Last week I facilitated a workshop at Women in Tech Texas in downtown Houston at the Hilton Americas. Over 800 women attended this 2-day event with a theme focused on resilience. I grew up in Houston, and it was surreal coming back after a five-year absence. Since my mother’s departure, nothing anchors me to my hometown any longer. Far from being bittersweet, I enjoyed being part of this conference and hearing inspiring stories from the following women:
- Sandhya Sridharan, Managing Director & Head of Core Engineering at JPMorgan Chase – “Defining The Guiding Principles Of Your Personal and Professional Journey”
- Lauren Woods, VP, Technology, Platforms & Architecture at Southwest Airlines – “The Good, The Bad, And The Beautifully Ugly To The Public Cloud”
- Rocio Leon, Director, Digital Transformation at HighRadius – “The Power Of The Ask”
- Brooke Grammier, VP| CIO at DLR Group – “Set Your Journey To The C-Suite”
- Alysia Green, GM Information Technology Engineering at Chevron – “It’s OK To Fail … And Talk About It”
There’s no easy button for becoming an executive in tech. What stands out to me is the power of perseverance in all these talks.
Sandhya spoke about knowing the difference between allies and admirers; admirers won’t necessarily tell you when you’ve made a mistake. Lauren focused on the importance of focusing on “the why” when Southwest Airlines moved from the prem to the cloud and learned from the team’s mistakes along the way. Rocio shared with us how reaching out to the correct decision-maker makes a difference; it allowed her to obtain a discount on her degree from UT Austin, delay her start date at Accenture, and extend her stay working in Chile and Peru. Brooke led us on her journey of being her authentic self vs. following misguided advice from a male colleague about muting her humor. Alysia stood out to me with how powerful allies are in your career development, which helped her on the global journey to become a GM at Chevron.
In a world where females only represent 26.5% of S&P executives and 15% of Fortune 500 CEOs, I was delighted to be mingling with intriguing women. I created four polls for my workshop about taking a seat at the executive table. Below is a summary of the results.
| Are you in, or do you plan to join the C-Suite on your career journey? | Responses |
|---|---|
| Yes | 75% |
| No | 25% |
This was a delightful response to participate with a roomful of women in the C-Suite or who were on their way there.
| Do you currently manage a team? | Responses |
|---|---|
| Yes | 69% |
| No | 31% |
It brings to mind that whether you manage a team or not, you still have influence and leadership skills that can allow you to make a big-impact in the business.
| If you could swap places with anyone in business, who would it be? | Responses |
|---|---|
| C-suite (CEO, CIO, CMO, COO) | 6 |
| Elon Musk, CEO SpaceX, Tesla & Boring Company | 5 |
| My better self in business/ no one | 4 |
| Oprah, billionaire talk show host, tv producer, actress, & author | 2 |
| Not sure | role doesn’t exist yet | 2 |
| Agency owner | 1 |
| Any top female fashion designer | 1 |
| Bill Gates | 1 |
| Business integration manager | 1 |
| Corporate strategy | 1 |
| DE&I leaders | 1 |
| Executive Leadership Coach | 1 |
| Kris Jenner, American media personality & businesswoman | 1 |
| Reece Witherspoon, American actress & producer | 1 |
| Sara Blakely, CEO Spanx | 1 |
| Sheryl Sandberg, COO Meta Platforms | 1 |
| Steve Hasker, CEO Thomson Reuters | 1 |
| Sustainability expert | 1 |
| Whitney Wolfe Herd, CEO Bumble | 1 |
| Winery owner in Italy | 1 |
These results were fascinating since not a single person selected one of the 41 female Fortune 500 tech CEOs such as Safra Catz of Oracle, Christine Leahy of CDW, or Adena Friedman of the Nasdaq.
| What leadership skills would you like to improve? (check all that apply) | Response |
|---|---|
| Self-confidence | 21 |
| Influence | 17 |
| Owning P&L | 10 |
| Negotiation | 10 |
| Networking | 7 |
| Written & verbal communication | 7 |
| Resolving conflict | 6 |
| Promoting diverse & inclusive culture | 5 |
| Team building | 2 |
| Managing risk | 2 |
Although the poll results aren’t statistically significant, they revealed that self-confidence is a gap for many women taking a seat at the executive table. Here’s the exciting thing, Dr. Chamorro-Premuzic believes “that you should aspire not to have high confidence, but to have high competence. Confidence will follow more easily when you back it up with real accomplishments.”
That’s my wrap-up for Women in Tech Texas. I look forward to attending next year.
