A New Look at Leadership Development for Women

Over the years, I've been involved with Linkage through their Global Institute for Leadership Development and their Women in Leadership Summit. So I was delighted when I was contacted to take part in a series of interviews on leadership for a global research study on the identification and development of leaders. The result of this work will be in an upcoming book by Phil Harkins, the CEO of Linkage - and a well known expert on leadership.

The interview was far ranging and today I received this note from the interviewer.

"Thank you very much for your willingness to support our leadership research at Linkage. Your discussion of the excess emphasis on traits (rather than results) in modern business is one of the key highlights that came out of this series of interviews. Your candor has been extremely helpful to us..."

Here are 4 of the key points I made during the interview.

1. I shared my definition of leadership: "Leadership is using the greatness in you to achieve and sustain extraordinary outcomes by engaging the greatness in others."
2. Women have been under-served by most leadership development initiatives because they over-focus on interpersonal skills (the 1/3rd of the leadership definition that has to do with engaging the greatness in others). For decades the a collection of competencies labeled interpersonal skills is one where women are consistently rated by their bosses as outperforming men.
3. The individualistic culture in the U.S. drives an overemphasis on seeking individual traits of leaders (the 1/3rd of the leadership definition that has to do with the greatness in you). This also under-serves women because of the competencies sought by boards and CEOs when identifying C-suite candidates and high potential employees, only 24% have to do with personal traits.
4. Of the competencies sought by boards and CEOs when identifying C-suite candidates and high potential employees, 50% have to do with business, strategic and financial acumen. These have to do with the 1/3rd of the leadership definition that has to do with achieving and sustaining extraordinary outcomes. Specifically, they are looking for evidence of these competencies via impact on the business. In study after study over the past several decades, men have been rated as outperforming women in these areas. That's why we call these extremely important competencies The Missing 33%™of the career success equation for women.
   

For decades, the paradigms underlying leadership development have been viewed as neutral - in spite of the fact that much the research at the root of these paradigms - dating back to the late 70s - was done on men. As a result, most over-focus on 2/3 of the leadership definition, leaving women at a disadvantage.

To illustrate: In our work with companies on their women's initatives, we analyze the competencies that they embed in their performance and leadership development systems. In one F500 company, only 18% of its management competencies focus on business, strategic or financial acumen (The Missing 33%) - while 48% focused on personal traits. So, if a woman were to cultivate her personal traits per their system, she would hit a glass ceiling pretty early in her career because she would lack the business, strategic and financial skills required to advance.

And while some companies place more of a balanced emphasis between personal traits and engagement skills, the minimal focus on business, strategic and financial acumen is not uncommon!

How does your organization emphasize The Missing 33% in its performance, succession, leadership development, women's initiative content and other advancement systems?

To learn more about The Missing 33%, why it's important, and what you can do about it; check out this short video, and pick up a copy of No Ceiling, No Walls. You'll be glad you did!

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

3 Important Questions!

Are you a Businesswoman or a Woman in Business?

Earlier this month I enjoyed delivering a webinar to a number of Professional Women in Healthcare. The topic was Think Like a CEO: Developing Business Acumen. Implicit in the topic is the question, do you think of yourself as a "woman in business" or as a businesswoman. I recommend that your answer should be that you think of yourself as a businesswoman. Here's why:

A "woman in business" can be said to be a woman working in a business, but a businesswoman is a woman who "gets" and is advancing the business of her organization. She understands the business of business, has strategic and financial acumen and is more likely to be considered as a "high potential" candidate for advancement.

So, how do you think of yourself?

What's the Brand of Your Women's Initiative?

It was an honor to consult with a large financial services organization as it launched launch its women's initiative - including a recommendation to initiate a women's leadership employee resource group. During the discussion about recommendations to the executive team and goals for the initiative, the topic of work/life balance and flex-time arose.

Taking advantage of the opportunity to offer advice, here's what I said,

"It's important to think about you you want your executives to see your efforts. Do you want to lead with the stereotypical work/life balance issues, or do you want to lead with a focus on leadership development and building the business?"

They made the right choice. What's your answer?

What are you Doing about The Missing 33%™?

In presenting The Missing 33% to the global women's council of a F500 company, I discovered that only 18% of its management competencies focus on business, strategic or financial acumen - while 48% focused on personal greatness competencies.

This is nearly the reverse of what our research indicates are the skills that executives and boards seek in C-suite candidates and high-potential employees. Of the skills sought for these movers, 50% have to do with business, strategic and financial acumen and 24% with elements of personal greatness.

How do you measure up in the area of business, strategic and financial acumen? How does your organization emphasize these in its performance, succession, leadership development, women's initiative content and other advancement systems?

At Leading Women, we consider business, strategic and financial acumen to be The Missing 33% of the career success equation for women. To learn more about what that means, why it's important, and what you can do about it; check out this short video, and pick up a copy of No Ceiling, No Walls. You'll be glad you did!

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

Leadership and Change

We are half way through Women's History Month and past International Women's Day. It is a month to reflect on the status of women - how far we've come, progress under attack and what's left to do. For Leading Women, March is also our anniversary month - 8 years ago, Jane Metzger was our first breakfast speaker. Since then much has changed for Leading Women and we're so grateful that you've been with us for the journey.


As I reflect on the horrific tragedy in Japan, I know that every day has its tragedies for millions of women around the world (to understand more about this read Half the Sky). And so, it feels fitting that I'm spending a chunk of this month in Guatemala where a group of Leading Women will be working with women's cooperatives and a local health center to strengthen their capabilities and position them for sustained success. You can read more about what we're doing here.

Working cross culturally is an excellent way to confront the fact that we have worldviews and that they influence everything we do. And so, we begin our work with a weekend focused on strategy and change and a contemplation of our worldviews on both

For example, in the U.S. we live in a linear culture with the future in front of us and the past behind. In other cultures, including in the indigenous cultures around Lake Atitlan, time is circular. Their actions are shaped by the cyclical nature of the season  and the work that has to be done in their milpas (plots of land where maize is grown).

As I think about my worldview on change, I see that it is shaped not only by the U.S. culture, but also by the fact that I am the eldest, that my grandparents or great grandparents immigrated to the U.S. and other factors. As I think about working on strategy and the changes that strategic plans require, I consider how a milpa is like a business. Both are influenced by the environment, both produce outcomes and both need nurturing infusions.

What forces have shaped your worldview on change? Do you seek change, embrace change or approach it with caution? Do different types of change cause different reactions in you? What are your beliefs about making change? And how does your complicated and personal worldview about change strenghten or impede your success as a leader? This is important self-discovery work - because, as I say, "leadership is all about change all the time."

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

100th Anniversary of International Women's Day

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

Reflections on the 100th Anniversary International Women's Day

March 8th is the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day and I am spending it with the Global Women's Council of a F500 company. For me this is a fitting way to celebrate both the accomplishments and highlight the steps yet to take in corporate America - the women in the room have made it close to the top of this venerable company, and yet in all its history it has never had a woman CEO.

That said, I'd like to take this opportunity to cast a wider eye at what's happening to women around the world. Starting here in the US, last week the White House issued its first report on the status of women in 50 years. While the media overplayed the wage gap, there is a related factor that has worsened, the rate of women living in poverty. 

As displayed in the Huffington Post, in spite of incredible leaps forward in level of education attained, 18% of women overall and nearly 40% of women heads of households live below the poverty level. In looking carefully at the graph, I noticed something disturbing.

• Both percentages were on an overall downward trend from 1964 to 1979.
• They rose during the Reagan years and stayed relatively high until around 1993 when Bill Clinton took office. During his presidency (1993 - 2001), the rates declined.
• During George W. Bush's tenure women's poverty levels increased again. 

Now, most of you know that I don't like to be political in this column, but the correlation between the policies of conservative Republicans and the worsening status of women have been on my mind given the many recent initiatives at the state and federal level to curtail women's reproductive rights. As I can attest from personal experience - access to family planning resources and reproductive rights are the foundation for women's health and economic well-being. But this is not simply a personal experience for many women who have had the luxury of planning their pregnancies. This is also one of the factors cited in a Federal Reserve Bank of Boston report on the progress made by women in business. And yet, our rights in this area are under the deepest attack in decades.

Federally, the revised H.R.3 would deny tax credits to businesses that offer employees health insurance plans that happen to cover abortion care, as well as disallow any medical deductions for expenses related to abortion. Women would not be able to set aside their own money in pre-tax health accounts for abortion coverage (hmmm, I wonder if their male partners could. So much for small government. You'd need an army to police the health policies of every company applying for tax credits and Health Savings Accounts of every woman!)

Several years ago two women - one anti-choice and one pro-choice - co-authored a book on reproductive rights. Though they had different perspectives on abortions, they found common ground when it came to preventing unwanted pregnancies. Shocking to the anti-choice author were the attacks she endured for her pro-contraception stance. Hearing them interviewed was the first time that I learned that the anti-choice movement is using abortion for a broader anti-contraception agenda.

This face of the anti-choice movement has been revealed again this month. For example, in Wisconsin the governor's budget would not only defund Planned Parenthood, it would reverse a state law that requires health insurers to pay for prescribed contraceptives. (No mention is made about whether he would reverse reimbursements for Viagra!)

Conservatism and religious fundamentalism are the foundation of these movements and both are on the rise not only in the U.S., but also around the globe - primarily in Muslim countries where unrelenting pressure is forcing women out of the mainstream and into the shadows. In emerging economies - as reported in Half the Sky - women and girls continue to suffer from sex trafficking and forced prostitution; gender-based violence including honor killings and mass rape and maternal mortality, which needlessly claims one woman a minute. But in the marvelous book by the same title, there is story after story of women who bravely take the lead to tackle these brutal issues.

So, here's to International Women's Day and Women's History Month. We've come a long way, but we and our sisters around the world still have a long way to go. Please get active, take the lead and make a little history to help women continue to make strides in health & safety, education and economic participation.

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

Associating with Associations

Here at Leading Women we're obviously big fans of networking...by that we mean the cultivation of strategic relationships inside and outside your organization. Why? First, because getting the job done almost always requires cooperation with others. Second, because the higher you go in your organization, the more important become external networks - specifically those with organizations that can influence the business environment for your organization.

That's why it's important to consider association memberships. Professional associations, industry associations, customer industry associations, vendor/supplier industry associations and trade associations are all fertile possibilities. To get you thinking, we offer a list of professional associations on our site. But through my own network, I recently came across a site with a comprehensive list of women's associations - as a matter of fact, nearly 700 of them! From advertising to banking, construction executives to railroad, to accountants.

With so many to choose from (and for most of us so little time) how do you choose? Here are 3 tips for finding the right associations to participate in.

1. Consider your profession. Most professions have at least one related association for example HR = Society for Human Resource Management; IT = Women in IT. As a matter of fact, our list is mostly professional associations.
2. Identify the industries represented by your major customers and discover the associations they belong to. This is a great way to keep customer trends in the forefront of your mind.
3. List the industries represented by your major suppliers/vendors. Their associations will alert you to trends that might disrupt or provide opportunities in the supply chain.

Relationships nurtured in any or all of the above will keep your thinking fresh and contributions valuable. So, be sure that you're associating with associations as part of your strategic networking plan.

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
 Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn

Lest We Forget

I generally try to stay away from things overly political, but I see frightening trends  (and actual votes) at the state and national level that will take women back to the 1950s when we had no ability to legally plan for families. And the recent vote to de-fund Planned Parenthood could mean that low income women will also have less access to maternal health care.

Why does this matter to women in leadership? Well, several years ago the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston published a study that indicated that access to family planning was one of the most significant factors in enabling women to have careers.

How are women and men allowing this trend to happen? I think it's because we take our rights of access for granted. Rights of access to family planning, rights of access to credit, rights of access to jobs. We believe that these rights are the norm and can't be rescinede and/or we buy into the myth that there is no inequality - in spite of statistics that shows that there is. For example, Ginka Toegel's Fortune story and the HuffPost article illustrating wage gaps by industry (visual above).

Lest We Forget...

This week, Congresswoman Jackie Speier courageously spoke against the de-funding of Planned Parenthood

"As the night wore on, the vitriol and grotesque commentary got worse and worse," Speier, a second-term Democrat from California, told HuffPost. "I sat there thinking, none of these men on the other side have even come close to experiencing this, and yet they can pontificate about what it's like. It just overwhelmed me."

Conservative, republican legislators in Wyoming told their personal stories when they spoke out against exceedingly restrictive and intrusive anti-choice state laws.

Recently a colleague sent me a link to a Story Corps story about a woman in the 1970s who was a pioneer in her profession. Thanks to her and women like her, we have the access that we do to various professions. Listen here as Dee Dickson describes how she made her way as an electrician.

Stephanie Coontz has a new book about the life of women in the 1960s. Worth watching:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Stephanie Coontz
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog Video Archive

Lead ON!
Susan
Susan Colantuono is CEO of Leading Women and author of No Ceiling, No Walls.
 Follow her on Twitter |  LittlePinkBook  |  Facebook  |  LinkedInGroup |  LinkedIn