing gender differences, the research acknowledges the impact of power imbalance. Clifton notes, “In this language game, rights to assess and, therefore, to define the organizational landscape are negotiated in talk and the person, or persons, who have most influence in this process emerge as the leaders. Thus, from this perspective, leadership is not a zero-sum game, rather it is in constant flow as talk progresses… it can be distributed and it is open to challenge.”
“However,” he notes, “those most likely to emerge as leaders are those who have access to more powerful discursive resources with which to influence the process of the negotiation of meaning.”
Applying that to formal roles, Clifton states “Whilst leadership may not be commensurate with hierarchy, access to discursive resources that are category-bound to more ‘powerful’ identities, such as chairperson, may skew the ability to do leadership in favour of people incumbent of certain organizational identities.”
Disrupting the Discourse Dynamic
In the majority of companies, the incumbents of most executive level identities are men. At both an executive and senior pipeline level, women are not in a position of equal access to the big conversations and often face challenges when they do get a seat at the decision table.
Sandberg and Grant have shared that senior women experience different outcomes to men when they speak. The bigger consequence at hand when women’s voices are institutionally disadvantaged is arguably the consistent re-positioning of predominantly male leadership and privileging of male-led organizational narratives.
Yet the research examples illustrated women “doing leadership” in discussion, including with male bosses. If leadership is a flow practiced with each conversation and discourse is a dance happening at every interaction, then every day presents new opportunities for you to “do leader.”
The more women do, and the more informal organizational culture changes to support and reward them equally to men in doing so, the less “leader” will be a long identity bridge women have to cross.
Instead, leadership can become a series of moments we step and speak into.
DESTINATION C-SUITE: Silicon Valley Tech Leadership While Female
Career Advice, FeaturedA couple of times a year, a former female colleague from my Fortune 500 days calls for advice on how to break into a Silicon Valley leadership role.The fact that I don’t get those calls more often is telling…and disappointing.I’ve had to good fortune to work with some of corporate America’s best and brightest women.And after nearly 20 years in the Valley, I am also a passionate advocate for making a career in high tech and grabbing the chance to make a real “dent in the universe.”So, why don’t more outstanding female corporate leaders make the move to leadership roles in high tech here?My take is that the environment is unquestionably challenging, but that corporate women are also often focused on the wrong risks.And I believe there are shifts in our approach that can increase the flow of corporate women into the Valley significantly.
Challenging the Environment
Even a cursory scan of recent Valley press indicates that the big companies in the Valley are flunking diversity. A recent report from Fenwick & West LLPreveals that women hold just 11 percent of executive positions at Silicon Valley companies, compared to 16 percent in the S&P 100. The implication is that women from outside of the Valley looking to move in at a senior leadership level are shooting the gap for a very limited number of places.I’m optimistic that, with increasing public and investor pressure on these companies to diversify their leadership, we’ll see progress over the next 5-10 years.But if you’re a woman looking to move now, my advice is to target companies that you are passionate about and that are showing relatively better leadership and Board diversity (such as Pandora) and/or making public commitments to improvement (like Intel).
The challenge is obviously greater for women without a technical or product background. While it’s true that Sheryl Sandberg joined Google in 2001 as its Vice President of Global Online Sales and Operations and Angela Ahrendts joined Apple in 2014 as Senior Vice President of Retail and Online Sales without an engineering degree or tech experience, both brought unique, complementary skills to the company’s leadership. Those opportunities are few and far between, but with careful research into the challenges facing the Valley’s biggest firms, you just might find a key pain point that your legal, financial, regulatory, governmental, marketing, retail or operating experience can solve for one of the Valley 150. Ironically, one of the better Valley opportunities right now is for senior women that have led high-profile, successful diversity initiatives at F500 firms.
The other option to break into the Valley is to start your own business.In my experience, that’s even less often considered, but possibly more often successful. If you have identified a problem that you believe technology can elegantly solve, at scale, and at a profit, this might be the route for you.As CEO of your own startup, you can be successful without a computer science degree (though it certainly would help) if you bring strong strategic thinking, recruiting and leadership experience. Financial analytics and salesmanship also required. Only two women in my network have ever approached me with this as their initial idea, and both have become success stories.
Focusing on the Wrong Risks
A Fortune 500 leader’s experience often trains them to focus on the wrong risks and prevents them from making the move to the tech industry (in the Valley or elsewhere). A former classmate of mine told me recently that all four of the Fortune 500 companies he’d joined since business school were now out of business. I think his experience illustrates well the risk profile most common among my Fortune 500 friends: over-estimating the risks of changing industries and/or moving to a smaller organization and underestimating the risks of staying with an organization that is not continuously innovating. While it may feel comforting to draw a large six-figure paycheck in the years between the start and obvious end of your global brand’s dominant leadership position, it’s more rewarding and often more lucrative to be on the executive staff of the startup that’s pulling the rug out from under those same companies.
Preparing yourself to take the plunge
There’s a great deal that anyone in a Fortune 500 role looking to get into a Silicon Valley leadership position can do to increase their odds for success in making such a change, but by far the most important is building a network here.A woman I know who went from leading a nonprofit in Washington D.C. to running her own tech startup in San Francisco first leveraged her board members from the tech sector; then joined a think tank comprised of politicians, academics and tech executives; and then asked for introductions from that core of technology connections to their networks.She soon had a significant, senior network in the Valley that was instrumental in her securing funding and kick-starting her hiring.It’s an approach many women can and should take.
Conclusion
I don’t minimize the continuing, systemic challenges that female leaders face in Silicon Valley.Over the last year, I’ve been the only female Limited Partner in a room of 40 and the only female speaker during a two-day tech conference. Some days, it’s a tough gig. But I agree with Newsweek in labeling the power of digital, mobile, social and cloud technologies as “our era’s Industrial Revolution.” And during this Revolution some will have the chance to create new products, industries and even economies.I believe most of those people will be doing so from an Ikea table somewhere south of Marin and north of Gilroy.And I fully expect that, someday soon, half of the chairs at that table will be occupied by women.
Guest contributed by Donna Wells
(Guest advice and opinions are not necessarily those of theglasshammer.com)
Is all publicity, good publicity?
Career Tip of the Week!Some people are more keen than others to update the rest of the world on their professional activities and that is partly to do with personality and partly to do with how you prioritize your online time. Next time you are posting something to Facebook, think about whether you could also share that update on other social spaces such as LinkedIn? The question to ask yourself is, “ does this help me show what I have expertise in?” Do you show up in a consistent manner and what then, is your message?
By Nicki Gilmour, Executive Coach and Organizational Psychologist
Contact nicki@theglasshammer.com if you would like to hire an executive coach to help you navigate the path to optimal personal success at work
Voice of Experience: Alaina Percival, CEO, Women Who Code
People, Voices of ExperiencePercival knows from experience the importance of shining a light on your strengths. She began her career in the footwear industry with a job at Puma running their niche products division, which included collaborating with designers and overseeing any major projects that weren’t shoe related.
While there, she learned an important skill – having to secure deliverables from people who were far senior to her in the organization. That dynamic meant that she couldn’t tell them what to do, so she had to figure out how to make them want to do it. “It was a skill that has translated well to my current role, since Women who Code is a volunteer-driven organization,” Percival says. “We can’t tell people what they have to do, we have to inspire them to want to work toward its missions.”
After Puma, she decided to return to school to earn her MBA and then went to a small women’s performance shoe company as corporate brand manager for women-specific volleyball and basketball shoes. Her major challenge there was helping the niche company compete with brands like Nike, only without their resources.
From Footwear to Tech
Eventually, she decided to move on from footwear, and begin to consider cities where she’d like to live. She chose San Francisco because of its many opportunities in the tech industry. “It was a struggle because I’d always worked with footwear, but I felt like I needed to switch gears and start over and find my path.”
She started consulting with tech companies and then became engulfed with Women Who Code, just as it was getting started. After teaching herself how to code, she began organizing events and finding sponsors; she found that her background in community development lent itself well to scaling and it became a passion project for her. At the time, she was working for a startup, and then when it got acquired by Yahoo, it provide the opportunity to bring Women Who Code into her next day job, where she was running the charitable arm of Riviera Partners.
“I was working with a lot of engineering executives, but fewer than 5 percent of them were women. I saw the experiences and opportunities they had and started bringing those into Women Who Code’s programs. That is where Women Who Code’s mission of inspiring women excel in their careers was formed and how I knew we could make a difference.”
Within a few months, she had filed for non-profit status and a trademark and built out a budget, and then realized that in nights and weekends, she was essentially running a huge organization that deserved the opportunity to shine. She decided to leave her day job and focus exclusively on Women Who Code.
Making a Difference Through Women Who Code
And that is the achievement she is most proud of so far: the impact Women Who Code is having on the careers of its leaders in the tech industry – their careers are ascending with awards, board appointments, press mentions and invitations to speak at conferences.
“The most exciting part is that the Women Who Code leaders whom we are helping empower are women who are dedicated to seeing other women excel. Their influence will impact the industry exponentially,” Percival says.
Looking at the industry as a whole, she sees that Women Who Code holds an important role in the landscape: already, they are seeing the benefits of reaching out to women and girls to showcase technology careers. Although they have made huge strides in attracting talented women to the field, they are still leaving at too high of a rate. “The conversation now needs to be about creating a better place for women in the industry and helping them navigate their career path. When women do enter the industry, there are not enough role models and they don’t see women well represented at the individual contributor level.”
The group has a weekly publication called Code Review that highlights everyday career successes of women – whether they have won an award, landed a new job or promotion or launched a new product. “We want to champion these women and create the feeling that it’s normal to share your successes, since it can be harder for women.”
Advice for Young Women: Code
According to Percival, all industries are becoming “technology industries,” whether it’s finance or footwear, so increasingly future executives will be those who have a background and understanding of technology. She herself wishes she had learned to code earlier and she urges women to learn the basics, by even taking one coding class. “In areas where women are underrepresented, the issue will only be exacerbated as we see top jobs going to those with a background in tech. It is essential they learn skills like coding as early as possible.”
In addition, she advises women to always set goals, whether they are clear on what they want to do or not. “Lay out that goal and work toward it; you can always change your mind later,” she says. And she underscores the importance of building a network authentically. “Approaching networking as relationship building is key, because then those people become more than just contacts: they become friends and your allies whether you need help in two weeks or two years.”
How Companies Can Win In the Talent Quest
She also believes that companies have a responsibility in the drive to bring more women into the field, and she advises them to really spend time thinking through how they can attract and retain women.
One key area is to make sure they are paying women fairly. She recommends companies analyze salaries and make changes if there are discrepancies that are gender-related. “If there’s an across-the-board percentage of people getting paid less, it’s expensive not to balance that out,” she says. Otherwise, companies will lose out on the women in the last 15 years of their career when they can provide the most value to the company and act as role models and mentors.
“You can’t afford to lose them when they’re the most experienced.”
By Cathie Ericson
Men Who Get It: Naveed Sultan, Global Head of Treasury and Trade Solutions, Managing Director, Citibank
Men Who "Get It", PeopleAs head of the Treasury and Trade Solutions division of Citi’s Institutional Clients Group, Sultan oversees one of Citi’s largest global businesses, which handles multi-country client relationships. This business provides an integrated suite of treasury, cash management and trade finance services to multinational corporations, financial institutions and public sector organizations and it runs the industry’s largest proprietary network with banking licenses in over 100 countries. “Our work goes to the heart of the topic of diversity,” says Sultan. “In any global business the talent mix must reflect the footprint, the cultural attributes and ability to adapt and understand the notion of inclusion. For a global organization to be successful, it must incorporate those elements into its business model.”
Sultan began his career in Pakistan, where he worked for a few years in corporate banking before taking a sabbatical to study in the United States for his second management degree, which he earned at Sloan School of Management at MIT. “My decision to study in the United States was driven by my desire to gain exposure to a diverse academic environment and interact with people with different backgrounds,” he says. “It was one of the best decisions I have made because it gave me a very rich experience.”
Upon graduation, he changed his line of specialization into transactional banking, extending into operations and technology, and joined Citi in Saudi Arabia, moving through several positions and geographic locales over his 23-year tenure to his current role.
A Diversity Champion
To Sultan, retaining a diverse talent pool makes business, economic and social sense. “It’s simply the right thing to do, but more than that, there is vital business and economic logic to it,” he says, mentioning a robust body of research that proves diversity contributes to a stronger business due to a better working environment and more informed decisions.
“The notion of diversity in a broader context has always resonated with me, but it’s even more compelling and convincing when you consider the business case,” he says.
Growing up, Sultan says his economist/banker father told him that he would be among the first generation in Pakistan to make the transition into an international environment, to live their lives in a global world. Along with that, he cautioned, would come the need to never pass a value judgment on someone who’s different, but to appreciate people for what they are and have a sense of inclusion.
“That lesson stayed with all of us, and that’s why I realize it’s an important mindset that managers need to have – the ability to value people for what they bring, rather than focusing on their shortcomings,” he says.
Valuing Differences
Sultan realized early on that you can’t confuse style with leadership. For example, somebody who is understated is merely exhibiting a different style and may well be an equally effective leader as someone who is more dimensional and extroverted.
“As managers we have to condition ourselves to develop an appreciation for different kinds of leaders,” he says, even though he has seen that supervisors often subconsciously believe that everyone should converge toward one common style of management.
But, as he points out, if you do that, why do you need diversity? As Citi has evolved rapidly in regards to this dimension he says that awareness has risen exponentially throughout the company. “Ever since I joined Citi, I have been participating in diversity discussions and how we should implement policies to make organizations more responsive to the notion of diversity.”
Mover and Shaker: Christina Smedley, Brand and Communications Officer, PayPal
Movers and Shakers, PeopleBorn in Jamaica, Smedley grew up in England and had her first job on a factory line, where one of her tasks — inspecting clear shampoo bottles for flaws – provided her first entrée to the importance of quality control and paying attention to details.
Prior to joining PayPal, Smedley worked for Edelman, where she was global chair of consumer marketing which entailed telling stories for big brands. One of her many initiatives during that time was helming Dove’s award-winning “Real Beauty” campaign where she helped change the way that people look at beauty — an important crusade both professionally and personally, as she has a teenager daughter. Prior to that, she handled worldwide communications for Amazon, helping change the way people would shop during a time when most people had never even heard of the website or the concept of online retail.
In her current role at PayPal, she is responsible for communications and marketing for global consumers and making sure the company is connecting them with tools to move money more simply.
“Money is such an intrinsic part of life, and it is changing faster in the next three years than it has in the past 20 years,” she says. “It’s exciting to be part of that narrative, and it’s why I’m passionate about what I do.”
At PayPal one of her roles has been to unify the brand globally including rebuilding the website and launching a new brand image; previously, due to its meteoric growth, the brand looked different in Australia than in Germany, for example.
And that’s what keeps her inspired in her day-to-day work: the opportunity she sees ahead to make it simple for people to move their money and provide a secure, effective double-sided network for merchants.
Sponsors and Mentors Play Valuable Roles
During her career ascension, Smedley has benefited from both sponsors and mentors and sees a role for both. Her trusted mentors have been people with whom she can share dreams and aspirations, but her sponsors have been those who have pushed her in ways she didn’t even think she was ready for.
“A sponsor might put you forward for a stretch assignment you hadn’t considered or a promotion you weren’t even asking for. Women tend not to put themselves out there, but you have to push yourself even if you think you aren’t ready; just take that deep breath, jump in, and ask for feedback.”
Along the way she has worked with women whom she says have left an indelible mark as mentors, and she’s also able to find qualities she’d like to emulate throughout different business units within PayPal. For example, she feels inspired by the customer service team, who can ably handle tough moments and respond positively under pressure.
Continuous Learning
She acknowledges that it’s as important to have a pause in your career as it is to drive forward, though assuming that philosophy can be challenging for individuals who are focused on advancement.
“We have so many influences and when you’re in the middle of a dynamic industry, it’s sometimes challenging to just stop for a moment and assess what we’re trying to do as a team, but that’s when you’re learning nuances and skills.” She says that she underscores that concept to those she mentors – that doing the same job for a period of time allows to you to hone the craftsmanship that will ultimately make you a better professional.
Smedley actively supports PayPal’s Women’s Initiative, a company-wide initiative that enables women throughout the organization to advance their careers through conferences, networking and continuous learning.
Smedley says she loves to travel and has brought that drive to her family, including her 16-year-old twins. In addition, Smedley is passionate about literacy and supports programs that advance the skills in her native Jamaica, since she has seen the impact that learning and reading can have on communities. “It’s vital to me to look after my homeland,” she says.
By Cathie Ericson
Me and You: Effective Leadership Through Personal Identification
LeadershipAccording to a 2013 paper by Weichun Zu et al, limited personal identification between leaders and followers can have a negative effect – not only in terms of leadership effectiveness, but also in the team’s ability to innovate and their commitment to the organization. The authors present a compelling argument; rather than focus on the impact of organizational identification on employees, we should focus more on the effectiveness of individuals personally aligning with leaders.
Organizational identification, first introduced in 1987 by Cheney and Tompkins, is usually experienced when decision makers select the option which “best promotes the perceived interests of that organization”. The advantages of high organizational identification include greater job satisfaction, improved cooperation and reduced absenteeism. What Zu et al found, is that personal identification results in these benefits too but with greater impact.
This case is supported by a research study published by Hobman et al in 2011 which highlights this difference between organizational and personal identification. The study found that “identification with the leader significantly mediated the positive associations between supportive leadership, intellectual stimulation, personal recognition, in the prediction of job satisfaction and job performance”. While identifying with individuals can have a positive impact, the authors didn’t find the impact to be as great when followers identified with the organization as a whole.
Effective leadership on an individual level is therefore critical to an organization’s success. This even more important in today’s relatively buoyant market where long term commitment to the organization such as high retention rates, is harder to come by. What does this mean for today’s leaders?
Thomas Sy, Professor of Psychology at University of California Riverside, shows how a leader’s perception of his or her followers can have a negative impact when trying to recruit a diverse workforce. In his paper, “What do you think of followers?” and in an interview with Science Daily, Sy highlights the risks around categorizing followers (most often done automatically and spontaneously). “Western leaders may recognize the potential of followers who show enthusiasm, and label and treat these individuals as ‘high potentials.’ However, Western leaders may overlook the same potential in equally capable followers who may not exhibit enthusiasm because their cultural values may inhibit expression of emotions (e.g. Eastern cultures such as Japan and China). This bias may also occur for gender.” Simply put, leaders are individually accountable for the diversity of their workforce, not just the organization’s bottom line.
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How To Make Sure Your Career Invests Back In You
Career Advice, Money TalksEspecially for women, it’s important to manage and maximize the financial returns of your career advancement.
Return On Career Investment
There is significant data to suggest that women generally receive a lower return on their career investment than men do. Research has shown, for example, that women reap less career and financial benefits for building strong connections on Wall Street; for combining education, experience and ambition; for performing equal work; for holding top executive positions; and for leading strong company performance.
But the pay gap is one aspect of the return on career investment gap in which women may hold more power and influence than they are asserting. With smart and pro-active management, your paycheck is not the final say on your ultimate financial nest egg, especially as you advance in your career and to earn more money to optimize.
The Financial Confidence Gap
A new study from Regions Private Wealth Management identified a financial confidence gap. Among survey participants, women, especially younger women, expressed lower levels of financial confidence than men and greater uncertainty about their financial outlook.
The data showed that when it comes to making investment decisions for retirement, more women than men described their risk tolerance as “conservative.” As a result, women may be inclined to prefer financial vehicles deemed “safe,” such as savings accounts or CDs with little growth potential, rather than invest in stocks and bonds, which typically provide greater returns over the long term.
Women’s lack of confidence around investing could inhibit women from investing or investing more assertively to reach the financial goals they hope to attain with their career, and compound the impact of the gender pay gap.
Women Should Be Confident in Investing
A confidence gap is rarely a reflection of ability, as studies have shown women tend to underestimate their ability and men tend to be overconfident. The reality is women who have educated themselves regarding potential investments have reason to feel good about their ability to choose wisely.Also, women are more likely to turn to others to fill information gaps, meaning more willing to turn to financial professionals and trusted friends for guidance.
This pays off. When it comes to investing, women who do invest tend to perform as well or even out-perform men with their portfolios, showing women generally display some savvy investor strategies, even if opportunity remains.
But just as too few women negotiate their salary compared to men to maximize income growth on the front end, too few women take the opportunity to maximize their investments by considering all options.
Stepping Up to The Investment Game
Here are three tips from the advisors at Regions Private Wealth Management to step over the financial confidence gap, and get into the game of managing the assets you accumulate through career advancement:
1. Gather your financial information.
To form a complete picture of your financial situation, map out all of your savings and investments as well as any significant liabilities you may need to factor in to your overall goals, such as paying off student loan or credit card debt. If you have a spouse or significant other, discuss where all accounts are held and make sure you both are able to access them in the event of an emergency.
2. Meet with a financial advisor.
Share your financial situation with a qualified professional, who can help determine if your portfolio is aligned with your risk tolerance and structured to meet your goals. An advisor can suggest ways to diversify a portfolio to help weather market fluctuations as well as help make any necessary adjustments and introduce strategies that could provide tax or other benefits. Remember investments are different.They are not a bank deposit or insured by the FDIC, they may lose value, and they may not be insured by any federal government agency.So, don’t be afraid to ask questions. Your financial advisor should go at the pace you set and provide any background information needed.
3. Commit to reviewing your portfolio.
Check in on the performance of your accounts on a regular basis, such as once each quarter. While you may not need to make adjustments, simply seeing how your portfolio reacts to market movements can build familiarity with the investment process and build confidence in your choices across time. Meet with your financial advisor on an annual basis to ensure the portfolio remains on target or to adjust for changes in circumstances, such as an unexpected windfall.
No matter where you are in your career, stepping more confidently into the investment game, while pulling in sound financial guidance along the way, can help you maximize the financial returns of your career and ensure your career invests back in you.
This article was sponsored by Regions Private Wealth Management.
Voice Of Experience: Pam Dunsky, Managing Director, Client Services Technology at TIAA-CREF
People, Voices of ExperienceDunsky knows that keeping centered in thoughts, energy and mood is an important discipline to find both in work and in day to day life.While for some this may be achieved through yoga, meditation, the gym, or music, for her being centered has come through her training in martial arts. Dunsky elaborates, “Tying together my personal passion, with my business life, has allowed me to use my training to keep perspective and balance dealing with it all— both personally and professionally.”
Trained in martial arts for more than 20 years, Dunsky travels regularly to Japan, and she and her husband own their own school where she teaches and trains. She enjoys the physical aspects but also the discipline and value of lifelong learning. Dunsky sees many parallels between martial arts and the business world, and uses that thinking to strategize and help others navigate the day.
Starting Out Strong
Prior to delving into the martial arts, Dunsky graduated from the University of Dayton with a degree in computer science. This led to her first position as an intern with Mead Data Central (now LexisNexis). The company was such a good fit that she worked there three different times as it grew from 300 employees to 4500, and alternated stints with AT&T in the interim – flexibility was crucial at that time as her husband completed medical school.
Dunsky had a well-rounded early career, moving across all technology delivery groups with positions including: development, project management, management of software delivery, applied research, infrastructure and data systems. Additionally, she acquired experience in a diverse set of industries including electronic publishing, telecommunications and financial services. Landing in financial services with Fidelity Investments in 2001, Dunsky joined TIAA-CREF in 2011 because she loved the firm’s values, and its commitment to its clients’ financial well-being to and through retirement.
Overseeing a Transformation
Since joining TIAA-CREF, Dunsky has taken on a challenging role as a transformative leader, and was recently promoted to the IT Leadership team. With over 800 staff members in her organization, she is excited about spearheading the expansive efforts to transform the firm’s operating model in the retirement space. “We are making great progress with this effort.Transformation requires a focus on customers and a strong collaboration between business and IT when it comes to envisioning, planning, designing and executing the type of changes that impact across the entire organization.Change is hard and it takes leadership at many levels every day to make it happen,” she says.
Dunsky has been focusing on process leadership, change management and agile delivery models.She recognizes that this is a constant learning process, but knows that collaboration, strategic thinking and pragmatic customer-centric actions will keep her team on the right path. What we need to deliver through technology is rapidly changing, but so are the ways we work.And women have unique and very effective skills to bring to many of the emerging models.
Advice from the Top
Dunsky does not shy away from a change or challenge at work, nor does she overlook the importance of building networks and having coaches and mentors. “Over the course of time you get a full appreciation of the importance of a diverse network and building relationships with people from whom you can gain continual support and dialogue over a long career.”
She urges women not to sell themselves short, but to always be ready and prepared to go after opportunities, even before they arise. “While you may not be clear on what’s the next best step, being open to lots of possibilities and in dialogue with leaders around the organization to make sure your talents, contributions and interests are known really helps,” she says. “The best opportunities come from people making the connection to you when they hear of projects or positions that make them think of you, but they have to know you and know your capability and brand for that to happen.”
Women Make it Happen
Smart companies embrace women in technology, believes Dunsky. “We bring valuable, diverse perspectives. We are highly organized. We are able to lead, collaborate and deliver in all aspects of design and execution.”
Dunsky has been involved in TIAA-CREF’s IT women’s network, as well as in its Women’s Employee Resource Group (ERG), for which she is starting a new chapter in New Jersey. Both organizations have shown the ability to drive tremendous engagement and forward the development of women in business and technology. Dunsky also devotes significant time to mentoring and coaching other women in the organization. She recently participated in the kickoff event for a group mentoring program to share experiences and to encourage other women to join take advantage of mentoring opportunities.
“We have to continue to find and leverage talented women in technology. The number of women coming into IT from universities has been declining, but there are more diverse roles in and around technology in the digital age than ever before.IT has been a tremendous career opportunity with challenging work and extremely bright and capable colleagues.
“Lean In discussions over the past few years have done a lot to reenergize the conversation of women — for clarifying their ambitions and seeing all the opportunities around them.We have so much to offer to the company and to each other in our unique journeys and that is one of the things I love about my work every day,” Dunsky says.
For growth of women in technology to continue, she sees a serious need to engage with schools and support programs to encourage technology as a possibility for young women.Young women are often entrepreneurial, confident and not afraid to try new things.Helping them get their start can be rewarding for both parties.
Dunsky is optimistic about the opportunities for both young females, and herself, in the evolving world of technology.
Why Leadership Identity is “Done” In Everyday Discussions
Career Advice, LeadershipWhat you may not have noticed is that in each of these interactions, meaning is being negotiated by one or more people who are simultaneously building their leadership identity. Is one of them you?
Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant have written in the New York Times about the challenges of “speaking while female”, which holds women and companies back – such as being manterrupted, having male co-workers take the words from your mouth and run with them, being penalized in competency ratings for talking as much as male executive peers, or witnessing your contributions not being allotted equal weight in strategic discussions. Clearly, more is at stake than share of talk time.
According to the discursive leadership approach, “leadership is a language game in which meaning is managed.” When women’s voices are undermined, their ability to create meaning, and therefore leadership identity, is likely too.
Small Stories and Identity Creation
Discursive leadership says that leadership identity is achieved through influencing the meaning within everyday interactions in an organization, where the players predominantly framing conversations are reinforcing their positioning as leaders.
Research from Jonathon Clifton at the Universite´ de Valenciennes in France suggests that we too often overlook the importance of everyday “small stories” in developing leadership. We often look at leadership identity through narratives where leaders stands back and reflect on their lives.
In contrast short stories are short, happening all the time in everyday settings, told within the purpose of interaction, and aren’t necessarily about the speaker – and it’s those moments in which leadership identity, viewed as more “fragmented, fluid, and dynamic” – is constructed. Echoing Herminia Ibarra’sperspective on leadership identity, identity isn’t something we have or are – it’s something we do.
If we look at leadership more as a practice and process, and less as a quality, then the upcoming briefing meeting, the strategic discussion, and the next conflict resolution are moments in which we can “perform leader identities.” At any moment, we can “do identity” in interactions.
Being a Meaning Maker
Clifton’s research focuses on observing how we “do leadership” through our daily discourse by managing meaning in the “here-and-now” moments of interaction.
Citing previous research, Clifton notes that at any point a narrator (speaker) manages meaning and position herself or himself as leader by:
Any time we talk about anything, we position it in one particular way and not another, which privileges one version of organizational reality while pushing aside others. By influencing the meaning through which discussions are framed, a speaker positions himself or herself as leader through the interaction.
The “fine-grained” discursive techniques of leadership are not necessarily conscious because meaning is always being influenced in conversation. Once observed, certain techniques can be sharpened with awareness and practice. Here’s examples of language plays the researcher pointed out in recorded meetings:
Resources and Power Imbalance in Managing Meaning
According to the research, the dance of leadership discourse is not strictly defined by hierarchy, but open to resistance, negotiation, or acquiescence and is often distributed and negotiated among different participants in any given discussion. As observed in previous research, “management of meaning does not take place in a social vacuum and rights to assess are constantly being claimed, challenged, and policed as participants jockey for influence…” But not everybody holds equal resources or power in the game.
What each person perceives as their “allowable contribution” to any discussion (eg opening, guiding, assessing, & closing it) is affected by where they sit, and if we bring Sandberg & Grant’s article into consideration – potentially by their experiences of speaking in a specific context in their organization as a man or a woman.
Though not addressing gender differences, the research acknowledges the impact of power imbalance. Clifton notes, “In this language game, rights to assess and, therefore, to define the organizational landscape are negotiated in talk and the person, or persons, who have most influence in this process emerge as the leaders. Thus, from this perspective, leadership is not a zero-sum game, rather it is in constant flow as talk progresses… it can be distributed and it is open to challenge.”
“However,” he notes, “those most likely to emerge as leaders are those who have access to more powerful discursive resources with which to influence the process of the negotiation of meaning.”
Applying that to formal roles, Clifton states “Whilst leadership may not be commensurate with hierarchy, access to discursive resources that are category-bound to more ‘powerful’ identities, such as chairperson, may skew the ability to do leadership in favour of people incumbent of certain organizational identities.”
Disrupting the Discourse Dynamic
In the majority of companies, the incumbents of most executive level identities are men. At both an executive and senior pipeline level, women are not in a position of equal access to the big conversations and often face challenges when they do get a seat at the decision table.
Sandberg and Grant have shared that senior women experience different outcomes to men when they speak. The bigger consequence at hand when women’s voices are institutionally disadvantaged is arguably the consistent re-positioning of predominantly male leadership and privileging of male-led organizational narratives.
Yet the research examples illustrated women “doing leadership” in discussion, including with male bosses. If leadership is a flow practiced with each conversation and discourse is a dance happening at every interaction, then every day presents new opportunities for you to “do leader.”
The more women do, and the more informal organizational culture changes to support and reward them equally to men in doing so, the less “leader” will be a long identity bridge women have to cross.
Instead, leadership can become a series of moments we step and speak into.
Voice of Experience: Leah Guggenheimer, Director at Burford Capital
People, Voices of ExperienceThis viewpoint has been honed over the many career paths that Guggenheimer has taken as a master of reinvention. “My unusual career path might appear random, but there actually was a method in place,” she says.“I curated each job to build on my proven skill sets and find new experiences.”
Guggenheimer began her career as an attorney, where she represented plaintiffs in employment and consumer fraud class actions – work that she eventually found tedious, due to the slow pace with which anything was accomplished. She wanted to transition to a new career, and with the realization that it was up to her to explain her transferrable skills, she was able to parlay marketing work she’d done on her firm’s website into a position in marketing and business development at a 100-person intellectual property firm.
Her aptitude became clear as she worked on a large technology and business transformation project, which put her on a career path in business process and operations management. Subsequent positions introduced her to all aspects of change management, from learning how to assess a business from top to bottom, to managing people and performance, budgets and profitability.
Those skills allowed her to open her own consulting practice, specializing in what she calls “punchy consulting projects” designed for a quick burst of operational growth. “It’s rewarding to come in and be the objective outsider, helping businesses grow by showing them what they can build on and how they can change.”
It all came together in her current role, which bridges both her legal background and her investment operations expertise. Burford Capital is a global finance and professional services firm focused on law, investing in commercial litigation assets via expense funding, monetizing of contingency arrangements, securitized debt facilities linked to legal claims, litigation-related insurance and judgment enforcement.After six years of rapid growth, Burford Capital needed someone who really understood both operations and complex litigation to help them grow and scale their business processes, and Guggenheimer had the perfect background to take on the challenge.
Make Your Own Way
Guggenheimer’s career trajectory is proof of the wide variety of professional paths that can be pursued for a rewarding career. “I would advise people to first figure out their strengths and what they like to do and then look for jobs that leverage those capabilities. Don’t get caught up on job titles or prestige,” she said. “Your core capabilities should dictate how you design your career.”
She also advises women not to feel pigeonholed: their skills are likely transferrable and they become even more professionally attractive by evolving their expertise. She herself was nervous when considering leaving law, but asked herself what was the worst that could happen. “If I didn’t succeed, I still would have learned something useful, and with every skill you develop, it’s that much easier to shape the roles that fit you and offer what you need to be challenged and interested.”
Stick With It
Guggenheimer’s career has been spent exclusively in law and finance, traditionally male-dominated industries. One barrier for women she has frequently seen is that they don’t have the confidence to speak out. Studies suggest that whereas a man only needs to feel 10 percent confident in what he is saying, a woman might need 80 percent confidence.
“This becomes a major issue in an industry where confidence in the face of risk is crucial to success. It’s imperative that women cultivate the confidence to believe in their inner voice.”
Recently Guggenheimer attended a roundtable for professional women with young children, some of whom were lamenting the difficulty of sustaining challenging careers and wondering if they should scale back. Her advice to anyone feeling like they want to quit is to stay with it a little longer. “You’re going to feel overwhelmed at first. But what feels insurmountable at first blush will get that much easier as you establish systems and routines.”
Over the years she has developed a core group of women to help support her own career, called “Ladies who Sup,” a nod to the fact that they were working so couldn’t have lunches together. The community was formed around where she lives, in New Rochelle, N.Y., rather than where she works. “It was a gift to have this community of working women who lived in my neighborhood and could provide the resources and community support we all needed,” she says. “Meeting for dinner was a great way to network and build friend relationships with others who shared the challenges of being working moms.”
Guggenheimer has a passion for travel, a bug she caught during a gap year after college and before law school when she backpacked around Asia. She loves to hike and SCUBA dive, preferring places where she can go off the beaten path to really get away and unplug. Her love of other cultures is evident in her philanthropic pursuits as well: for the last five years, she has volunteered for AFS, a leader in educational exchange programs for high school students, as a liaison as well as a host family for an exchange student from Thailand.
“The world is wide and is meant to be explored.”
By Cathie Ericson