October 17–19, 2013

WALKING IN HER SHOES! CAPITALIZING ON INSTINCT AND WORK/LIFE BALANCE STRATEGIES FROM THE C-

SUITE

• According to the Harvard Business Review Journal Study in 2012, women, who occupy three percent of Fortune 500 CEO• positions, are outnumbered four to one in the C-suite, comprise less than 16 percent of all corporate officers and occupy

only• 7.6 percent of Fortune 500 top-earner positions. How many of these women are women? Take a guess. Most of us have

been to• countless leadership seminars. Some of us skim through several leadership books and pick up on tidbits of leadership

strategies• and knowledge from speeches at conferences like these. But, the question is, of all of the leadership advice, what is

actually• working? What are the top key strategies that we need to embrace to make the difference in the way we ensure our voices

are• heard? Top women leaders in STEM join to share their success, roadblocks, and thoughts on new strategic moves to get

into the• C suite.• Learning Objective: Increase leadership, productivity and performance.• Outcomes- At the end of this seminar, participants will be able to:• a. Examine and study top women executives and strategies(i.e. Sheryl Sandberg, COO Facebook).• b. Explore transformational leadership techniques for women.• c. List Ineffective leadership habits and choices.• d. Explore strategies to improve work/life balance.

Trends

• A new report highlights the fact that of all the Fortune 500 companies, there are now 20 female CEOs heading up these companies. That's an "impressive" 4%. Seem a little low? Maybe, but Forbes points out that not only is it a record number of women heading up these companies, 11 of the 20 were appointed in 2011 and 2012. Is this a trend that is likely to continue?

The Notables• IBM, broke its 100-year tradition of male CEOs when it hired Ginni Rometty as its

CEO. Rometty started at IBM in 1981, and was appointed to a series of leadership positions while working her way up through the ranks of IBM. In 2012, she was named Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer.

In 2012, Yahoo! chose Marissa Mayer for its top spot. Mayer came to Yahoo! from Google where she was employee #20 and the company's most prominent female executive. Since her hiring, investors have supported Mayer's vision for Yahoo!. The stock has seen a solid uptrend since her hiring.

Hewlett Packard hired Meg Whitman just over a year ago. Whitman was named HP's CEO in September 2011. Prior to that she served as the CEO of eBay from 1998 to 2008, and held executive level positions with Hasbro Inc., FTD Inc. and The Walt Disney Company.

Why Now?

• In another study, Catalyst, a nonprofit advocating for more women in business, found that from 2004 to 2008, Fortune 500 companies with the largest percentage of female board directors outperformed those with the least by 16% when measured by return on sales and 26% when measured by return on invested capital.

Key Examples• Oprah Winfrey, Chairman of Harpo

From one television show, Winfrey has built a media empire that includes magazines, radio channels and even television networks. In addition to being the first African-American female billionaire, she has been called "arguably the world's most influential woman" by CNN.

Meg Whitman, CEO of Hewlett-PackardWhitman was named CEO of Hewlett-Packard, topping off a resume that includes growing eBay's revenues of roughly $4 million to about $8 billion, and running for governor of California. Her career has had a few controversies, but there's no denying that Whitman has a talent for the CEO's chair.

Sheryl Sandberg, COO of FacebookIn 2008, Mark Zuckerberg hired Sandberg from Google, where she was responsible for onlineadvertising. She took a position with a company that was not profitable, and it was under her leadership that the decision to rely on ads for generating revenue was made. It was a decision that has led to the company's monumental growth and initial public offering.

Transformation of the workplace

• How does one become a chief executive officer (CEO)? Is there a certain blueprint to follow in order to attain this prestigious title? What professional and personal traits are necessary for the position? Technically, anyone can fill the chief executive slot, but typically those who have distinguished themselves in some manner and have strong leadership characteristics end up getting the job.

Characteristics of Women Executives

• Drive a democratic and inclusive approach by building an ecosystem and nurturing talent

• Intuitive crisis managers enabling fair and sound judgment• Great negotiation skills• Collaborative inclusive styles of leadership• Setting higher benchmarks for ourselves, and our peers• Initiative and make more rational decisions,• Capacity to multi-task

Personality Traits • Having a degree from a top-notch school and an exceptional

knowledge of the industry in which the company operates are great qualities to have. However, those qualities in and of themselves don't guarantee that a person will make it to the top of the corporate ladder. Personality traits may also play a role in an individual's ability to attain chief executive status. Typically, CEOs are: good communicators, deal makers and managers – extroverts who are eager to go out on the road and tell their

company's story – able and willing to present a cohesive vision and strategy to

employees – able to garner respect

7 Unsuccessful Habits• See themselves and their companies as dominating their

environment• Identify so completely with the company that there is no clear

boundary between their personal interests and their corporation’s interests

• Think they have all the answers•  Ruthlessly eliminate anyone who isn’t completely behind them•  Underestimate obstacles• Stubbornly rely on what worked for them in the past

Challenges• Women in top management need to be perceived as serious

players• Women leaders find it difficult to break into established male-

dominated corporate networks at the risk of balancing work/home aspects

• Senior women executives find performance assessments based on personal characteristics, ability to put in long hours and visibility of effort rather, than on delivery or output as a challenge

• At times the challenges faced by women leaders are industry-specific and cannot be measured or generalized

Experience

• Generally speaking, a person must have a great deal of experience in the company's field in order to become CEO. A chief executive's job is to provide vision and a course for the company to navigate, which is difficult to do without extensive experience and a working knowledge of the potential risks and opportunities that lie ahead for the company.

Strategies for Work Life Balance

• What works for you might not work for the next person?

• Don’t beat yourself up about the past!

Will the Trend Continue?

• 2012 was a giant leap forward for women in the workplace, as large companies hired a record number of female CEOs. While those championing gender equality have cause for celebration, many argue that the work is far from over. Women are still underrepresented in boardrooms and underpaid in most sectors of the workforce.