Image via Catalyst
Metrics, metrics, metrics was the theme of this year’s Catalyst Awards Conference. Held yesterday in New York at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, the Conference honored award winners Campbell Soup, Deloitte, LLP, RBC, and Telstra Corporation Limited.
Each of these companies demonstrated a passionate commitment toward promoting workplace gender diversity, and they had the numbers to prove it. The general consensus within the conference, attended by over 70 CEOs and 1500 industry leaders, was: “if you set targets for other parts of your business, why not set gender and diversity targets as well?”.
“The business case for gender diversity is so clear,” commented Julie Nugent, Director, Research and Chair of the Catalyst Award Evaluation Committee, referring to recent studies showing that gender diversity at the top ranks of companies improves their bottom line. “This is truly becoming a global initiative.”
With the award winning companies based in the US, Canada, and Australia, Nugent explained that Catalyst received applications from all over the world, citing a particularly large increase in applications from the Asia-Pacific region this year.
The international research-based organization works “with businesses and the professions to build inclusive workplaces and expand opportunities for women and business.” The awards honor “innovative approaches with proven results taken by organizations to address the recruitment, development, and advancement of all managerial women, including women of color.”
Top Five Body Language Tips to Earn Your Next Promotion
Expert AnswersBody language and wining trust with our nonverbal signals are some of the most important gestures in business.
There are some fundamental pieces of nonverbal communication that you can use to better control a conversation, command attention and convey the right messages, because they are fundamentally about our cultural shared physicality – regardless of gender. Here are the top five tips body language tips from my new book Winning Body Language (McGraw-Hill 2010).
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Gender parity in the workplace: Is it only a matter of CEOs believing the business case for change?
Featured, Industry Leaders, LeadershipYes and no. Yes we need all CEO’s to understand the bottom line impact of this productivity issue on their businesses. However that is only part of the solution as strategic plans must be designed and implemented with some sort of a target attached and consequences if targets are continually missed- like any other business function.
The 2010 Catalyst awards dinner showcased their latest research Pipeline’s Broken Promise, which is an excellent piece of work. The new study highlights that men have higher starting salaries in their first post-MBA job than women even after taking into account number of years of prior experience, time since MBA, first post-MBA job level, global region, and industry. These salary differences are not due to different aspirations or parenthood.
Career profiles were examined from 9,927 alumni who graduated between 1996 and 2007 from MBA programs at 26 leading business schools in Asia, Canada, Europe, and the United States. As the Catalyst report points out, the premise of the promise of gender parity occurring sooner rather than later is that the pipeline for women into senior leadership is robust. After all, over the past 15 years, women have been graduating with advanced professional degrees in record numbers – often equal to or even surpassing the rates for men, swelling women’s representation in managerial ranks. Concurrently, companies implemented diversity and inclusion programs to eliminate structural biases and foster women’s full participation in leadership. However the percentage growth of women in senior leadership positions would suggest otherwise. Hence the promise is broken that there is a pipeline of women coming up through the ranks.
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Movers and Shakers: Shamina Singh, Chief Operating Officer, Global Community Relations, Citi
Movers and Shakers“Courage, I think, is something that is cultivated,” said Shamina Singh, Chief Operating Officer, Global Community Relations at Citi.
After spending 15 years working in high profile public sector jobs – Senior Advisor to Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House of Representatives; President Clinton’s U.S. Department of Labor’s Congressional Liaison on health care issues, and Deputy Executive Director of America Votes to name just a few – Singh found the courage to take a dramatically different route.
She said, “I was ready for a change and wanted to explore new opportunities while leveraging the experience I had built in the public sector. …after learning about [Citi] and the potential to move the needle on global issues, I realized it was the right fit for me.” Singh was also recently named to the Young Global Leaders program of the World Economic Forum – another opportunity to expand her global outreach.
“We can’t afford not to be talking to each other across the world,” she said.
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New Morgan Stanley Program Focuses on Diversity – Despite Tough Economic Climate
Industry Leaders, LeadershipAs we recently learned from the new Accenture study focusing on women leaders and resilience, despite a rough economic climate many companies are not only choosing to keep women’s initiatives and leadership programs, but in many cases they are expanding them and creating new ones altogether.
In December of last year, Morgan Stanley did just that by announcing its new Emerging Manager Program (EM Program), which, according to the company, “seeks to identify and provide capital, as well as strategic advice and infrastructure solutions to emerging asset managers.” What’s impressive is that the program will place a specific emphasis on including minority and women-owned asset managers.
The EM Program will be headed by Carla Harris, a 23-year veteran of Morgan Stanley. Currentlya Managing Director in Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM), and chair of the Firm’s Private Placement Commitment Equity Committee, Harris was a logical choice as champion of the program due to her long tenure in the industry and as a high profile successful minority player. The actual manager participants themselves will be overseen by an investment committee comprising representatives and senior management from across Morgan Stanley.
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Aspire: The Leadership Advantage
News“This new century needs a new generation of leaders who are more transformational and embrace their feminine qualities,” says Dr Samantha Collins, Founder of Aspire, an executive coaching and leadership development consultancy that has recently released a report into successful leadership styles. “The old school style of many politicians and corporate CEO’s is on the way out and transformational leadership behaviours are on the way in.”
“In this latest research it appears that the financial and political events at the end of the last decade have given us pause for thought,” says Catherine Shovlin, Director at Customer Interpreter, a strategic research consultancy which co-produced the report.
The report, Tearing up the Rule Book: A New Generation of Leaders for 2010, introduces the new measure of Leadership Intelligence (LI). LI measures rate your ability to be a successful leader, and what makes a successful leader in today’s economy is not what you would necessarily expect.
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Voice of Experience: Wanda Eriksen, Partner, Assurance, PricewaterhouseCoopersAG
Voices of Experience“I see myself riding a wave,” explained Wanda Eriksen, Assurance Partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Zurich office and founder of its Women’s Initiative. “I think that I’m really part of the change. Looking back, I’m going to be in that group to really have more opportunity.” Eriksen sees a shift in attitudes regarding women in the workplace – an acceptance that grows larger with each generation.
She recalled how she had been approached to spearhead the Women’s Initiative for PwC Switzerland. “Until about four years ago, I was not even remotely informed about gender issues. I was like, ‘I don’t want to start any trouble!’” she joked. “In the beginning I needed to be convinced. [In Switzerland], we were probably about 10 years behind the U.S.,” regarding gender activities.
“I don’t want to say there are barriers… there aren’t a lot of women in leadership positions,” Eriksen explained, attributing this to the “little me” syndrome, in which leaders (usually men) promote people who are like themselves or take someone similar to themselves under their wing. “It’s more related to behavior than barriers,” she said. “I also see that things are changing, solely through the increasing volume of women choosing to have a career.”
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Intrepid Woman: Betty Ross, Financial Advisor, Sapient Financial Group
Intrepid Women SeriesAfter speaking to Betty Ross, you realize the power that comes with being honest and straightforward and that sometimes, a frank approach is the best approach. So let’s begin: What are the chances that a young black girl growing up in the segregated South during some of the region’s most tumultuous times would persevere and make a grand life for herself after growing up in low-income housing to parents with eighth grade educations? Are her chances even further diminished when she becomes the woman of the house after her mother passed away when she’s just thirteen, baring her with the full brunt of domestic responsibilities for her father and four siblings? What are her chances when she becomes a teenage bride and mother for the first time at eighteen, and a divorced mother of two at twenty?
For Betty Ross, a seventy-year-old financial advisor currently with Sapient Financial Group, who grew up in an area where high school was the height of education, succeeding and going beyond what was expected of her was never a choice, but rather the only option – no matter how long it took.
In 1971, Ross left San Antonio, Texas – where she was born and raised and currently lives today – just seven years after the city had officially been integrated, though it was still experiencing a great deal of racial unrest. “I decided that being in Texas wasn’t good for me or my sons; it held too many painful memories and the city was slow to progress,” Ross said. “I wanted to provide my sons with a different outlook on life.” If you’ve encountered Ross – even for a moment – you’ll understand that her sons would have turned out just fine without the change of location because her strong spirit, fearlessness, and tenacity are enough to facilitate any change necessary.
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Measuring Up: Diversity Accountability Scores Big at Catalyst Awards Conference
NewsImage via Catalyst
Metrics, metrics, metrics was the theme of this year’s Catalyst Awards Conference. Held yesterday in New York at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, the Conference honored award winners Campbell Soup, Deloitte, LLP, RBC, and Telstra Corporation Limited.
Each of these companies demonstrated a passionate commitment toward promoting workplace gender diversity, and they had the numbers to prove it. The general consensus within the conference, attended by over 70 CEOs and 1500 industry leaders, was: “if you set targets for other parts of your business, why not set gender and diversity targets as well?”.
“The business case for gender diversity is so clear,” commented Julie Nugent, Director, Research and Chair of the Catalyst Award Evaluation Committee, referring to recent studies showing that gender diversity at the top ranks of companies improves their bottom line. “This is truly becoming a global initiative.”
With the award winning companies based in the US, Canada, and Australia, Nugent explained that Catalyst received applications from all over the world, citing a particularly large increase in applications from the Asia-Pacific region this year.
The international research-based organization works “with businesses and the professions to build inclusive workplaces and expand opportunities for women and business.” The awards honor “innovative approaches with proven results taken by organizations to address the recruitment, development, and advancement of all managerial women, including women of color.”
Read more
You Can’t Be Serious? 6 Ways to Get Taken Seriously at Work
Office PoliticsWhen a previous boss of mine told me I’d be a more significant player at work when I looked older, I almost rushed out and bought a twin set and pearls. But surely there are other ways to get taken seriously at work, aside from dying your hair grey and borrowing clothes from your elderly aunts.
The Glass Hammer spoke to six experts about how to come across confidently, professionally, and seriously in the workplace. Here’s what they had to say.
“Women often have less confidence than men – even when they have the same or superior smarts, experience, and talents,” says Ann Demarais, Ph.D., author of First Impressions: What you don’t know about how others see you, and owner of a business communication consultancy. “Their confidence is not always commensurate with their competence. Women leak this lack of confidence in their body language – by appearing quiet, fidgety, or overly perky.”
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PwC’s GLBT Diversity Initiative: “I am Open”
NewsAt PricewaterhouseCoopers, diversity means openness – about oneself and about accepting others’ differences. The company explains that “open working relationships are stronger and more productive.” Openness about difference allows colleagues greater opportunities to learn about one another, and find common ground.
Jennifer Allyn, Managing Director, Office of Diversity, explained that GLBT inclusiveness is often overlooked within diversity programs, because “the gay dimension of diversity is invisible.” That is, people can’t usually tell if someone fits into this group simply by their appearance.
“Five to six years ago, PwC convened a board of GLBT partners to advise our diversity team, to make sure GLBT staff feel included and welcome at our firm,” Allyn explained. “The advisory board is made up of very visible role models” – role models for both GLBT individuals, as well as PwC employees at large.
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