Are you aware of what skills are of foremost importance to get added to the list of great CEOs! Learn from guest contributor Linda Fisk, a multi-award-winning leader, keynote speaker, podcast host, author and university professor dedicated to amplifying and extending the success of other high-calibre business leaders.
The road to the top position in a company, the Chief Executive Officer, is shifting from a decade ago. The types of skills that today’s CEOs needs to cultivate in order to excel include strong communication skills, the ability to collaborate closely in a team, the ability to operate with genuine empathy and the ability to build high-performing teams. The skills that will be of foremost importance for today’s CEO are to listen carefully and communicate openly in order to elicit public trust as the face of the company.
We know that as times change, and the marketplace evolves, navigating a successful course requires new leadership skills. So, when it comes to managing your own career, how do you prepare yourself to move into the top position? What abilities should executives focus on developing as they choose companies, functions, and jobs? And, what path should executives follow as they strive to reach the next level?
Those aren’t easy questions. The trends vary by function, geography, and industry – and of course, by company. But, once a leader reaches the C-suite, technical and functional expertise matters less than softer leadership skills and a strong grasp of business fundamentals. In other words, the skills that help you climb to the top, won’t suffice once you get there.
To thrive as a CEO, a leader needs to be an astute student of business, but also an exceptional leader, adept at the “softer” leadership skills. Requirements for today’s CEO have shifted with the value being placed on being a team player, a collaborator, a good communicator and a strategic thinker. The CEO of today needs to be capable of multitasking continuously, leading in a team-oriented style, successfully coping with stress and pressure, and carefully managing the performance of their team, protecting them from burnout.
Marketing has not typically been a route to the top position in an organization. However, marketing is often the area that is responsible for crafting the company’s brand, communicating its values, creating a sense of identity and connecting with customers in a tangible, but personalized and authentic way. And, with the ability to track, measure and report performance in every aspect of sales and marketing now, marketers are now able to show tangible evidence of their ability to accelerate profitability and growth. And, in the new digital-first works, marketers are expected to be tech-savvy and have a deep understanding of, and connection to, the company’s customer base. That’s a powerful combination in today’s complex business environment.
4 Reasons CMOs Can Be Great CEOs
Today, with the increasing importance of digital and social connection to the customer, CEOs that rose to the top through marketing have not just become a possibility, but an imperative in many companies. Here are four reasons that a CEO that rose to the top through a marketing career is now a significant competitive advantage:
- Experience in a position of listening, learning and engaging – Marketers have developed unique expertise to ensure that all customer touchpoints help the company learn about customer expectations, needs and preferences to create and communicate a vision and roadmap for meeting their needs – whether it’s products, services or values they can relate to. And, marketers have developed sophisticated practices of ensuring that those customers who have purchased good and services become their advocate and champion, engendering their loyalty.
- Experience with produce innovation that supports sales – Marketers have the ability to provide a pathway for cycles of product innovation that are more and more aligned with customer needs. CMOs are in a perfect position to facilitate this since they sit between sales and product development teams. They also enable sales to execute effectively with key messaging, support materials, lead generation programs, and appointment setting programs that relate to the problems customers are trying to solve.
- Experience with sales enablement and driving revenue through new sales channels – Marketing has now broadened in scope as new consumer channels and touchpoints have emerged, and e-commerce initiatives are now typically falling to marketing. Marketing is now expected to drive revenue through direct and digital channels – often becoming the primary sales channel. The lines between traditional marketing and sales functions are continuing to blur with social technologies, digital interactivity, and mobility becoming integral to consumer and business connections. Because marketing and sales must respond seamlessly to new opportunities, marketing leaders now often serve as the CEO’s single point of contact for revenue generation.
- Experience owning and managing the customer relationship – From start to finish, the customer lifecycle, which is comprised of hundreds of touchpoints across a number of platforms over time, yield a wealth of valuable data. These data-driven insights can, and should, influence overall business strategy, powering strategic business decisions. Marketing leaders also have experience establishing alliances to extend customer lifecycle across all touchpoints, using the data to leverage the resulting insights.
Overall, the ability to promote transparency and manage customer communities and public conversations are increasingly critical, all while leaders manage a workforce that has grown up in the digital age and expects immediate access to information. Technology, and in particular digital channels, will continue to dominate marketing and sales strategy in the future, catering to a customer base that has an ever-increasing desire for speed and easy interaction. The demand for segmentation capabilities will grow as companies address a more diverse population of customers who expect ever-higher levels of service and increasingly tailored and personalized products and solutions.
For all these reasons and a dozen more, marketers are now able to show tangible evidence of their ability to accelerate profitability and growth and compete for the top position for the list of great CEOs in the company. What path should executives follow as they strive to reach the next level? Marketing seems like a really good choice.
Linda Fisk
Linda Fisk is a multi-award-winning leader, keynote speaker, podcast host, author and university professor dedicated to amplifying and extending the success of other high-calibre business leaders. She is the Founder and CEO of LeadHERship Global, a community of unstoppable women enhancing their leadership blueprint and embracing their power to be the best version of themselves- in work and life.
Subscribe to https://www.womenlines.com to become the best version of self! Womenlines is a weekly online magazine publishing content on Business Excellence, Health, Leadership Skills and listed in the top 50 women’s online magazines to follow in 2021!
Every book has a story and every author aspires to share that story and impact as many people!
It is all about telling people why you have written a book, what motivated you, how it can create a difference in the reader’s life , how was the experience of writing a book. There are so many stories to be shared with the audience in order to establish a connect with them. ‘Books for Excellence’ show at Womenlines is giving platform to all such authors who are having such collection of stories and they really want people to read their book.
Womenlines welcomes authors who want to share the story behind their book with the global audience in ‘Books for Excellence Show’ and amplify visibility for their book through our branding campaign through 8 social media platforms. Book Marketing services at Womenlines can amplify your book’s digital presence globally!
Email contact@womenlines.com to know the details!
Register Now!
Are you looking out for physical health, leadership skills, mindset health and image branding strengthening tools to be the best version of yourself? Subscribe to weekly powerful updates of Womenlines for free. Click https://www.womenlines.com!
BIZWAY is an Online Presence Platform, a Business talk show presented in collaboration with online magazine Womenlines and a business service company Solworxs! In the video shared above, listen to the incredible WOW story of 2 entrepreneurs Ritvik Raj and Karishma Seetharaman, founders of company XOOG which provides a platform to teach children globally, how to become a Rubik’s Speedcuber.
As a parent don’t you want your kids to develop cognitive skills, improve memory retention and elevate concentration and problem-solving skills. Visit https://xoog.info/ now to know how you can help your kids to develop these skills.XOOG is a talent discovery and enrichment platform for kids to carve out their own future. XOOG team knocks into your children’s untapped potential and nourishes them aptly, thus leading them to ultimately walk on their own destined paths. In the long run, they will be fully armoured to face the real world and become independent.
Here are a few moments of XOOG’s triumph, we would like to share with you:
· Winners of Edtech sector in Eureka 21 IIT Bombay’s business model competition.
· Champions of India Innovation Cup 2.0 and sponsored pods at Gitex Future Stars 2020.
· XOOG’s students showcased their talent at Global Innovation field trip.
· XOOG has been backed as a member of IN5 and will be sponsored to open services in Dubai internationally.
· XOOG courses have been accredited by STEM.org.
Ritvik Raj is a senior speedcuber for 8 years specializing in Curriculum Design and Mentoring. He Can solve the 3×3 Rubik’s cube in 10-12 Seconds. He has done various certifications in Graphic design, Digital Art, Fitness and Nutrition and used to freelance on these domains. The science behind how people think and feel with their mind is what fascinates him and building products based on these deductions is mission. Management, Sales and Marketing are few more avenues he has good experience on.
Karishma An admirer of Technology and the world of coding .She loves developing innovative technological webapps .She is also a speedcuber. She used to lead the Corporate Relations team and was also the VP of Entrepreneurship Cell NITT. She interned in Neuro Marketing at Wharton Business school.
XOOG team believes-
“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.
– Albert Einstein.
Every child has potential and it is our duty to give him exposure to such platforms which can help him to nurture his skills.
Don’t let your brain go sour. Like your body, it needs exercise too! Rubik’s can be a mind puzzle but once mastered, it mounts up to the greatest asset you can ever have.
Bizway OPP Talk Show aims at sharing the WOW story of the entrepreneurs with the global audience and celebrate their entrepreneurship journey digitally across the globe! As it is said ‘Once online, forever Online’ and Bizway OPP Talk Show brings to you an opportunity to celebrate your entrepreneurial journey digitally forever. If you are an entrepreneur, business owner, a friend of an entrepreneur or if you have any entrepreneur in your network whose entrepreneurial journey should be celebrated digitally, visit Bizway Talk Show to know details and register for the show!
Healthy recipes for healthy you segment at Womenlines brings to your healthy recipe of Plum Mocktail!
Womenlines takes pleasure to welcome Nalini Dheer from India as a guest contributor for the ‘Healthy Recipes for Healthy You’ segment of Womenlines! ‘Healthy recipes for healthy you’ is especially for that segment of Womenlines audience who are eagerly looking for new recipes which are healthy also!
Mocktail
Plum Mocktail is enriched with blended plums with the flavours of cumin, lemon and black salt!
Ingredients
250 gm plums
100 to 150 gm sugar according to your taste
Black salt
Roasted cumin
Lemon juice according to your taste
Method
- Boil plums in two cups of water till plums become soft switch off-gas
- Add sugar and let it melt completed
- Seive it and keep mashing it completely
- Adjust the consistency with water and add seasonings black salt cumin powder and lemon juice
- Serve with ice
Nalini shares a passion for life and loves to express that through food. Nalini has travelled all over India and abroad with her husband who was a doctor in the Indian Army and now retired.
Nalini is now keen to build a community of like-minded folks with a focus on sumptuous tasty and healthy food through “Oorja”. She would love to share with busy mothers and busy households, the beauty of the dynamic Indian cuisine and western Indian variations. Her endeavour is to make her recipes crisp & concise that is quick to follow and healthy for today’s on the go modern woman.”
To learn other healthy recipes like Plum Mocktail Visit – Oorja – https://www.instagram.com/iamoorja/?hl=en
Are you looking out for physical health, leadership skills, mindset health and image branding strengthening tools to be the best version of yourself? Subscribe to weekly powerful updates of Womenlines for free. Click https://www.womenlines.com!
Check out the women’s health checklist by Dr Sara Kayat in the above video, who in her informative sharing takes us through some of the areas of health that women should monitor and be aware of.
Women’s Health
As it is said
“The greatest wealth is health.” – Virgil
Womenlines is delighted to bring to you content that can empower you with a healthy mindset, both physically and mentally!
Gender disparities have an impact on nearly every aspect of women’s lives, including health. On top of that, nowhere are these disparities more pronounced than in developing countries. While improving women’s health is a challenge everywhere around the world, it is a matter of vital importance for women in developing countries. To respond to this urgent issue, research suggests that one tool can have an immense impact in this area: empowerment.
https://www.axa.com/en/magazine/the-key-to-improving-women-s-health-in-developing-countries
It is all about empowering every woman with the knowledge about how to take care of personal health. Lifestyle, food habits, personal care, mindset health care together contributes a lot in overall health status of any woman.In present times periodic health check ups which include visits to doctor, getting the screening tests prescribed by the doctor and following the suggestions based on the health reports should be followed by women with mindfulness.
As world health organization has mentioned on their website-
Some of the sociocultural factors that prevent women and girls to benefit from quality health services and attaining the best possible level of health include:
- unequal power relationships between men and women;
- social norms that decrease education and paid employment opportunities;
- an exclusive focus on women’s reproductive roles; and
- the potential or actual experience of physical, sexual and emotional violence
Certainly there are humongous challenges faced by women across the world whether it is related to education, personal health care, work life balance and many more. Women empowerment is the best solution to all these challenges. Mass awareness in women tribe about giving attention to personal health through media, workshops, support groups can be help women in getting responsible for their own health.
“It’s important to be proactive in ensuring your future health and there are some health checks that are specific to women. Breast Lumps Abnormal Bleeding Bloating Vaginal Discharge Fertility Weight Taking Supplements Alcohol Smoking Exercise”- Dr Sara Kayat, a practising GP at Grays Inn Medical Practice.
You will probably recognize Dr Sara from Channel 5’s GPs Behind Closed Doors, ITV’s This Morning, where she is the resident GP, ITV News and W Channel’s 12 Hours to Cure Your Street. She is an advocate of maintaining good health. Visit the website https://www.hsf.co.uk/drsara to know details about her!
Women’s health has to be given priority in our society so that they can contribute fully in society and lead a fulfilling life.
How Power of sharing and being true to self can help you to be a leader of your field, learn from Fleur Touchard, Director of Digital & eCommerce at a top French Designer Brand, USA, a guest in ‘Entrepreneur/Professional of the Month Show at Womenlines!
Director Digital at a top kid’s Designer Brand Fleur Touchard
Fleur Touchard has been a digital expert for 20 years. Expatriated since 2015 in the USA, she has enabled European companies to develop here in the US and has dedicated all her expertise since 2018 to the top French Designer Brand. Her dual culture and digital expertise allow her to adapt and revolutionize the strategies to the US market.
“With over 20 years of experience as a Web specialist, I’ve seen the digital world evolve a lot. I started my career in 1999 in France, as the Content Editor of the first shopbot in the country. Ecommerce was just starting and very few people were buying online. I fell in love with the media and its possibilities, I also liked very much being able to edit my content and see the changes immediately. Since then, I never stopped working in digital, either for brands (magazine, printing retailer, luxury clothing…) or in agencies. In 2015, my husband and our three daughters arrived in NYC. After spending some time teaching French or building my network as a consultant, I joined a top French Designer Brand as Head of Digital and eCommerce. The Web is a great way to build awareness and drive traffic to the stores. It is always reinventing itself and the options seem limitless between social media, Google, newsletters or eCommerce. I feel very lucky to wake up every morning to do a job that I love and that I am very passionate about.”
Fleur Touchard
Weblinks : https://fleurto.wordpress.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/fleurto/
Womenlines team wishes more success to Fleur in all her future endeavors!
Are you looking out for physical health, leadership skills, mindset health and image branding strengthening tools to be the best version of yourself? Subscribe to weekly powerful updates of Womenlines for free. Click https://www.womenlines.com!
Bizway is an international Online Presence Platform (OPP) Business Talk Show with a key objective to foster beyond and enable entrepreneurs to grow into the future. Bizway initiative is by Womenlines , an online magazine and Solworxs, a business service company from India.
Business Talk Show
What is OPP?
Online presence platform is a service which is offered by the Bizway team to facilitate business to join an online show and create the marketable content from the online show which is later made available at various branded digital pages like Linkedin, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, etc… and online magazine Womenlines for 24*7 digital presence on the content online.
How does Bizway work?
Business needs to register for the platform and needs to take the relevant briefing to get ready for presence online. The briefing will be of two stages one on the basic mentoring that helps business to understand the key pointers to highlight and the later stage is personal branding related to present well for the online session.
Why only Bizway platform?
Business needs constant marketing of the products on the internet and this platform is the best way to maximize the online presence with content from the live show with the business owner to get him/her the maximum visibility. The Bizway team help with the much-required briefing for the business to help them present a superb online performance making absolute marketing activity. Write to urbizway@gmail.com to share your wow story right now!
Emotional Intelligence is a magic wand that has to be used by every woman for her excellence!
Women are emotional, and some are very emotional. Sometimes these emotions become weak point and it prevents them to perform their best in any field. Women never knew that emotions can be used intelligently and can be used in a much better way to succeed. Womenlines is bringing to you informative content on emotional intelligence to empower readers with this magic wand forever!
Listen to Purva Gupta in the video above, Founder & CEO of Lily where she is on a mission to help women discover clothes that make them look & feel their best using their emotions & perceptions about their body. Poorva has shared at TEDxLynbrookHighSchoolabout, how Emotional Intelligence can help women feel their best |
Emotional Intelligence
The term emotional intelligence was created by two researchers, Peter Salavoy and John Mayer in their article “Emotional Intelligence” in the journal Imagination, Cognition, and Personality in 1990. It was later popularized by Dan Goleman in his 1996 book Emotional Intelligence.(Credit)
It’s a scientific fact that emotions precede thought. When emotions are high, they affect the way people’s brains work and reduces thie cognitive abilities . Emotional Intelligence can help people understanding and managing their emotions better and also understanding others emotions too.This helps them in leading a successfull personal and professional life.
This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format–
Women in the US get 13 negative thoughts about their body every day. Girls, as babies, start disliking parts of their body and as young adults, develop serious insecurities about their body that hurt their self-confidence. Purva shares an idea that can potentially fix this problem. In her talk she describes how using Emotional intelligence, understanding a woman’s emotions, perceptions, psychology & aspirations about her body, to buying and wearing clothes can help her not only look her best but also feel her best.
Purva has spent more than 10,000 hours speaking to women regarding their feelings about why they buy the clothes they buy. She learnt that loved brands focus on making an emotional connection with their users during her time at the ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi. In her past life, Purva helped UNICEF structure a venture capital fund to scale life-changing technology innovations, took mobile payments and branchless banking startup to millions of users and evaluated innovative early-stage startups at the Khosla Impact Fund. Currently, she is the Founder & CEO of Lily where she is on a mission to help women discover clothes that make them look & feel their best using their emotions & perceptions about their body. Purva is an alum of the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute, has an MBA from Indian School of Business with the Young Leader Award for 2013 and a Bachelors in Economics from Shri Ram College of Commerce (India). She aspires to use emotional intelligence and artificial intelligence to understand a woman’s psychology to predict what products & services will make her happy.(Credit)
Subscribe to https://www.womenlines.com to become the best version of self! Womenlines is a weekly online magazine publishing content on Business Excellence, Health, Leadership Skills and listed in the top 50 women’s online magazines to follow in 2021!
Women in business, this list of powerful quotes is just for you to keep your spirits high!
At Womenlines we believe that every woman is blessed with some power which she can use if she is empowered with the right mindset and knowledge. It is all about becoming a better version of self every day. Better self as a professional and as a person both. Women in the business many times feel difficulties facing challenges in work and life. They need to strengthen their mindset and keep their self faith strong, then only they can face such challenges. As words have energy and power with the ability to help, to heal, to hinder, to hurt, to harm, to humiliate and to humble. Here are some power-packed words from achievers themselves who have achieved their dreams-
- “If you don’t build your dream, someone else will hire you to help them build theirs.” Dhirubhai Ambani
- “You will be defined not just by what you achieve, but by how you survive.”?Sheryl Sandberg
- “Growth and comfort do not coexist.” ? Ginni Rometty
- “We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes – understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success.” ? Arianna Huffington
- “Stay true to yourself and your vision. Don’t let anyone person’s opinion move you; listen, but be confident.”?Amanda Kahlow
- “Don’t be intimidated by what you don’t know. That can be your greatest strength and ensure that you do things differently from everyone else.” ?Sara Blakely
- “At the end of the day, you are the only one that is limiting your ability to dream or to actually execute on your dreams. Don’t let yourself get in the way of that.”? Falon Fatemi
- “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” –Eleanor Roosevelt
- “Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim.”-Nora Ephron
Women in business need to work on their personal development regularly. They have to take care of their mental, physical and emotional health with mindfulness every day. Womenlines online magazine brings to you powerful leadership, business excellence, and health content weekly to help you become the better version of yourself.
A study of over 28,000 women by the University of British Columbia found women going through the stress of the pandemic are more likely to suffer from hypertension. This is especially true when they are experiencing social isolation and are in middle or older age groups. (Credit). All these researches prove that it is so important to take care of physical and mental health, particularly in present times especially when many women are working from home. Womenfolk have to start giving priority to self-care which can be only done once they start giving themself priority.
Subscribe to https://www.womenlines.com to become the best version of self! Womenlines is a weekly online magazine publishing content on Business Excellence, Health, Leadership Skills and listed in the top 50 women’s online magazines to follow in 2021!
Do you know how to be ready to make that conscious choice to get out of mediocrity and leave behind a legacy!
Shilpa Kulshrestha, a Game Changer Coach, founder of Scintillate Coaching and bestselling author of “Play it Full” is sharing the secrets in the insightful article below. Shilpa Kulshrestha helps people step into their power zone to create extraordinary careers.
Clutches of Mediocrity
Your family, religion and even your name were decided before you were born. You came into this world in a passive mode, eating what you were fed and learning what you were taught.
A good part of your early years was spent in school, where you did not have the opportunity to feast on the subject that you loved because it was all about passing in all compulsory subjects for a well- rounded development, irrespective of your own interest. School boxed you nicely in a bright package that was best suited for the average challenges of life.
You did well in school or probably not so well and next came the university. It was a big deal as it was called by others as your gateway to the outside world. All the people who had any connection with you whatsoever, came into their best form to coax you to pick up a stream that will make you a corporate success. You were the centre of every discussion on the dining table and on phones with the extended family. There was pride in those eyes on what you were accomplishing and how well behaved you were. In other words, as most people do and as most people accomplish.
Once again, the important decisions of your life were being taken without you having a say at it, and you allowed yourself to be thrown into an ocean of conventional wisdom, by joining that Engineering, Medical or Accounting profession. After all, people around you wanted you to be successful and this “what everyone does” continued to be the ruling guideline.
But you were smarter than most and you figured there is something wrong – you decided to get to the top of the ladder by climbing higher and did post-graduation, which narrowed down the “everyone does it list” to a bare 10% than before.
You were then scooped up by a corporate giant, who came all the way to the campus to gobble you up before you got a chance to think about anything else. You again couldn’t say no as you wanted to prove to others and yourself that you were so much in demand. Perhaps your personal circumstances, financial constraints, sense of responsibility played a role as you took the wise path because that is what someone who is responsible will do.
Once you entered corporate life, you were imprisoned for ever by the corporate zombies, promotions, free insurances and off course, that fat pay check in your bank account every month.
This was amazing as you contemplated what to do with the significant money you made and how much better it was than rest of your friends! You used some of that money to upgrade your technical skills as those were selling like hotcakes in the market and fewer people were doing it. This paid back well. You went up the ladder and further shrank that comparative figure of the number of people in that top slot.
The rise to the top created a standard you had to live by- in the form of having a great partner, a palatial house and the best car in the market.
However, in your late thirties and a rising star, you started noticing an uncomfortable thought.
None of it brought fulfilment. You remembered your parents’ wisdom how once you reach that level, which was impossible for them, it will bring in massive rewards and you knew that you had ticked all the boxes, yet you didn’t feel like you won. Perhaps you needed to go beyond.
A little more time passed and then one evening, you recalled your school teacher’s warning not to loose track of your dreams and you started feeling that she was on the verge of being proved right!
The weekends you live for.
The vacations that you wait for.
The hobby that you keep pushing off.
The dream that you have but seems far away.
All in exchange for
A life of mediocrity that you have settled in so well.
It is surely not possible to change now. You can’t just throw it all away for chasing the dreams. It will be childish. What would your family think, what would your son aspire, if he sees you acting so recklessly?
A wise friend whispers in your ear – be contended. Who are you to challenge that? What are you but an average bloke who is doing amazing by the average standards of the society?
=====================
While the story is that of a fictional “you” – seeing a life getting wasted like this is just too much pain.
Are you too struck in this automatic mode, playing ball by ball, taking life as it comes?
Do you depend on external events or circumstances to drive your direction?
Would you like to get on to the driver seat of your life?
How good will it be to take full control of it, pressing brakes at your will, to grab learnings along the way and accelerating at your will, to reach your goals with all those golden learnings?
Are you ready to make that conscious choice to get out of mediocrity and leave behind a legacy?
If the thought excites you, this would be the most powerful thought of your life!
As a Game Changer Coach, founder of Scintillate Coaching and bestselling author of “Play it Full”, Shilpa Kulshrestha helps people step into their power zone to create extraordinary careers. She has been awarded the “Indian Achiever’s Award, 2021” & “Women Entrepreneur of The Year, 2021” & she sits on the Forbes Coaches Council. Connect with Shilpa on Linkedin!
Womenlines brings to you a series of articles about top women entrepreneurs in the world! This month let’s learn from Meg Whitman, an American business executive and former political candidate’s work experience!
It is all about learning from the leaders friends!
As a woman in business, every woman aims for excellence, to give her best in her role, how to work towards the growth of her organization along with her team, how to face adversity and continue working wholeheartedly. There are so many odd situations where her knowledge is tested, her patience is tested and above all her integrity is tested. Meg Whitman is one such woman in business who is famous for her transformational leadership style!
Meg Whitman
Key Achievements
- Meg Whitman was the President and CEO of eBay, where she helped build the now iconic online auction and shopping company into one of the largest and most financially successful internet enterprises in the world. She restructured eBay’s services and also prepared the company for its IPO which was due six months after she joined. Under her leadership, eBay not only survived the dot-com bust of 2000-01 but also made some major acquisitions including that of PayPal for $1.5 billion in 2002 and Skype for $2.75 billion in 2000. During her tenure at eBay, which lasted for a decade, Whitman turned eBay into an Internet giant with 15,000 employees and $8 billion in sales. (Credit)
- Whitman was a senior member of Mitt Romney‘s presidential campaigns in both 2008 and 2012 and ran for governor of California as a Republican in 2010, but supported Democrats Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020.
- In 2011 she became head of Hewlett Packard, where Whitman’s leadership, collaborative team-building, and risk-taking has led to the company’s turnaround.
Key Learning Points from Meg Whitman
Stop looking for the wrongs: While entering a new job, look for things which are going right in your new organization and amplify them. One shouldn’t just look for things to be fixed. Doing things that you are good at, in a better way is at the heart of a turnaround. (credit)
Appeal to the right brain of people: While reaching out to a large number of people, it is not the facts, figures or ROIs that wins an argument. It is the stories you tell, experiences you share that wins over people and makes them want to work towards your goals and theirs. . (credit)
Change takes time: She clearly outlines the fact that change doesn’t happen overnight. When she joined the firm, she set out on a 5-year plan. Yes, you read that right. 365*5 days is what she wanted to turn the company around wherein most of the corporate talks on a Quarter to Quarter timeframe. Have the conviction to convey the message that meaningful change requires quality time. . (credit)
Meg Whitman sees innovation in three ways: evolutionary (creating iterations of prior technologies), near-term (anticipating “what’s around the corner”) and, disruptive (discovering “completely new ways of doing things”). (Credit)
Be brutally honest. During their first meeting, Whitman asked Pieri to list the things Keds was good at and to assign a grade to each. “I was saying A’s and B’s, and she was saying, ‘No, those are C’s, maybe D’s,’” says Pieri. But when Whitman expressed such criticisms she also took responsibility for them. And when things screwed up, “She always asked, ‘What did we learn?’”( Credit)
Recognize credit repeatedly. When someone–no matter how junior–came up with what Whitman considered a good idea, she would repeat it with that person’s name: “Well, Henry said….” And in meetings and conversations thereafter, she made sure to associate the idea with Henry. “What’s great is that it makes Henry want to have another idea and Jane want to have an idea like Henry’s,” says Pieri. She was gratified that Whitman repeatedly credited her with the smart decision to license Looney Tunes at Keds: a move former Disney executive Whitman had originally opposed. (Credit)
Courage… is an incredibly important trait I think for anyone in almost any field. You have to have the willingness to do things that other people tell you maybe can’t be done and to do them faster and in a different way.
Meg Whitman
Are you looking out for physical health, leadership skills, mindset health and image branding strengthening tools to be the best version of yourself? Subscribe to weekly powerful updates of Womenlines for free. Click https://www.womenlines.com!