By Liz Brenner, Vice President of Marketing, Employee Engagement, SAP
With International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month upon us, I’m reminded of the progress women have made in the workplace over the last century. During this time of year, I celebrate the hard work and determination of the many women that came before me and made it possible for me to balance a successful career with a fulfilling family life and to work at a company that values my contributions and invests in my career success.
And although we’ve come a long way, there is so much more work to be done. Take a look at the composition of senior leadership teams. In Grant Thornton’s newly released International Business Report, it stated that only 24% of people in senior leadership positions are women, a percentage that has only increased by 5% over the last decade. This is surprising when you consider that “women today control as much as 70% of household purchases and $20 trillion of consumer spending worldwide” according to a recent Boston Consulting Group publication.
Shouldn’t senior leadership teams more closely reflect the customers making buying decisions?
Women in leadership: A new mandate in the Future of Business
At the recent Watermark Silicon Valley Conference for Women, Hillary Clinton proclaimed that women in leadership roles is becoming a mandate for business success as well as economic growth: “Where women are included, you’re more likely to have democracy; you’re more likely to have stability and prosperity,” Clinton said. “It’s not just a nice thing to do.”
I couldn’t agree more.
To better understand the challenges and opportunities for women in today’s workplace, we talked to three women executives at my company, SAP. Below they share their thoughts on how women can move their careers forward today.
Maggie Chan Jones, Chief Marketing Officer (CMO)
Maggie Chan Jones is the chief marketing officer (CMO) of SAP, where she is responsible for the development and execution of marketing strategy across the globe. She champions SAP’s mission to help its customers, partners, and employees Run Simple. As a business leader in the marketing industry, she is passionate about women, tech, and early talent. Maggie previously served as a board member of the Women’s Bean Project, a nonprofit social enterprise.
Helen Arnold, SAP Global Managing Board and Chief Information Officer (CIO)
Helen Arnold is a member of the SAP Global Managing Board and is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for the SAP Group and head of Cloud Delivery. As CIO, she leads cloud operations and the SAP HANA Enterprise Cloud, and drives SAP’s continuous innovation journey in streamlining and rethinking internal systems at SAP. She focuses on cloud service delivery to private, public, and managed cloud customers and is responsible for the adoption of SAP’s solution portfolio internally.
Anka Wittenberg, Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer (CDIO)
Anka Wittenberg is Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer at SAP, responsible for the development and implementation of SAP’s Diversity and Inclusion strategy globally. Prior to SAP, Anka gained extensive international HR experience, most recently heading Corporate HR globally at Benteler International AG. She is a member of the supervisory board of Westfalen AG, Germany and board member of the Childhood Foundation Germany.
How did you get to where you’re at today?
Maggie: I am a firm believer in knowing yourself, understanding what you want, and going after that goal. Be very clear about your talents and skills and how you can use them in a professional role. Make sure you have the right support network – including friends and family. And if possible, find a mentor – someone you respect and can learn from. Don’t be afraid to take risks in your career. It’s okay if things don’t go well at first. Those experiences will always give you confidence. Build positive relationships with people by expressing interest in learning from others and helping others be successful. Here’s how my first 100 days as a CMO went.
Approximately 60% of Fortune 500 companies now employ a Chief Diversity Officer. Why is it a critical role? And what impact can it have on a company looking to attract more women leaders?
Anka: Given rapidly changing marketplace dynamics and an increasingly diverse world, diversity and inclusion are critical components to competitiveness. Companies with more diverse management teams are linked to stronger financial performance and better reflect the market overall. Diversity enables companies to have a better understanding of their customers, which improves customer satisfaction and expands market share. It strengthens an organization’s ability to innovate; improves employee engagement, productivity, and satisfaction; and helps companies outperform the market. Diversity is not just a “nice-to-have” cultural topic – it’s a business imperative. That is why companies invest in diversity and inclusion as strategic differentiators. More specific to female leaders, Chief Diversity Officers help build awareness for gender intelligence, facilitate programs that encourage women to pursue leadership opportunities, and help ensure that the corporate culture is attractive to women.
Fewer than 17% of CIOs are women. For women who work in technology, what paths can they take to become a CIO?
Helen: With increasing digitalization and tighter innovation cycles, the role of the CIO has changed. It’s no longer about being a technology agent for the business. Instead, it’s much more about being an innovation partner. My advice to women who see this as a career path is to carve out roles for themselves in their company’s innovation journey – understand what and how your company needs to achieve on a strategic level and make sure you play a key part of that journey. The new technology is about connectivity (such as the Internet of Things and the networked enterprise). These kinds of collaborative, open processes suit women who tend to have strong intuition and the ability to see the big picture. The new world of digitalization requires the ability to think outside the box, and women can take advantage of this.
What is your advice for young women who want to be leaders?
Helen: I always say that women should follow their passions and be authentic. However, it’s also essential to take up opportunities to grow their leadership skills. For example, at SAP, we have a Business Women’s Network, which provides its 8,000 female members with development experiences such as fellowships, job rotations, and mentorship.
Anka: I encourage young women to find role models and mentors in fields that interest them to get firsthand knowledge of what it takes to be successful. Getting real-world experience through fellowships and job rotations can also allow aspiring female business leaders to “test” an opportunity to ensure it’s a good fit. It’s always a smart idea to take advantage of the numerous opportunities available to network with other strong, authentic women leaders by working and volunteering for diversity-focused organizations and associations with inclusive cultures.
Maggie: I strongly believe in supporting women in tech – whether they are young and starting out, looking to make a change, or experienced with ambitious career goals. In my organization at SAP, we are exploring ways of getting emerging talent on the fast track by offering meaningful opportunities early in their careers, including exposure to executives and exciting projects.
Whenever I talk to the women we are developing, I offer this advice:
- Be curious. This is the best time to learn more about yourself, what excites you, and what you are passionate about. Explore as many areas as you can through opportunities such as job rotation.
- Be a catalyst. Find an opportunity to lead early in your career. Determine an area or topic you can be great at, in many cases something new and different. Then, paint your vision on how you’ll lead. In a highly collaborative environment, your first leadership experience could be a cross-group project, which is a great way to develop your leadership and influencer skills.
- Find multiple mentors. Look for mentors from different areas and with competencies you want to emulate. Get a balanced perspective by searching out both male and female mentors who can help open different paths for you.
An opportunity for continued progress through open discussion and action
In a world where 47% of the workforce are women, why are there so few in the boardroom? If you think about it, this is a lost opportunity for businesses. Women inherently possess certain skills that businesses desperately need today. As current IMF managing director Christine Lagarde once observed, “When women are called to action in times of turbulence, it is often on account of their composure, sense of responsibility and great pragmatism in delicate situations.”
As I continue my reflection this month, I’m hopeful that our focus today will help the women of tomorrow break new ground and forge new paths – and that my daughters have an inspiring view of the world to share when they celebrate International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month many years in the future.
For more perspectives on the Future of Work and women in leadership, check out Executive Research on the Future of Work and follow #FutureOfWork.
