By Aimee Hansen
Across the past twelve months, four African-American leaders have stepped down from positions of high visibility in the business and political world.
What’s most striking about these few departures is the size of the gap created by them, highlighting an African-American representation among women in leadership that remains far too small and a diversity movement that remains far too narrow.
The large gap left by losing a few powerful African-American leaders is a wake-up call to widen our diversity, not just in intention but in individual practice and in outcome.
Losing Power Players
This year’s Fortune’s Most Powerful Women 2016 continued to feature Rosalind Brewer (#19 – CEO and President, Sam’s Club and Walmart), Anne-Marie Campbell (#20 – EVP, U.S Stores, Home Depot), and Ursula Burns (#25 – CEO and Chairman of Xerox), with Beyoncé displacing Taylor Swift (#51).
But the 2017 list will look different. Last May, Ursula Burns, the first and only African-American women to run a S&P 500 company, announced that she would step down from her CEO position after splitting Xerox into two companies. After Rosalind Brewer’s recent retirement news, black women – already scarce – will now be absent from the helm of major U.S. companies.
Meanwhile, former FLOTUS Michelle Obama has left the high profile visibility of the White House (although her voice may well remain in the spotlight) and Loretta Lynch has ended her term as the U.S. Attorney General.
These four women (Obama, Lynch, Brewer, and Burns) accounted for over 50% of the African-American names on Forbe’s World’s 100 Most Powerful Women 2016.
Losing four black women from highly visible, influential leadership positions wouldn’t be so striking except – in the context of so few peers in positions of power – it simply is.
Monolithic Diversity
The percentage of women CEOS among Fortune 500 companies dropped to only 4.2% in 2016 (from 24 to 21), which is a hit for all women. The near absence of minorities amidst that 4% testifies that diversity’s approach to advancing women remains very monolithic.
Black women remain caught in the blind spot of intersectionality, and while naming the problem helps, it does not address it. As Melinda Marshall and Tai Wingfield, authors of “Ambition in Black & White: The Feminist Narrative Revised,“ write in the Harvard Business Review, “At the intersections of race and gender, both then and now, black women have labored unseen, even to those lobbying for their advancement.”
As a recent AAUW report highlights, “the specific ways in which they (black women leaders) are disadvantaged clearly differs from the better-understood ways that white women leaders are dis-advantaged.”
The diversity movement falls short of advancing women when we too often ignore the rich diversity of needs, realities, and challenges experienced by different women, and work to address them.
Intersectional Barriers
As research has shown, black women are (three times) more likely to aspire to leadership roles than white women and half as likely to attain one.
As summed up by a 2016 report in the Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, some of the myriad of factors holding African-American women back from the C-Suite include dual bias at the intersection of race and gender (a net that affects everything else), the impact of stereotypes on perceptions (as an example, African-American women are often perceived as aggressive in communication), a lack of career opportunities to showcase skills, having to prove competency more than colleagues, a lack of strategic feedback, workplace isolation and ‘outsider’ status.
The Biggest Barrier is Social Exclusion
But one of the strongest barriers for black women is the lack of access to powerful social networking with influential senior executive leaders, which requires a certain level of ‘insider’ status.
According to Wingfield and Marshall in HBR, black women “have mentors and strong support networks but lack sponsors—leaders who will talk them up behind closed doors, steer plum assignments their way, and defend them against detractors.”
Black Women Executives Research Initiative Revisited by the Executive Leadership Council, the first longitudinal study of black women executives (BWEs) in corporate America (2007 and 2015), gleamed insights into both the challenges and experiences of 59 senior leaders across the eight year period.
The importance of creating and maintaining sponsorship relationships, and building a network of allies, was emphasized by BWEs.
As one interviewee said, “I believe you almost have to have somebody in the room where the conversation is happening that says, ‘this is the person who can make the contributions and be valuable.’ If you don’t have that it’s very hard.”
Research by Catalyst has demonstrated how black women and men who experience a heightened sense of “being different” based on their race/ethnicity within the workplace suffer an “Emotional Tax” that can include impaired sleep, a sense of always being on guard, speaking up less, reduced innovation and creativity, and feeling less psychologically safe in contributing their own voice at work.
However, a sense of inclusion reduces the Emotional Tax, and increases psychological safety, such as feeling leaders and team members ‘have your back’, that mistakes won’t be held against you, and that co-workers are not going to try to undermine your efforts – in other words, a corporate environment in which anyone can feel comfortable in taking risks, not just the majority.
Absence from networks also affects black women entrepreneurs. Despite the fact that African-American women are the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs, their endeavors tend to lack major investment backing or significant outsider funding.
Strategic Career Management
The Executive Leadership Council report also found that 27% of BWEs had advanced in their careers (since 2007), and over 60% did so while in Profit & Loss roles. Yet 46% of BWEs left their companies to start their own business or moved to a different company, sometimes losing ground.
In-depth interviews revealed four factors that were most influential in career developments for these leaders: 1) alignment of values, 2) agility and re-purposement, 3) sponsorship, and 4) relationship-building as politics.
The primary reason for satisfaction among BWEs in their work was alignment of values on an industry, corporate culture, positional or interpersonal level – and the primary reason for dis-satisfaction, and hence job movement, was a deterioration of alignment.
A key career strategy for BWEs, referred to as agility and repurposement, was an ability to move rapidly between challenges to foster “continuous learning, cross-functional, boundary-spanning work and intentional, if not always planned, career expansion.”
Many successful BWEs were keen to take assignments, even adjacent opportunities and glass-cliff appointments, that ultimately advanced their learning, broadened their expertise, and gained visibility and network connections.
Disrupting the Silos In Business & Diversity
As written in HBR, leadership which aims for real diversity must purposely disrupt silos in the workplace, creating more opportunities for intersectional visibility.
As Wingfield and Marshall write, “Leaders must create a culture in which people at the intersections of functional or affinity identities have equal access to their attention or equal opportunity to earn it.”
And as champions of diversity, we must disrupt the insidious silos that exist within the diversity movement and within. For each non-minority woman in a place of leadership, we can ask if we are doing our part in including African-American women in social networks and enabling opportunities for visibility?
Are we checking our own relative privilege and our own blindspots? As much as we want equality, are we practicing it within the power and influence we hold?
While theglasshammer is putting a focus on African-American women in leadership during February’s Black History Month coverage, minority women are living the lesser-understood intersectional challenges every single day, and we must make a daily practice of staying awake to that.
Happy Presidents Day
FeaturedOn Presidents Day this year enjoy a selection of our profiles from 2016.
Image via Shutterstock
Voice of Experience: Sarah Churchman, Talent, Inclusion and Wellbeing Leader, PwC UK
Mover and Shaker: Karyn Cavanaugh, CFA, Senior Marketing Strategist, Voya Investment Management
Voice of Experience: Susanna Charlwood, Partner, Shearman & Sterling’s Litigation Group
Voice of Experience: Melissa Barrett, Managing Director, Chief of Staff Global Compliance & Head of Global Compliance Training, Goldman Sachs
Voice of Experience: Marie Louise Kirk, Partner, Goldman Sachs
Mover and Shaker: Peggy Watson, Vice President, Product Management, North American Fleet for WEX
Movers and ShakersPeggy Watson believes that respect and relationships are the cornerstone for success. She has found that it’s vital to take the time to know what matters to people: Whether you’re trying to close a deal or get the best from an employee, if you know what makes them tick and address it in a genuine way, you will be successful.
“Being genuine and having respect will allow you to build relationships that will help you move forward together,” she says.
A Successful Career at WEX – With One Detour
Watson has spent the majority of her 30-year career in marketing, starting with a position in high school doing management and marketing for a pizza chain. It not only sparked her love for food, she jokes, but also gave her the business bug and an enduring curiosity for how businesses tick and promote themselves.
She joined WEX in 1998 where she has held various roles for the past 18 years with only one brief departure.
“I loved my job and got a lot of energy and satisfaction from it, but at one point after I had reached a director level position, I had the opportunity to try something totally different which I thought was my calling – that would allow me to combine my love of business with my love of food,” she says. She joined a small catering business, working with the owner to expand its reach; although she wasn’t sure it would be the right fit, she told herself to be bold and take a chance because if she didn’t try it she would always wonder what might have been.
The wonder ceased soon after she joined as she realized that she was better suited to corporate marketing. “I have always enjoyed cooking and entertaining, but I realized my joy comes from doing it for people whom I love, and the job took me away from that.”
Her boss at WEX had encouraged her to return if her other opportunity didn’t work out so soon she was back, feeling more confident and bolder in her career after the learning experience. “It was an amazing experience, from which I learned a lot, and have no regrets.”
After she returned to WEX she eventually moved into a role where she was overseeing both product and marketing and supervising a large team. “That’s one of the benefits I’ve experienced while working at WEX. There’s always a new challenge.”
Overseeing the Challenges of the Future
Backed by a company always looking to increase the speed with which it moves and innovates, Watson enjoys building teams and is now relishing the challenge of building a repeatable and scalable process for taking customer insights and turning them into valuable products solutions for customer.
One important industry innovation she is tracking is the intersection of payments, mobile technology and the connected car, which has the potential to have a major impact on their business model going forward. “I believe that the concept of a driverless car will be a reality within my career,” she says.
Realities of the Corporate World
When reflecting on what she expected in the business world, Watson shares a vision common among young professionals – the glamour of corporate travel. While she appreciates the opportunities she has had to go interesting places and meet people, she soon found out, as many do, that on the whole travel takes its toll.
Mentors Helped Her Achieve
Over the years Watson has had a number of advocates who have helped with both visibility and building confidence. Along with multiple positive role models, she had one in particular who showed her what not to do — a boss early in her career who seemed to enjoy working in a chaotic environment and would create fire drills to watch the staff respond. Watson quickly learned that when there is actual deadline stress, you want the team to take it seriously and be at their best, rather than having it be a regular occurrence.
On the other hand, she mentions a boss who offers two traits Watson tries to emulate. “She was the smartest person I’ve ever known, but she used her knowledge to be inclusive rather than exclusive. She was the smartest person in the room, but she never made anyone feel less so. “Her knowledge was deep and wide, and she was generous with it, rather than imperious.” Watson says that she learned that sharing information leads to strong, trusting relationships that will positively impact your career.
Watson also appreciated the team perspective her mentor offered, understanding what each person brought to the table and how it fulfilled the whole picture.
“She brought me on the team to fill a gap. She herself was a very talented writer, and once when I struggled for days trying to write a piece she stopped me and said, ‘Don’t struggle with that, as I can do it easily. Instead, I need you to manage the production of the publication because I’m dreadful at that.’” That’s when Watson says she learned to look for complementary skills rather than clones when pulling a team together.
Watson appreciates the educational opportunities she’s been offered at WEX, including an integrated leadership development program of which a significant component was working with an executive coach. “That relationship has been enormously helpful in developing my career and refining my future goals and how to achieve them.” Watson notes that she’s often been tapped for a positon even when she wasn’t certain she was ready, but the rapport she’d developed with the coach allowed her to see the possibilities and embrace the challenges by taking the risk and putting herself out there.
In one instance, she put her hat in the running for a bigger job that she wouldn’t have considered without her coach’s encouragement. Though she didn’t end up in the position, the process was extremely empowering and built a feeling of confidence for the next opportunity.
A Love of Cooking Permeates All Aspects of Her Life
When not working, Watson continues to indulge her love of cooking and entertaining; in fact she says it’s not unusual for her and her husband to have dinner guests two or even three times a week. “I learned a lot in the short time I switched careers, and now I can whip up a dinner party for 20 in two hours,” she says with a laugh.
And although her catering venture wasn’t a good career fit, she continues to help friends with special occasions. Using cooking as a creative outlet has threaded throughout her career, even to her philanthropic pursuits, where she delights in helping in soup kitchens and food drives.
Career Lessons
There are two important lessons I’ve learned over the course of my career, she says. “First, take risks – you always learn something from them, and the more you do it the less scary they are. And second, respect people: Understand where they are coming from and understand what they do well and give them the opportunity to use those skills.”
Burnout Isn’t “Their Issue”: Changing Our Behaviours to Benefit Us All
Career Advice, Office PoliticsBy Nneka Orji
For many, burnout is a familiar concept; its association with emotional exhaustion and reduced motivation is widely acknowledged.
Image via Shutterstock
Why You Need to Continue Learning – and How to Do It
Career Advice, Career Tip of the Week!, Guest ContributionVoice of Experience: Yolanda Cash Jackson | Equity shareholder in the Government Law & Lobbying Practice Group & Member of the Management Committee of Becker & Poliakoff
Black History Month, Voices of Experience“It’s important never to put limitations on yourself based on how others see you,” says Becker & Poliakoff’s Yolanda Cash Jackson. “While it can be challenging to be the first and break new ground, since there’s not a pattern, you have to learn to take directions from your gut and people you trust.”
These words have served Jackson well during her years in law, which she considers her second career, after seven years in retail. During law school she worked as a summer law clerk for the oldest law firm in Miami, where she was subsequently offered a position as an associate and stayed there until former colleagues opened another firm and hired her.
Within a year, the founding partners got a divorce, her husband passed away and she found herself at a personal cross roads. She went to a midsize firm where she was doing litigation, until she got an interesting offer from a friend with whom she had grown up in the community where her father was a pastor. He was running for Florida State Senate, and she helped oversee community outreach on his behalf. He then asked her to head up his state Senate campaign as his campaign manager and that was it — she was hooked on government law.
She developed a proposal to start a government services firm within her firm, but they rejected the proposal since the majority of their work was based on hourly payments, rather than retainers, and they didn’t see it as a financially sustainable model.
Soon after, a friend referred her to Becker & Poliakoff, where she started in January 1999 with the agreement she would do both litigation and government work. The campaign niche grew so rapidly that soon she was able to focus exclusively on government outreach.
“Unfortunately I’m still a rarity as an African-American lobbyist in a for-profit corporation,” she says, adding that she sometimes gets pigeon-holed based on race although she has been able to successfully work across both sides of the aisle. “I certainly often catch people by surprise,” she says.
Some of her most impactful clients have been historically black universities, where she can see she has made a true difference. In addition, although she has worked with numerous municipalities, she is most proud of Miami Gardens, a city with the largest concentration of middle-class minority citizens south of Atlanta. She began working for them 12 years ago when they had one employee; they since have grown to more than 500 employees with a multi-million dollar budget. One of her biggest achievements has been helping establish them as the third largest municipality in Dade County. Since that time, Miami Gardens has hosted Super Bowl 2013 and a nationally recognized jazz festival.
Making Strides within the Lobbying Industry
While Jackson says she can feel a change in the acceptance of women in visible roles on the lobbying floor, she says that there are still certain industries like insurance and banking that remain male dominated. However, she says a sea change is already underway and with more women coming into the legislature, she has seen the rally of support as women legislators ensure women have access.
As she works with younger women, she sees a continuing challenge in impressing upon them the importance of maintaining a certain decorum – from how they dress to how they interact with clients and legislators.
“Men might not be as concerned about going to dinner or drinks with a legislator after hours, but a woman needs to think about it,” she says, noting that women have to be more careful that their achievements are never called into question based on relationships. “Appearances and reputation are paramount, and often younger women don’t instinctively realize that,” Jackson says.
Regarding women she considers her peers, Jackson believes that they need to remember to support one another. She cites the movie Hidden Figures, where the women were focused on helping each other achieve the next milestone — discussing challenges and celebrating each other. Naturally this type of interaction is less common in a competitive environment like lobbying where you always have to win, but there’s a balance between being competitive and cutthroat, she notes.
Jackson sees a place for women’s groups, but mentions that sometimes there can be duplication between other networking groups. Careful never to want to be seen as “the diversity partner,” she balances the needs of gender-specific networking with overall industry involvement.
Seeking Balance
Another area she has seen great strides being made as millennials impact the workplace is in work/life balance. Jackson remembers bringing her daughter to work years ago and letting her fall asleep on the couch if a project needed completion. Now, women are more apt to go home and be with their families, which is important, and yet, the pendulum could be swinging back slightly. She says she sees a reoccurrence of comments such as “Oh they’re never in the office” regarding professionals who work from home. “You know who’s doing meaningful work, and yet face time still matters,” she says.
That said, one of her goals for 2017 is balance. In her line of work particularly, it’s hard to separate work from pleasure since she thrives in her role as rainmaker and opportunities are always around her. For example, she met one of her current clients at the hair salon.
One important outlet in addition to her family is work she does with philanthropic organizations, including Children of Inmates and the Florida Children’s Initiative, both of which have expanded throughout the state since she’s been involved. She also has put her heart into her position on the board of the Urban League as well as her church.
Mover and Shaker: Chenelle Manley, Manager at National Professional Services, PwC US
Black History Month, Movers and ShakersSometimes the best career advice is the most enduring, finds Chenelle Manley, who took to heart basic lessons gleaned from her parents and grandparents that are simple yet effective. While you can learn all the client and technical knowledge you need, there are some lessons that can’t be taught – being punctual, and having a positive, can-do attitude, for example.
“Have a good work ethic; but don’t feel obligated to tell people you’re working hard because it should be apparent,” she says. Those enduring lessons have been the cornerstone of a successful career at PwC.
A Successful Career at PwC
“If I was talking to my 21-year-old self I would tell her that time goes by fast,” says Manley, noting how fast her tenure at PwC has flown.
She began as an intern in the Detroit office after her sophomore year of college at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, as part of a diversity and inclusion program known then as PwC eXceed. She was one of the fortunate ones to receive both a scholarship and internship, which she counts as one of her best learning experiences where she could get to know everyone at PwC without the pressure of juggling client work.
She completed two more client service internships, and for the third, begged her recruiter to let her try out the Private Company Services group in New York. It ended up being the perfect fit and she joined in 2009, spending seven years there until this fall when she transitioned to the National Professional Services Group.
While she was previously primarily working on audits, now she will split time between two groups, since the National Professional Services Group supports engagement teams and helps with thought leadership on financial accounting standard setting. “I’m excited not only to meet new people, but also to increase my technical expertise. You don’t always have the chance to flex specific muscles unless a client has those needs.”
Rising With the Support of Others
When Manley first joined the workforce, she thought that as a black woman she might have to work harder, but never felt that pressure at PwC. In addition, she worried that in such a big firm, she might just be a number but over the years she’s found that not to be true at all. “I feel I have always been supported both personally and in my career growth,” she says, noting that her recent transfer came about because of robust partner support that allowed her to look into different opportunities.
Through this move she has learned that the partners truly are a resource. Initially hesitant to mention leaving her group since she admired her partners and clients and had great working relationships, she notes that the partners have been supportive of her path. “It’s scary to raise your hand and want to make a change when you’re doing well, but having those conversations with partners empowered me to take the leap – they were so much more helpful than I had envisioned. It was the first time I had activated that specific network.”
As she realized, her partners would rather see someone make a great career move within the firm than leave. She says the bonds extend to the personal side as well; when she was looking for a new house, her partners offered her help and advice. “You expect that from friends and family but when it’s from a relationship at work, it’s surprising and appreciated.”
Over the years she has been involved in a number of internal mentoring programs, including the Vanguard program that was particularly helpful when she joined it within her first month at PwC. She has seen the power that sponsorship can have, noting that it doesn’t have to be loud but often moves in silence, when you have no idea that someone knows your work product or even your name.
“The mentor prepares you for your next role, but the sponsor champions you in areas that are out of your hands,” she says. “I’ve had people help me land on the right engagements and take advantage of the right programs, which has furthered my development. That support is crucial to elevating your career.”
When Manley first interned in New York, there was only one black female in her group in the metro office, a senior associate who had become a manager by the time Manley joined full-time. “She was a hard worker, highly regarded by partners and staff, with high integrity,” Manley says. “Although we didn’t frequently work together, she made a point of furthering our connection by sending emails to check in and see how I was doing. She was that person who was always there and offered her experience, and to me that is the best definition of a role model.”
Currently pregnant with her first child, Manley looks forward to accessing PwC’s working moms’ groups, such as Mentor Moms, which is PwC’s effort to match women returning from maternity leave with experienced mothers who are successfully juggling family and careers. She has seen the value that PwC puts in its working moms by providing support and resources that didn’t exist even 10 years ago. “It used to be that in order to succeed at work, you had to have a crazy schedule that might infringe on family time, but that’s no longer the case,” she says.
Traveling, Volunteering and Spending Time with Family
With days about to be even fuller once her baby arrives, Manley appreciates the support she receives from her family. Avid travelers, she and her husband head out whenever they spot a great travel deal, and have recently visited Dubai, Italy and Costa Rica, among other locales. As Manley notes, PwC’s policies make it very possible to take vacations. Manley is also an active volunteer and has fun assisting her husband, a civil engineer by day and a photographer by night, who often taps her as an “unofficial model.”
“It takes me out of my comfort zone and is so different from my normal job,” she says.
Are Moms the Original Project Managers?
Career Advice, Work-LifeAs both a mom and a project management trainer, I can’t help but notice the amazing parallels between the two universes. Since I was a project manager long before becoming a mom, I assumed that my project management skills were just amazingly convenient as I juggled the complex labyrinth of motherhood. But as I mingled with other moms years later, I started to notice that the best moms seem to have almost innate project management skills that help them not just survive but thrive when faced with the day to day challenges and complexities of managing life’s most important project – raising our kids!
What Smart Moms Could Teach the Even Best Project Managers
Always Have a Backup Plan
Image via Shutterstock
The best moms know that if it can go wrong, it probably will. Of course, it’s better to hope for the best but plan for the worst and that includes having a solid backup plan – whether it’s an extra sippy cup, a change of clothes, an alternate lunch option, or a favorite toy just in case little Johnny misses his nap and loses his “pleasant personality”. Likewise, project managers can’t just rely on their project plan/schedule as written no matter how much time was spent generating it – they must plan for technology failure, losing a key team member, product delivery delays, etc. from Day 1.
Avoid Theoretical Time Estimate/Pad the Schedule
Every experienced mom know that a trip anywhere (to church, school, play dates, etc.) almost always takes longer than you’d think on paper. Yes, GPS may say that grandma’s house is only a 20 minute drive, but that estimate doesn’t account for the almost predictable traffic jam, the last minute potty trip/diaper change that definitely can’t be rushed, and of course the extra 5 minutes it takes to load everything into the car (race back for whatever you forgot), buckle car seats, settle any arguments, etc. So often project managers fall into the tempting trap of calculating “theoretical task estimates” that also don’t take into account some of the not so unpredictable delays and snags that we should proactively consider when building the timeline.
Temperature Check Regularly
As a busy mom, it’s so tempting to get caught up in the practical day to day minutia and really miss the important connections with our kids. I’ve noticed that moms seem to naturally “check in” with their kids periodically to find out what’s bothering them, what’s their favorite game/song, who’s their new best friend at school, etc. Similarly project managers can get overwhelmed by day to day administrivia and should remember the importance of checking in with the team to assess morale and see what’s working and what’s not. Whether it’s periodic informal lunches or round robin meeting debriefs, you can’t put the team on autopilot – checking in proactively is key!
Build Broad Networks and Firm Up Relationships Before You Need Them
Moms know that “it takes a village” – no one can do it all on their own. So, they actively reach out to establish their village early whether that includes extended family/friends, play groups, before/after care programs, etc. Moms also know the importance of nurturing those relationships constantly so that when she has the last minute babysitting emergency, her favorite nanny is more likely to come over asap – no questions asked J. Similarly, project managers are ultimately responsible for delivering project results on time on budget but are often completely reliant on others (including distant stakeholders at times) to get the job done! They absolutely need to build a strong extended team to help support the project – particularly during times of crisis. But the key is don’t wait until there’s a crisis to try to build the relationship J
Dana Brownlee is an acclaimed keynote speaker, corporate trainer, and team development consultant. She is President of Professionalism Matters, Inc. a boutique professional development corporate training firm based in Atlanta, GA. She can be reached at danapbrownlee@professionalismmatters.com. Connect with her on Linked In and Twitter.
Finding A New Job – The “When” and the “How”
Career Advice, Career Tip of the Week!There are many reasons to get a new job. It is worth exploring before you jump ship what it is you do not like at your current job and within that, why you do not like it. This way you have a better chance at not repeating the experience in the next job and in actual fact, you might find you ways to stay in your current position and be much happier and more productive. You know what I am going to say- yes, that’s right! Get a good coach to work through any challenges, fears and feelings that you are having right now and to help you articulate what you do want to do in the hours known as work. The “when” to change jobs is a big one. Often people jump to fast or take a very long time to do it, both extremes can be less than optimal to your career plan. If you are saying “what plan?” right about now then hey no judgement but those who plan tend to get what they want faster by virtue of knowing what they want and this process can help with that as the answer is always inside your own heart and mind.
Anyway, If you are sure you that the time is right to find a new job, you might be wondering how to go about it. I say think of it as a pyramid with the peak being knowing a manager or recruiter in a competing team or firm who needs you and by some serendipity has an open spot. Rarely happens, but if you are not networking and talking with peers and competitors and even clients, then you wont know when it does happen. Networking is the number one way to get a new job. Internally and externally- both are equally valid. Ask your mentor and sponsors (careful if they are your boss) if they know of a challenge that would be good next step for you.
The next layer in the pyramid is using a headhunter. Some are better than others but if you can find a good one, then your legwork is greatly reduced and their job is to conquer the art and science of placing the right person in the open job.
The lowest, broadest and most time consuming way to find a job is applying to hundreds of jobs on the internet. It can feel like a blackhole and although many people do get hired this way, it can not be counted on as the core of your strategy. Here is a review of job boards and the job search that just came across my desk recently that might help you get this foundational piece in place. It is hard to ignore it as an activity but do not rely on it as the only way to secure your next job. Remember, the closer your qualifications are to the requirements posted, the more likely your resume will be fished out of the pile by hand or robots to be considered further.
Best of Luck!
Nicki Gilmour is an industrial psychologist and qualified career coach as well as Founder and CEO of glasshammer2.wpengine.com
If you wish to be coached by Nicki in 2017 she is taking on a small number of (paying) individual clients this year- please apply nicki@glasshammer2.wpengine.com
Voice of Experience: Angela Harrell, Senior Vice President, Corporate Responsibility, Voya Financial; President of Voya Foundation
Black History Month, Voices of Experience“Women sometimes feel like they must have all of the answers in a male-dominated industry,” says Voya’s Angela Harrell. Harrell believes that women tend to put pressure on themselves, and hang back, rather than apply for an assignment or position because they might not feel like they check every single box. Men alternatively may only have half the necessary skills, but apply because they plan to manage the uncertainties as they arise. “As women, we need to believe that we are capable and can achieve whatever we set our minds to do. Perfection can be the enemy of good,” she says.
This translates to the board room or in meetings. “Women sometimes risk coming off apologetic or even discount their own expertise with phrases like, ‘You may have already thought of this, but …’ or ‘This might not be a good idea, but ….’ If you have an idea, sell it,” says Angela. “If you are going to speak up, do so with conviction.”
A Varied Career, Focusing on What Really Matters
After earning degrees in foreign affairs, Harrell expected to move into international work. Instead, after grad school, she joined a consulting firm and subsequently an executive recruiting firm, which relocated her to Atlanta. As a Coca-Cola Scholar, she had ties to The Coca-Cola Company and soon joined them as a project manager in the chairman’s office, coincidentally replacing another Coca-Cola Scholar.
There she worked for the chairman and CEO, eventually moving into public affairs and communications, where she performed a wide variety of functions, including executive speech writing, media relations, internal communications, overseeing the annual report, the sustainability report and global photography. During her tenure she travelled extensively, including spending two years as an expat in South Africa.
Two years ago, she joined Voya Financial, where she heads up the corporate responsibility function and serves as president of Voya Foundation. “It is truly a culture that embraces corporate responsibility and all its facets, from ethics and integrity to sustainability and serving clients in a way that reflects our mission and values.”
A Service Ethic
This ethos is evident throughout the company. While Voya employees donate to charities at what Harrell calls “an extraordinary level,” employees are equally as generous with their time. Harrell oversees Voya’s National Day of Service (NDOS), where 60 percent of the company’s 7,000 employees (and 100 percent of its senior leaders) logged 13,500 volunteer hours this year.
For the event, employee-led committees across the country selected community projects for volunteerism efforts. Employees embraced the opportunity to interact with a diverse network of project participants, all in the name of serving the community. Harrell sees this effort as one that encourages ongoing volunteer behavior, since many people desire to help but are daunted at the prospect of diving in on their own. “Volunteering with colleagues to make a difference in a community infuses a different kind of dynamic into relationships and really reinforces the power of working together. In 2016, family members were invited to participate in the event.”
Harrell has acquired a more holistic understanding of how corporate responsibility manifests in financial services, affecting everything from environmental, social and governance (ESG) influences on investment decisions to the importance of transparency and disclosures. “It’s exciting to see businesses and individuals increasingly take ESG into financial investment considerations and think about the long-term impact on people and the planet,” she says.
Imparting Lessons to the Next Generation
When looking over her career, Harrell notes that her achievements of real significance have involved empowering others. “I am proud of how my team members have stretched themselves, either to transform an existing program or to develop a new, groundbreaking one,” she says. “When I stand back to consider my achievements, they center around enabling others to flourish by providing guidance and coaching as a partner, rather than being prescriptive,” says Harrell. “If you give guidance and help clear the runway, people can really soar.”
She adds that the best feedback she can get is positive input about a member of her team. “That is how you multiply and scale your effect,” she says.
Part of this focus stems from her early years when she was self-reliant to a fault, determined to accomplish everything by herself. But that attitude can preclude opportunities to understand other people’s perspectives and how they might approach things, which can influence you to think creatively. She soon realized that asking for help or input would allow her to grow, rather than reflect weakness.
“The kind of leader I want to be is the one who says, ‘How can I help you?’ but lets people succeed on their own,” she says.
She also encourages young women to think about their own personal brand and how they want to be perceived by others. “It’s not about being someone you are not. It’s about making sure you are yourself in all facets of your life,” she says. “If there is too much dissonance between who you are at work and who you are in your personal life, it can be exhausting. You can be your own true self and be successful.”
She mentions one woman who said she was always feeling pressure to “not be too nice” and be less emotional, which was contrary to her personality. Harrell urged her to choose the path where she could be herself, while ensuring that she wasn’t so nice that people would walk all over her.
She reminds senior women to pause and make sure they are continuing to build relationships with those around them, with a special recognition of more junior women.
“Part of our responsibility is to reach our hands down and bring others up with us,” she says, adding that it can be informal and doesn’t need to be overly time consuming, like connecting during lunch or for coffee. “We have to transfer some of the strength we have to those who are less experienced.” As such, Harrell often mentors other women and is active with many of Voya’s employee-led committees.
Noting that many women lead the community-oriented groups at each of Voya’s sites, she says those roles allow women to hone leadership skills they might not otherwise obtain. She recommends women take advantage of leadership opportunities within employee resource groups or through the mentoring programs their companies may offer. They help women flex their leadership muscles and meet colleagues they wouldn’t normally interact with often.
A Global Citizen
An avid traveler who has lived in eight countries and traveled to more than 50, Harrell is serious about her globe-trotting. She is an adventurer who immerses herself in different cultures. “I love learning about culture through the way people greet each other, their dress, food and all other nuances you experience when you get off the beaten path. It really fuels me,” she says.
Equally intrinsic are the many experiences she can obtain right in New York. “The entire world is here, no matter what I want to see or eat or the language I want to hear,” she says. “It’s amazing to literally be surrounded by the world.”
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Black Women Leaders in Business: Will Recent Losses Wake Us Up?
Black History Month, Career Advice, FeaturedAcross the past twelve months, four African-American leaders have stepped down from positions of high visibility in the business and political world.
What’s most striking about these few departures is the size of the gap created by them, highlighting an African-American representation among women in leadership that remains far too small and a diversity movement that remains far too narrow.
The large gap left by losing a few powerful African-American leaders is a wake-up call to widen our diversity, not just in intention but in individual practice and in outcome.
Losing Power Players
This year’s Fortune’s Most Powerful Women 2016 continued to feature Rosalind Brewer (#19 – CEO and President, Sam’s Club and Walmart), Anne-Marie Campbell (#20 – EVP, U.S Stores, Home Depot), and Ursula Burns (#25 – CEO and Chairman of Xerox), with Beyoncé displacing Taylor Swift (#51).
But the 2017 list will look different. Last May, Ursula Burns, the first and only African-American women to run a S&P 500 company, announced that she would step down from her CEO position after splitting Xerox into two companies. After Rosalind Brewer’s recent retirement news, black women – already scarce – will now be absent from the helm of major U.S. companies.
Meanwhile, former FLOTUS Michelle Obama has left the high profile visibility of the White House (although her voice may well remain in the spotlight) and Loretta Lynch has ended her term as the U.S. Attorney General.
These four women (Obama, Lynch, Brewer, and Burns) accounted for over 50% of the African-American names on Forbe’s World’s 100 Most Powerful Women 2016.
Losing four black women from highly visible, influential leadership positions wouldn’t be so striking except – in the context of so few peers in positions of power – it simply is.
Monolithic Diversity
The percentage of women CEOS among Fortune 500 companies dropped to only 4.2% in 2016 (from 24 to 21), which is a hit for all women. The near absence of minorities amidst that 4% testifies that diversity’s approach to advancing women remains very monolithic.
Black women remain caught in the blind spot of intersectionality, and while naming the problem helps, it does not address it. As Melinda Marshall and Tai Wingfield, authors of “Ambition in Black & White: The Feminist Narrative Revised,“ write in the Harvard Business Review, “At the intersections of race and gender, both then and now, black women have labored unseen, even to those lobbying for their advancement.”
As a recent AAUW report highlights, “the specific ways in which they (black women leaders) are disadvantaged clearly differs from the better-understood ways that white women leaders are dis-advantaged.”
The diversity movement falls short of advancing women when we too often ignore the rich diversity of needs, realities, and challenges experienced by different women, and work to address them.
Intersectional Barriers
As research has shown, black women are (three times) more likely to aspire to leadership roles than white women and half as likely to attain one.
As summed up by a 2016 report in the Journal of Business Studies Quarterly, some of the myriad of factors holding African-American women back from the C-Suite include dual bias at the intersection of race and gender (a net that affects everything else), the impact of stereotypes on perceptions (as an example, African-American women are often perceived as aggressive in communication), a lack of career opportunities to showcase skills, having to prove competency more than colleagues, a lack of strategic feedback, workplace isolation and ‘outsider’ status.
The Biggest Barrier is Social Exclusion
But one of the strongest barriers for black women is the lack of access to powerful social networking with influential senior executive leaders, which requires a certain level of ‘insider’ status.
According to Wingfield and Marshall in HBR, black women “have mentors and strong support networks but lack sponsors—leaders who will talk them up behind closed doors, steer plum assignments their way, and defend them against detractors.”
Black Women Executives Research Initiative Revisited by the Executive Leadership Council, the first longitudinal study of black women executives (BWEs) in corporate America (2007 and 2015), gleamed insights into both the challenges and experiences of 59 senior leaders across the eight year period.
The importance of creating and maintaining sponsorship relationships, and building a network of allies, was emphasized by BWEs.
As one interviewee said, “I believe you almost have to have somebody in the room where the conversation is happening that says, ‘this is the person who can make the contributions and be valuable.’ If you don’t have that it’s very hard.”
Research by Catalyst has demonstrated how black women and men who experience a heightened sense of “being different” based on their race/ethnicity within the workplace suffer an “Emotional Tax” that can include impaired sleep, a sense of always being on guard, speaking up less, reduced innovation and creativity, and feeling less psychologically safe in contributing their own voice at work.
However, a sense of inclusion reduces the Emotional Tax, and increases psychological safety, such as feeling leaders and team members ‘have your back’, that mistakes won’t be held against you, and that co-workers are not going to try to undermine your efforts – in other words, a corporate environment in which anyone can feel comfortable in taking risks, not just the majority.
Absence from networks also affects black women entrepreneurs. Despite the fact that African-American women are the fastest growing group of entrepreneurs, their endeavors tend to lack major investment backing or significant outsider funding.
Strategic Career Management
The Executive Leadership Council report also found that 27% of BWEs had advanced in their careers (since 2007), and over 60% did so while in Profit & Loss roles. Yet 46% of BWEs left their companies to start their own business or moved to a different company, sometimes losing ground.
In-depth interviews revealed four factors that were most influential in career developments for these leaders: 1) alignment of values, 2) agility and re-purposement, 3) sponsorship, and 4) relationship-building as politics.
The primary reason for satisfaction among BWEs in their work was alignment of values on an industry, corporate culture, positional or interpersonal level – and the primary reason for dis-satisfaction, and hence job movement, was a deterioration of alignment.
A key career strategy for BWEs, referred to as agility and repurposement, was an ability to move rapidly between challenges to foster “continuous learning, cross-functional, boundary-spanning work and intentional, if not always planned, career expansion.”
Many successful BWEs were keen to take assignments, even adjacent opportunities and glass-cliff appointments, that ultimately advanced their learning, broadened their expertise, and gained visibility and network connections.
Disrupting the Silos In Business & Diversity
As written in HBR, leadership which aims for real diversity must purposely disrupt silos in the workplace, creating more opportunities for intersectional visibility.
As Wingfield and Marshall write, “Leaders must create a culture in which people at the intersections of functional or affinity identities have equal access to their attention or equal opportunity to earn it.”
And as champions of diversity, we must disrupt the insidious silos that exist within the diversity movement and within. For each non-minority woman in a place of leadership, we can ask if we are doing our part in including African-American women in social networks and enabling opportunities for visibility?
Are we checking our own relative privilege and our own blindspots? As much as we want equality, are we practicing it within the power and influence we hold?
While theglasshammer is putting a focus on African-American women in leadership during February’s Black History Month coverage, minority women are living the lesser-understood intersectional challenges every single day, and we must make a daily practice of staying awake to that.