Today marks the 2009 release of the UC Davis Census of Women Leaders where they are reporting that once again, the number of women in the C suite and on Boards of the top 400 public companies in the state of California is a paltry 10.6% which is DOWN from the 10.9% number reported in 2008.

Equally shocking is that 118 (29.5%) of California’s largest 400 public companies have no women board directors or executive officers. Only 15 of the 400 companies have a woman CEO.  The Bay area has the county with the greatet percentage of women directors - San Francisco (15.7%), as well as the county with the least - Santa Clara (8.2%) - the heart of Silicon Valley.

I was really excited to participate in an NPR interview this morning until the first comment from a listener came in with the remark about why are we even talking about this issue since many women want to stay at home to take care of kids while their husbands bring home the paycheck.

When asked to respond to this, I could only comment that it is an example of the gender bias and stereotyping that exists for both women and men that keep things stagnating the way they are.

The reason I don’t understand why we have to talk about this issue is that there is so much data out there supporting that when there is diversity of all kinds in the board room and the C Suite that there is better financial performance, more measured risk taking, and greater creative thinking and problem solving due to the diversity of backgrounds, disciplines, gender, race etc.

Organizations will face a major talent shortage in the near future as qualified, educated women (more women graduating with MBA’s than men for example) will look at those companies who created intention around having diversity of all kinds as a better place to work.  Those who create sponsorships to create opportunities for women, who measure the degree of diversity in hiring and who actually walk the talk will be the ones who win the talent competition.

Women also can influence changing this picture by learning how to network more strategically to break into the power circles where decisions are made; negotiate higher salaries rather than justifying what is offered; and seeking out and accepting roles they might need to stretch into.

Men will take a role if they are 50% qualified and feel they will figure it out when they get there. Women tend to feel they need 100% of the competencies before they can accept the role.

This issue is about choice. Maria Shriver’s recent report on women talks about how roles are changing as many women are the main career bread winner and the husband stays home to take care of things on that front. And, there are many women who are choosing to stay home to relish the valuable time they will have with their children.

The point is, there is not one right answer here. But corporate America seems to be stuck in a model of one way of doing things that does not support the aspirations, life challenges, or goals that many women have.

We’re having a dialogue about this issue tonight with Dean Currall of UC Davis Graduate School of Business, Maureen Connors, Board Member of Decker Outdoor Corporation (in the Top 25 companies in CA on the UC Davis list); Karen Rohde, SVP of Sun Microsystems (being acquired by Oracle), Bethany Mayer, Chief Marketing Officer of BlueCoat, and Deborah Campbell, Director of Membership from Catalyst.  Come join us at 6pm at DLA to continue this discussion or comment here on what you have to say about this very important issue.

In my previous blog, I reported on the highlights of the W.I.N. Global Leadership conference held in Prague, Czech Republic on October 8-10.

In addition to those highlights, during the conference two business school professors from London and Switzerland  delivered presentations that I found quite thought provoking. Both discussed the different characteristics that make women leaders thrive, but also pointed out ways they shoot themselves in the foot.

Do you agree with these competences and assertions from Nigel and George or do you have a different list?  Do any of these competencies strike an idea for a new development area for yourself?

Nigel Nicholson, Professor at the London Business School, began by stating that we have a fundamentally wrong model of leadership being practiced today that is based on meritocracy where decisions are made on a linear hierarchy.  It creates a purely random universe where people “get there” by luck.

What you are supposed to be doing as a leader is getting the best out of those around you.  There is a unique set of characteristics that women have used to help drive the future that are actually more positive than the male dominant hierarchy model.  However, women often don’t jump into the water if it doesn’t look good.Meaning they don’t move between enough different environments - which lessens their opportunities for leadership roles.

Nigel also talked about the strategy of the future being based on vision and outlined some key skills that women have and should develop in order to prepare themselves for future leadership roles.  These key skills include:  asking questions; de-centering (seeing what something looks like from another perspective); managing like a partner and not a boss; storytelling - connecting people with the past, present, and the future in a way that is emotionally compelling.

A leader answers the following questions:

1. Who am I and why am I here?
2. Who are we and what do we stand for? - Our core competence and real purpose
3. Where are we going?
4. Why are we going there? - Stated with conviction!
5. Why must we change? - A crisis is a terribly opportunity to waste

On the last day of the conference, George Kohlrieser, Professor at IMD in Switzerland listed out his view of the critical competencies for women leaders.  His background is very interesting as he began his career in law enforcement and grew to become a hostage negotiator.  Much of his work is about resolving conflict and many of the ideas presented below are covered in his new book “Hostage at the Table: How Leaders Can Resolve Conflict, Influence Others, and Raise Performance.”

The core competencies for women leaders he highlighted in his presentation were:

1. Being assertive
2. Being decisive
3. Social bonding to raise performance (otherwise known as connectedness or networking)
4. Managing conflict for a win-win outcome
5. Being a secure base and having secure bases
6. Mastering the mind’s eye to focus on positive goals (versus being sucked into the negative outlook on life)
7. Developing resilience
8. Understanding business

One of the most compelling statements he made was how we get to the highest level of performance through failure and how we live in a world where there is a high expectation for entitlement.

On October 8-10, 2009, I had the pleasure of attending and presenting at the W.I.N. Global Leadership conference in Prague, Czech Republic. This was my third time attending this conference and I was again impressed with the integration of creativity through music performed at the start of each plenary session and the bevy of global thought-provoking speakers.

The W.I.N. audience is very similar to that of FWE&E in its composition of entrepreneurs, executives, consultants, thought leaders who are forward-looking people and influential decision makers. They state that the W.I.N. woman is typically culturally aware, wants to be part of a community and has an international and open mindset. She is well educated, keen to learn, to grow and to contribute, receptive to new technology, embraces change and listens to her intuition.

The theme of this year’s conference was Wisdom in Action - divided into three main segments with the first day providing a global overview of topics of interest to women leaders, followed by a day of work and career issues, concluding with a day focusing on leadership and personal growth topics.

Some of the highlights for me included Axel Olsen from the Institute for Future Studies in Copenhagen who stated that the future is going to be created by women in new and different ways than we’ve seen in the past. This is the best time in life to create our own future where the opportunities are as big as the risks. The Institute offers 15 megatrends that they feel will shape the future with the top five being knowledge, new technology, acceleration, hyper-complexity and globalization. Other trends that interested me were immaterialization, individualization, networks, environment and aging. He ended by stressing that existing competition means nothing and that surprises will come from new and different angles.

Other sessions that I found quite compelling included hearing from Lorella Zanardo, Founder and General Manager of Sportgate who has taken on the challenge of highlighting sexism against women in Italy by creating a documentary entitled The Body of Women after being shocked by the images of women in the media in Italy on public television during early hours of the day.

The story of Unilver’s re-energizing of the Dove Brand as told by Angela Nelissen, Sales Director HPC of Uniliver was such an interesting story. The idea of the body self esteem campaign came from a brainstorming session held at a corporate offsite where the women were sharing the issues that meant the most to them and many of them related to self esteem. It was interesting to hear the stories of the internal communication created to “sell” the new campaign and the resistance shown by countries such as France and Italy where beauty was not viewed in the same manner. The new Dove self esteem fund for girls has been a very generous and creative offshoot of the campaign.

We heard the story of career development from Alison Smale, Executive Editor of the International Herald Tribune who, after spending many years in Eastern Europe and Russia and actually being present when the Berlin Wall came down, now lives once again in the UK. Her story of her education, opportunities that opened, and risks that she took were very compelling. What was most interesting was to learn that the International Herald Tribune is about to begin a new series on global women entitled “Turning Point” where they will cover information about women in all walks of life in all countries.

I was moved to tears by the story from Marguerite “Maggy” Barankitse from Burundi who has founded the Maison Shalom (House of Peace) and has supported up to 10,000 children orphaned by the strife in her country. Her native language is French and hearing her wonderfully accented voice tell the story of seeing her family killed in front of her, pleading with the killers to let her save the children, starting to care for them with nothing and ending with the successful story of building a wonderful school, hospital and many other services was beyond amazing. Her focus on it all being driven by love, her compassion and her belief that it could all be done was humbling.

The conference concluded with a drumming session lead by Doug Manuel and Sewa Beats where, through the practice of drumming, we learned how to follow and how to lead. An incredibly fun and motivating experience if you’ve never done it.

I look forward to hearing more stories from the other participants and will continue to post updates on the learning from this amazing group of women who come together as W.I.N.

It’s been a great weekend for women in the news.  In Kuwait, four women won parliamentary seats in Saturday’s elections after just being allowed the right to vote in 2005!

At the Preakness, a filly, Rachel Alexandra beat all the boys to be the first filly in 85 years to win!

Okay, so part serious and part silly but I’ve been thinking about this a lot since hearing Rayona Sharpnack, Founder and CEO of Institute for Women’s Leadership, lead a program entitled, “Women Empowering Women - Why We Don’t and How We Can.”

It was an interesting discussion amongst the group as we could all remember at least one occasion when a woman was not quite as “empowering” as she could have been.  And, we can probably all think of at least one occasion when perhaps we weren’t as gracious as we should have been towards another woman.

One attendee shared a story of how she was nervous recommending a good friend who is also a skilled consultant for a particular role as she was concerned on how it might reflect on her if the woman crashed and burned.  She eventually did recommend her and the work turned out well but this was an example of a common story.  I’ve heard the same reasons stated for why one woman on a Board of Directors does not recommend another qualified woman she might know.

In Rayona’s work, she talks about how our culture and upbringing create the contexts for how we perceive life today.  Then we create assumptions that masquerade as facts that justify the decisions that we make.

One of my “contexts” is that you have to work more than twice as hard as everyone else just to stay even.  After hearing Rayona, I really started thinking more about the effect this has had not just on me but also on my team as I continue to push them to strive above and beyond.

There is a quote attributed to Madeline Albright, former Secretary of State under President Clinton, where she shares that there is a special place in hell for women who don’t support other women.

What contexts do you notice in your life?  In Rayona’s language, what can you “trade up” to in order to show support for other women?  Does it make a difference?  What do you think?

I’ve been absolutely amazed at the number of articles I’ve seen recently about sexism in America that segue into the alarming statistics on the stagnation and slippage of women’s advancement in corporate America. What’s driving the numbers and why is there such emotion around the topic - from both men and women? For example, check out the recent article in Conde Nast’s Porfolio entitled Sexism in the Workplace. Some really “interesting” statistics include: (and there are many more):

• American Bar Association shows female attorney weekly wages amounted to 70.5% of male lawyer’s in 2006 compared with 77.5% in 2005.
• Number of women holding Fortune 500 board seats increased steadily between 1995 and 2005 but has been essentially flat for the past 3 years.
• Number of female corporate officers at Fortune 500 companies has dropped in each of the past three years.

What’s even more interesting is reading the blog comments of the readers. The venom represented by both men and women shows mass stereotyping, fear, anger and a general sense of powerlessness on the part of women. The Wall Street Journal had a front page article on Saturday March 29th titled At the Barricades in the Gender Wars talking about Hilary Clinton’s campaign and the fear her supporters have about a sexist backlash. A lot of questions about whether America is ready for a woman leader. My colleague Paige Wesley mentioned that she’s talked to a number of women from various generations who are actually concerned about this – feeling that a woman won’t get Congressional or public support to be effective in the White House.

How is it that other nations have been able to cross this barrier and the U.S., where we pride ourselves on civil rights and women’s lib, still quakes at the idea of women in power? Why is gender even a point of debate when there are so many other more serious issues to discuss? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this one! What’s the next step? How are we as women owning – and investing in - our power and authority? What needs to happen to drive the change we want to see? Is it about networking skills - developing our own “old girls club”? Having intention? Being mentors? I think we could all benefit from hearing about how your gender may have affected your rise to leadership - both positively and negatively. What did you learn from the experience, how would you change your response to it now? Looking forward to continuing the discussion! apo prednisone quitting celexa side effects

Today, Monday November 17th, 2008, UC Davis Graduate School of Management, in partnership with FWE&E, is publishing the 4th Annual UC Davis Study of California Women Business Leaders to report on the latest numbers of women leaders for the top 400 public companies in the State of California.

In addition to UC Davis, we are proud to partner with The InterOrganization Network (ION), an organization consisting of 12 member organizations like ours in the major business centers of the U.S. including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit, etc. We combine our energies by all providing census data with our partners for our local areas and our programs are based on advocating the advancement of women to positions of power in the business world, especially to boards of directors and executive suites. Download ION’s 2008 Report (pdf).

The fourth annual UC Davis Study of California Women Business Leaders found that only 13 of California’s 400 largest public companies have a woman CEO. Overall, women hold just 10.9 percent of board seats and executive positions — insignificant progress from 2007, when the figure was 10.4 percent, and from 2006 and 2005, when it was 10.2 percent. Download the complete report (pdf)

What can we do about changing this picture? On November 18, 2008 FWE&E will host “Women in Corporate Leadership: Action Plan for Change” from 8 to 10 a.m. at Microsoft, 1065 La Avenida, Building I, in Mountain View. Register today to attend the event.

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Nancy Pelosi has just published a new book, already on the bestseller list, called Know Your Power:  A Message to America’s Daughters

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On August 13th, she was in conversation with Sydnie Kohara about the book to an audience of approximately 400 women leaders at the Oracle Auditorium.  The conversation was an intimate fireside chat with Nancy talking about her experiences with her family, in politics, and of being a leader.

When I read her book, there were two messages that really resonated with me — building confidence and building collaborations.

I often hear stories from women who are presented opportunities that are a significant challenge or step up from what they are currently doing, and the first reaction is, “I couldn’t possibly do that, I’ve never done that before.”   A man’s reaction is typically - “YES!” and then privately they think the same thing.  Women need to learn to just say “YES” and have the confidence to know they’ll do a great job.

I learned that whatever opportunity I was presented, I would be likely to succeed as I had the confidence to know that through collaboration,  I would find someone who’s either done this before who could share their experience, or find someone I could partner with who would help me take the opportunity to a new level.

Forums like ours exist as we, as women leaders, know the true power of collaboration.  Power means influence leading to action.  What actions can we take today and who can we collaborate with today to make a real difference? oxytrol premarin substitute rimonabant and death

In the United States, the upcoming retirement of the baby boomers will probably mean that companies are going to lose large numbers of senior-level employees in a short period of time; nearly one-fifth of the working-age population (16 and older) of the United States will be at least 65 by 2016. Demographic trends show that women are the largest demographic for helping fill this upcoming talent pool decline and organizations will begin to experience recruiting issues if they do not start to pay attention to how to attract and retain women leaders.

There are many ways women can support themselves to improve their potential to lead within an organization. What ideas do you have?

What Can Women Do?

1. Connectedness

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– Women network differently than men and learning how to break into the informal power networks in order to be considered for senior level roles is critical. Men have more “weak ties” and feel more comfortable with reciprocity which makes them more open to recommending their acquaintances for senior roles.

Women must learn how to build networks of people that truly can provide the influence to help them advance rather than just building strong personal relationships with a small group of people they feel comfortable with.

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– As mentioned above, women feel that they need to have 100% of the qualifications required before they can apply or accept a role that they have not had experience with before. Men will raise their hand if only 60% of the qualifications are met. Women need to develop the confidence to know that they have the common sense and ability to ask for help in order to be successful at more challenging roles.

3. Seek Sponsors and Mentors

– Those women that seek out role models of other women and men who have attained roles they aspire to often move up faster due to the support and advice they receive.

4. Manage Your Career – Seek opportunities, both inside and outside the organization, to broaden skill sets to encourage learning of more operational knowledge such as strategy, financial acumen, sales and global experience to help round out the abilities needed for more senior level roles.

On November 17th, UC Davis published the latest Census of Women Leaders in California and the statistics showed that not much progress has been made since the inception of the study 4 years ago. And, these numbers have not changed much nationwide as shown by the ION Census Data from 12 other major financial centers in the US including New York, Boston, Chicago and Detroit.

This is such a complex issue with gender differences, stereotypes and corporate culture all playing a role in why the numbers stay where they are.

Research shows that having women leaders in your organization has a direct impact on corporate performance. Companies with the highest representation of women on their top management teams experience stronger financial performance when compared to companies with the lowest representation of women in senior positions–Return on Equity is 35% higher and Total Return to Shareholders is 34% higher for companies with more senior women executives. McKinsey has also published some recent data that supports this premise.

We believe that there are practical steps that can be taken by both organizations and women leaders to help change this picture. What ideas do you have regarding what can be changed within yourself or your organization?

What can organizations do about it?

1.    Support from the CEO and Measurement

Embracing Diversity is not an HR issue and creating a Diversity Team under HR with no funding is not the same as truly supporting and role modeling diversity at the top.

Companies with CEO’s who create intention and measurement for the recruitment (this is not the same as setting quotas), retention and engagement of women leaders often show a higher percentage of women leaders in their ranks.

This can be accomplished by encouraging hiring managers, and measuring them, to make sure that they are interviewing as equal a number as possible of women vs. men for any open positions.

Unconscious stereotyping still exists and people tend to hire people they are comfortable with and more often than not, this equates to people who “look like them.” Creating intention to help break through this unconscious stereotyping is one method for enhancing women’s opportunities for advancement.

2.    Support Mentoring, Sponsorship, and Networking Programs

Women apply for roles when they think they have 100% of the criteria listed in the role whereas men will apply if they meet 60% of the criteria. Women need to be encouraged more to apply for these positions and having formal mentoring programs have proven to be an effective tool.

Sponsorship is the next level up where a manager creates opportunities for high potential women leaders to move up more quickly rather than waiting for general opportunities to arise.

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92% of women are the main caretakers at home with child care or elder care in addition to holding full time jobs. Other than basic benefits such as maternity leave, companies need to become more creative in assisting women with more flexibility to manage the challenges they face outside of work and not be penalized from the leader track if they need to take more time off during their peak earning years in order to manage their home life challenges.

I’m sure many of us read with interest the announcement of Carol Bartz as the new CEO of Yahoo! Carol lead a very successful growth and change effort at Autodesk and has now been brought into Yahoo! at a time when there is much needed strategic and leadership re-direction.  Her track record certainly points to Carol being the right person for the job on both counts.

On the same day this news came out, there was a great article forwarded to me by Board of Advisor member Karen Appleton, VP of Bus Dev at box.net.  The article, The Glass Cliff: Are Women Leaders Often Set Up to Fail? by Sylvia Ann Hewlett of Off-Ramps and On-Ramps

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fame discusses the very interesting premise that women are over-represented in precarious leadership positions such as the one Carol Bartz has just accepted.

Related to women on boards, she references a recent work that disputes that when women are added to boards the financial performance of the company declines.  Rather it appears that women are added to the boards when the share price is tumbling as a means of showing that something is being done.  The women being last in are first to be blamed.

In the article, she references several studies including The Athena Factor

-  research that shows that a significant proportion of women in science, engineering and technology (SET) believe that when they fail they don’t get second chances.

I’ve spoken with several women members of FWE&E who have specifically said they have seen this phenomenon of women not taking senior roles in organizations where they have seen the women before them fail.  The general consensus was that for some reason the bar was higher for the women put in these positions and there was little mentorship and no room for error.

This is not to say, especially in these precarious economic times, that men don’t face the same hurdles.  It just seems that when women are placed in these positions and fail, the cultural stereotypes come out about how women aren’t as effective leaders as men.

Have you had or seen similar situations?  How do you feel about Carol’s chances of success at Yahoo?