Contributed by executive coach Ann Daly PhD
Back to school!
It’s a rallying cry we usually associate with kids’ backpacks and notebooks, but don’t forget about mom. More and more, working women are heading back to school to upgrade their skillsets and resumes with an advanced degree.
In fact, this fall a record number of women will be entering two of the country’s top MBA programs–the Harvard Business School and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Women will make up 39% of Harvard’s class of 2013, and at Wharton, women will represent 45% of the incoming class.
Those happy numbers are the result of national efforts by groups such as the Forté Foundation, a consortium that advocates the MBA as a career-advancement and leadership-development strategy for women.
That said, a concurrent MBA – attending classes while keeping your job – isn’t for everyone. “If you’re looking for career advancement within your current company or within the same industry, the part-time/executive route is a good option,” advises Elissa Sangster, Forté’s executive director. “But if you are looking to change your career or industry, I highly recommend taking the full-time route.”
The pay-off for a concurrent MBA is big. “You get your education while continuing your career progression and drawing a salary.”
But there’s also a downside, Sangster adds: “Your life will be very complicated.”
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Voice of Experience: Joanna Cound, Managing Director, Government Affairs and Public Policy, BlackRock
Voices of ExperienceAccording to Joanna Cound, Managing Director of Government affairs and Public Policy at BlackRock, a critical career juncture for women is the move from director level to managing director.
“I made MD in 1994, before there were a lot of [women’s leadership] programs in place. It’s amazing how robust the program that BlackRock has set up is,” she said. BlackRock Women’s Initiative Network (“WIN”) was launched in April 2010 and currently has seven regional chapters with over 1,800 members. She advised that women begin to build a supportive network early, to help navigate and seek mentorship throughout their career.
“Networks are hugely important to your career,” she said. “Women know this but often neglect networking for more immediate priorities. Seeking guidance from senior executives, both from mentors and more informally from colleagues, is also critical. They say ‘feedback is the food of kings’ and it’s true. Ask for feedback and act on it.”
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Cracking the UK’s £15 Billion Glass Ceiling
NewsA recent report out of the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission has revealed that at the current rate of advancement, it will take 70 years before gender parity is reached in the boardrooms of the FTSE 100 – and that’s just parity by numbers. It doesn’t even measure the rate of advancement when it comes to pay, power, or responsibilities.
The report, Sex and Power 2011, analyzed the UK’s top 26,000 positions across business, government, media, the arts, and the public sector. According to the Commission, there are about 5,400 ‘missing’ women from influential positions in Britain.
This amounts to “the squandering of talent,” says the report. It continues, “We are losing out on what women can contribute, with the Women and Work Commission estimating that unlocking women’s talent in the workplace could be worth £15 billion or more.”
This glass ceiling is an expensive one – and the report provides a few key reasons it’s still in place. Here’s why.
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Across Boundaries: What the UK can learn from Australia about Women on Boards
Industry Leaders, LeadershipAs the debate around the use of quotas to increase the number of women on UK boards continues, so does the need to look at what’s working around the world to shift the gender diversity needle.
Earlier this month, the European Professional Women’s Network invited Claire Braund, co-founder of Women on Boards, the leading advocate for improving gender diversity on Australian boards, to a London event to speak about the Australian story and outline Australia’s track record of success around women gaining access to board positions in business, government, community and not-for-profit sectors.
Braund co-founded Women on Boards – which now has 11,500 members – in 2006 and she is currently in the UK as part of her Churchill Fellowship award, a bursary with which she is examining the impact of boardroom quotas in Norway and the progress of the public policy debate in the UK and France.
Hosted by investment services company Mercer, the EPWN audience was welcomed by Mercer’s UK CEO Alan Whalley, who also serves as the executive sponsor of the Vine, the company’s network for women. Braund outlined the introduction and impact of the new Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) regulations, announced in December 2009 and described by Australian federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick as “the first structural intervention we’ve had”. The plan will force companies to publish a gender breakdown of directors and senior employees and to set both objectives and targets for gender diversity.
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Voice of Experience: Monica McConville, Partner, Practice Leader, English Law Equity Capital Markets, Shearman & Sterling
Voices of Experience“It’s important for women, when first starting out, to remember that you have a right to a seat at the table, even if you’re the only woman in the room,” said Monica McConville, a London-based partner and leader of Shearman & Sterling’s English law equity capital markets practice.”
She added, “Opportunities will come your way. Always try to embrace them.”
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Voice of Experience: Natalie Horton, Head of Synthetic Equity Trading for North America, Deutsche Bank
Voices of ExperienceNatalie Horton, Head of Synthetic Equity Trading for North America at Deutsche Bank, has spent seventeen years learning the business. And her biggest piece of advice comes down to building relationships.
“Network – I could say it a thousand times. It’s so important. Above you, around you, and below you,” she said. “Get to know everyone. That’s how you learn. If I have any sort of problem, maybe I don’t have the answer, but I know who does,” she explained.
Horton has built her career by taking risks and making connection with others – and, she said – she wants more women to feel comfortable doing the same.
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Hey Cyberloafer, Get Back to Work
Office PoliticsWe’ve all been there before. It’s Friday. The day is dragging on. You’ve got a massive amount of work staring at you between now and dinner. The weather outside is gorgeous. But… you’re inside, and the buzz of the fluorescent lights above is giving you a headache.
You look around – everyone’s got their head down, minding their own business. You know you shouldn’t, but you open up your web browser. You click over to your local newspaper’s web site, your favorite celebrity gossip forum, or (gasp) Facebook, and spend 10 minutes joyfully killing time. You quickly minimize the window when a coworker walks by, and get back to work – refreshed and ready to tackle the task at hand.
Don’t feel guilty though. According to a new study, surfing the web at work (or “cyberloafing”) is actually good for your productivity. And the reason may surprise you.
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UK and Norway Show Why Quotas are Necessary for Achieving Gender Parity on Boards
Featured, Managing ChangeDepending on whom you ask, the UK’s recent foray into the issue of gender equality on boards has produced big results – or results that are not big enough.
According to the Guardian, in the past six months since the Lord Davies Report was released, FTSE 100 boards have appointed 18 women (or 31% of the total appointments since February 24). Eighteen women might not seem like a lot, but this is more than double the number of women appointed in years past. But is it enough?
Meanwhile, it seems that Norway isn’t satisfied with the results of its current gender quota law, which mandates that 40 percent of board seats at every publicly traded company be held by women. Boards have upheld the law since 2008, when it went into full effect.
Now the progressive Nordic country is eying private companies’ boards as well. It seems that without compulsory quotas, firms by and large don’t elect to promote large numbers of women on their own.
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Ask-a-Career-Coach: How to Survive an MBA
Ask A Career CoachBack to school!
It’s a rallying cry we usually associate with kids’ backpacks and notebooks, but don’t forget about mom. More and more, working women are heading back to school to upgrade their skillsets and resumes with an advanced degree.
In fact, this fall a record number of women will be entering two of the country’s top MBA programs–the Harvard Business School and the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. Women will make up 39% of Harvard’s class of 2013, and at Wharton, women will represent 45% of the incoming class.
Those happy numbers are the result of national efforts by groups such as the Forté Foundation, a consortium that advocates the MBA as a career-advancement and leadership-development strategy for women.
That said, a concurrent MBA – attending classes while keeping your job – isn’t for everyone. “If you’re looking for career advancement within your current company or within the same industry, the part-time/executive route is a good option,” advises Elissa Sangster, Forté’s executive director. “But if you are looking to change your career or industry, I highly recommend taking the full-time route.”
The pay-off for a concurrent MBA is big. “You get your education while continuing your career progression and drawing a salary.”
But there’s also a downside, Sangster adds: “Your life will be very complicated.”
Read more
Catch 22: Challenging Masculine Leader Stereotypes
Managing ChangeAccording to a recent Northwestern University report entitled Are Leader Stereotypes Masculine?, the characteristics that people commonly ascribe to women, men, and leaders contribute to the challenges that women face in obtaining leadership roles and performing well in them.
The study also found that women are viewed as less qualified in most leadership roles and when women adopt culturally masculine behaviors often required by these roles, such as being assertive or aggressive, they are viewed as inappropriate or presumptuous. Alice Eagly, professor of psychology at Northwestern and co-author of the study calls this ‘the double bind.’
“Masculine qualities are seen as more crucial to leadership, so women are thought to be less qualified than men. We call this the double bind because when women have these ‘masculine’ characteristics and behave in ways that are competitive and ambitious, it’s not seen as a good thing,” Eagly said.
“This is because women are thought of as ‘nice’; they must be nice even when they become leaders, which leads people to question whether or not they’re cut out for the role. If they’re not nice; however, people wonder what’s wrong with them. Men don’t have this problem because they’re never expected to be nice.”
How do we get out of this Catch-22? Eagly provided some suggestions.
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Men Who Get It: Jorge Benitez, Managing Director, North America and Chief Executive, United States, Accenture
Men Who "Get It"“I remember Susan Butler, Accenture’s first female senior executive,” began Jorge Benitez, Managing Director, North America and Chief Executive, United States at Accenture. “To be the first at something – that’s huge.”
In fact, Benitez himself has been an advocate for and a role model of diversity at the company since he joined it thirty years ago. He explained, “There weren’t a lot of people who looked like me when you looked around. We’ve made huge strides since then. And it’s important as we become leaders to pass that onto the next generation.”
“It’s night and day versus 30 years ago – diversity is part of our fabric now. Of course, we can always find room for improvement,” he said.
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