Most Prominent Women Leaders, 2019 | Avid Women Leaders

October 2019

The Most Prominent

Editor’s Choice

The Art of Leading

Disruptive Technology and Changing Trends Inuencing Business

Attributes of a Good Leader

EDITOR’S NOTE Overcoming the Perceptions

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HE knows, how to run a business, and thus she prevailed enormously.’ Such kind of statements were almost none to hear during the early times of business revolution. But, this phenomenon was predicted and did changed as the many decade passed. Those days are gone, when women had to face the domination and skepticism of investors, colleagues, senior executives and clients on their ability of lead an organization.

In this proactive growing business world, women are witnessed to break through the glass ceilings to make their way out to reach top notch executive positions in organizations. Be it a Sheryl Sandberg—the COO of Facebook, Ginni Rometty—the Chairperson, President and CEO of IBM or Indra Nooyi—the Chairman and COO of PepsiCo, name them; they all have attained a successful stature in their respective organizations and field. Through their impeccable achievements they proved that ‘myth’ in the ‘myth of metriocracy’ is no longer exists. They turned to be a great example for many upcoming women business leaders and entrepreneurs who are striving to attain the same.

CIO Look understands what it takes for a leader to overcome all the external as well as internal obstacles, believes in providing full support to various upcoming leaders in various industries. In this special issue of September, “The Most Prominent Women Leaders, 2019”, CIO Look features some of exceptional women leaders who have strived and further thrived in achieving many milestones in their pathway.

“To dream, and to work on that dream irrespective of situations or obstacles is the true definition of successful person.”

It admires such prominent women leaders and appreciates their contribution in making the business world more appealing than ever. Below are the glimpse of these featured personalities introduction: Dr Caroline Barelle, CEO of Elasmogen Ltd, a highly qualified and proficient in Pharma and biotech, is working to bring effective medical solutions for all.

Martina Klingvall, Founder and CEO of Telness is working to provide telecom solutions in an attempt to leave a positive experience to the customer.

Michelle Beyo is Founder of FinAvator, a consulting firm with expertise in Payments, Prepaid, Loyalty and Blockchain focused on Digital Marketing, Product Strategy and Sales Acceleration for Startups, FinTech’s and Enterprises.

Nancy Zeffman, Co- Founder at Cucumber Clothing, understands the problems with women’s nightwear and clothing and took many steps forward to modify it.

Let’s unveil such inspiring interviews and stories of such significant avid women leaders and their role in their organizations in this special edition and spread a word about their contribution in making this world a better place. Also, flip through the CXO standpoints presented by some of the leading industry experts to taste the glimpse of industrial revolutions.

Enjoy the read…!

Bhushan Ghate

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Industry Intel

Leader’s Desk

Unbaised Future

Rethinking the Products of Today for a Better Tomorrow

Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem for Women

Establishing Gender Equilibrium

ARTICLES

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Editor’s Choice

The Art of Leading

Disruptive Technology and Changing Trends Inuencing Business

Attributes of a Good Leader

CONTENTS

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Dr Caroline Barelle A Denition of Prociency

Martina Klingvall Simplifying Telecom Complexity Prociently

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Michelle Beyo

Passionate about Payment Innovation, Financial Inclusion and Diversity!

Nancy Zeffman Dening Creativity with Innovative Fabric Solutions

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K. Roy Editor-in-Chief

CONTENT

Senior Editor Alan Swann Managing Editor Rohit Chaturvedi Executive Editors Bhushan Ghate

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Email info@ciolook.com For Subscription www.ciolook.com

SALES

Senior Sales Manager Kshitij S. Customer Success Manager Jack Ryan Sales Executives John, Kane, Shashikant TECHNICAL

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October, 2019

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Rethinking the Products of Today for a Better Tomorrow

Celia Pool Co-founder DAME

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|October 2019 |

Industry Intel

T

he world is finally waking up to the single-use plastic crisis.

Over the last 10 years we have created more plastic than the whole of the last century combined. Half of the plastic we create is used just once, and then thrown away, taking 500 years to decompose. By 2050, the oceans are predicted to contain more plastic than fish. The plastic crisis is now too big for recycling alone to fix.

Global governments, businesses and consumers need to collaborate quickly to make impactful change before it’s too late. However, change is difficult when environmentally damaging habits have become so entrenched and often appear more financially appealing.

Technology is helping in this fight.

Reusable water bottles are now widespread, and apps that help you locate drinking water refill stations are now emerging. At the same time, reusable coffee cup technology is addressing the half a trillion disposable coffee cups discarded every year. Such items are gaining increasing social currency with consumers, who are keen to display them as markers of their environmental conscience. This revolution is encouraging, but what about the products that people aren’t so willing to talk about?

100 billion menstrual products are thrown away globally every year.

These are single-use, mostly made of plastic and cannot be recycled. You can choose not to have a coffee, you cannot choose not to have a period.

Reusable options (e.g. menstrual cups, cloth pads) have been on the market for decades, yet the adoption rate has been slow. The primary barrier to entry is the fear of habit change.

So how do we bring about a revolution? The answer is keep it simple. And take time to consider consumer psychology. As humans, we abhor change. We are creatures drawn

towards the comfort of the known. By keeping habit change to a minimum, consumers are much more likely to adopt a new idea.

This was our philosophy at DAME when we created the world’s first reusable tampon applicator. We ensured the design was familiar and intuitive, so women did not have to compromise on their convenient, established rituals. We knew that hygiene could be a significant barrier to entry, so we worked with leading micro-biologists and medical engineers and used the best medical grade, anti-microbial materials on the market. As a result, the consumer only must rinse the applicator in cold water after use to keep it clean. Simple steps, minimal habit change.

However, it is challenging to tackle an issue that has such little awareness.

Menstruation has historically been shrouded in shame, fear and discretion. It is not a topic openly talked about. This is a problem with feminine care as a whole: it is frequently dismissed and the women trying to address it are critically underfunded. In 2017 female founders got 2% of the $85 billion VC investment pot. About 8% of partners at the top British VC firms are women.

According to Harvard Business Review, stereotypes about female entrepreneurs persist: women are overly cautious, shy away from growth, have insufficient resources and consequently their ventures underperform. Yet there is no performance data to support these stereotypes.

How are products used by women supposed to change in line with human and environmental needs, when they aren’t given appropriate recognition or have women involved in all stages of the process? Women need to be given more of a voice if we are to create meaningful change. The world of AI is already highlighting the need to diverse away from male, white,

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Western coders if we are to avoid unconscious bias in the robots of tomorrow. Amazon had to abandon an AI recruitment tool that was discriminating against women, instead favoring prospects who mirrored Amazon’s existing male engineer workforce. At DAME women have been involved in every stage of the journey, not as a token gesture but as an absolute necessity.

However, our overarching business strategy goes beyond issues of inclusivity to incorporate a wider mission. DAME was founded on the belief that business can be used as a force for good. We use this core value to guide every decision we make in the business, bringing great clarity to our route forward. By communicating our genuine and authentic commitment to this mission, we hope that our message will quickly be picked up by those eager to join a movement for change. To date, we have seen this happen not only with our consumers and the press, but with employees.

People are increasingly drawn to companies doing good. 75% of millennials would take a pay cut to work at a socially responsible company.

All this strengthens our resolve at DAME to continue to tackle critical problems that are not openly acknowledged, that are significantly underfunded, and that have historically been controlled by giant monopolies. Today we are focusing on menstrual products, but our vision is to revolutionize the entire bathroom.

These are big mountains, but having strong guiding principles makes the navigation much easier.

-Words by Celia Pool Co-founder of DAME For more information visit wearedame.co

|October 2019 |

Leader

Dr Caroline Barelle A Definition of Proficiency

T

he world has witnessed rapid technological progress in every sector and pharmaceutical industry is no exception. The demands for safe and effective drugs, and technological solutions to increase clinical success rate are getting higher everyday, and thus, new discovery and development process are needed. Understanding this need and sworn to its attainment, Dr Caroline Barelle, CEO of Elasmogen Ltd, a highly qualified and proficient in Pharma and biotech, is working to bring effective medical solutions for all.

Caroline has worked in the life sciences sector for many years initially in an academic setting and laterally in the biotech and pharma arena. She believes that one becomes a leader as soon as he/she impacts others by providing support and insight which in Caroline’s case, in the early years, was as a post-doctoral fellow in a research lab. After ten years of academic research, she transitioned into the biotech sector which she absolutely loved and then into a team leader position in big pharma where she was leading a team of scientists in drug discovery and development. Opportunity struck when the pharma company re-

structured, closing her team’s site and leaving a number of incredibly talented scientists looking elsewhere.

This was the catalyst for founding a new biotech company based on the technology they had developed as a team. That was over six years ago now and they are still going.

In such a complex and changing world as drug development, the team around is everything. Elasmogen’s science team is exceptional, innovative and committed and is the engine for the company. As a drug discovery company, ultimately Elasmogen’s endpoint customers are patients and the company never loses sight of what it is trying to achieve which is bringing new effective medicines into the clinic for unmet medical conditions. In reality given the significant cost and substantial risk of new medicine development, the company’s strategy is to develop novelty and improved efficacy over existing drugs as well as creating completely new drugs and to partner with large pharma to take these drugs into the clinic.

According to Caroline, their field of drug development is biologics – drugs that originate within the body such as antibodies which can be engineered

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to detect and destroy diseased tissue.

It is a hot area with substantial competition. Elasmogen’s technology lends itself to tackle many different diseases and as a small company, it simply does not have the bandwidth to do everything so its strategy is to collaborate with companies and academia who bring both expertise and other technologies. This way both can combine together to find solutions to treat complex diseases.

Caroline strives to be transparent (given the unstable nature of biotech companies), inclusive and mindful of individual needs to create an environment where open conversation and debate is encouraged and where everyone shares a common goal which is ultimately the continued success of the company. Working in the life sciences industry, she has had the privilege of working with people from all cultures and backgrounds throughout her career. It is by nature a diverse sector and this adds incredible value to all aspects of scientific research whether it be in the public or private domain. The team is small but it has a rich diversity of nationalities which benefits the company and which the company will continue to foster.

|October 2019 |

Dr Caroline Barelle CEO Elasmogen Ltd

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|October 2019 |

About the Leader

“

If you surround yourself with the right people then anything is possible.

Throughout Caroline’s career, she has always tried to be as supportive as she can to others to provide them with the opportunity for self-development and to progress in whatever direction they wish to take. For anyone in a leadership role, there is a responsibility to ensure that one creates opportunity and training as required and go that extra mile to use connections and network to help others to reach their potential. She takes honesty, integrity, resilience and compassion as most crucial traits which every leader must possess.

With postgraduate qualifications in both business and science, Caroline has a strong commercial, biopartnering and biologics drug discovery/development background.

For over 4 years she has successfully led teams at Wyeth Inc and subsequently Pfizer Inc in Global Biotherapeutic Technologies progressing early platform technologies to late stage clinical development. Prior to this she was Alliance and Programs Manager at Haptogen Ltd and a key part of the acquisition team that successfully exited the business to Wyeth Inc. Caroline has been awarded a prestigious Royal Society of Edinburgh Enterprise Fellowship and is a doctoral graduate from the University of Aberdeen in Biochemistry and holds an MBA from Robert Gordon’s University.

Caroline’s future objective for her company is "To continue to build this company, to expand both the scientific and management team, to increase its portfolio of collaborations and bring our first product into the clinic."

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|October 2019 |

Disruptive Technology and Changing Trends Influencing Business

F

ew decades ago, reaching the moon was beyond imagination. But not today, because technology has completely changed the world and made it possible.

Technological inventions were revolutionized in the 18th and 19th century with the steam engine, the telegraph, fiber optics, typewriter, sewing machine, etc. Later, it changed the way we communicate on a real-time basis with telephone, radio, and internet.

Innovations in nanotechnology, biotechnology, and information technology are already helping to solve challenges that occur in these sectors. Through the breakthrough innovations in health services, technology has been able to improve the lives of poor people in developing countries.

Let us see how trends in technology are changing businesses.

Internet of Things IOT has begun to change the world around us. It allows the businesses to access their information virtually, creating a flexible and global way of accessing data, any place, and any time. It reduces the cost by maintaining IT system, rather than purchasing expensive systems and equipment. It also allows employees to be more flexible in work practices. Let us see some fields where IOT must be adapted.

Healthcare

Manufacturing field is increasingly being automated and technology driven. Advanced technology and systems such as automation, nanotechnology, cloud computing, the Internet of Things, and others are changing the face of manufacturing to improve business technologies. So, the adaption of technologies in work will revolutionize the way it was in the past in the field of manufacturing as well.

Hospitals and other healthcare facilities are largely paper-based industry. The pen and paper approach is still followed largely around the world. Patient’s record sharing is still done in the traditional way which is timeconsuming. Whereas, real-time monitoring via connected devices can save lives in an event of a medical emergency.

IOT devices collect and transfer health data and are stores in the cloud. These data can be shared with a physician or a health firm, in order to allow them to look at it, regardless of their place, time or device. Therefore, in an event of an emergency, patients can contact a doctor who is many kilometers away with a simple smartphone.

Fleet Management Fleet operators spend a large amount of time, money and resource in maintaining the safety standards and resource in maintaining the safety standards and operate at the desired performance levels. Through various sensors, fleet companies have access to a vast amount of data. This information can help the company to make realtime quick decisions for instant improvements. In fact, these insights can help in effectively managing the overall supply chain. Undoubtedly, IOT has set to become the backbone of the fleet management industry.

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|October 2019 |

Editor’s Choice Public Transport Management In today’s major cities at rush hour, getting to and from work is a nightmare. Imagine a world where not only the cars are smart, but also the street and traffic lights. Public transportation systems like trains and buses are connected to individual’s smartphones. This will help to know the exact time to leave the houses accordingly.

In smart cities, passengers are already enjoying Wi-Fi and USB charging stations on public transportation. Overall, IOT already started affecting the aspects of our life.

Renewable Energy Will you like earning money on reducing the use of electricity? Thanks to IOT energy-saving tools, you can significantly decrease the numbers in your bills. IOT energy solutions are sensor-based technology. It analyses weather and environment condition, helps automate the management of wind farms, optimizes maintenance and thus reduces the cost dramatically. People (both households and companies) get a better understanding of their usage habits and adjusts them accordingly. These system collects data on electricity consumption in real-time and helps generate important insights for environmentalists, researchers, and conservation strategists. Thus, installing IOT smart energy device can join the environmental initiative, cut down on energy consumption and lessen the greenhouse effect.

Agriculture The global population is set to touch 9.6 billion by 2050. So, to feed this much population, the farming industry must embrace IOT. Smart farming based on IOT technology will reduce waste and enhance productivity. Ranging from the quantity of fertilizer utilized to the number of journeys the farm vehicles have made. In IOT based smart farming a system is built for monitoring the crop field with the help of sensors and automating the irrigation systems. It is highly efficient when compared with the conventional approach.

Thus, with the population growing rapidly, the demand can be successfully met, if the farmers implement agricultural IOT solutions in a prosperous manner.

Blockchain Technology Blockchain technology is changing the way we do our day to day businesses. Companies are starting to work with Blockchain technology because it gives you privacy along with it is transparent. Let’s see how blockchain can help to deal with business.

Smart Contracts Contract is where consent of the parties is involved to agree and interact with each other. Blockchain technology helps to guarantee the validity of a transaction through a secure validation mechanism. Industries and institutions are heavily reliant on contracts, such as insurance, financial institutions, real estate, construction, entertainment and, law. A smart contract helps formalize the relationships between people, institutions and the assets they own. They eliminate the need for trusted third parties and are self-verifying, self-executing and Tamper resistant.

Blockchain will be an important part of our financial and technological digital future. It is one of the incredibly creative inventions that technology has ever seen. So how we use it is up to us, it could indeed transform the global scenario.

Technology and changing trends in businesses is not something which is going to happen in the future, it is happening right now. It has already started affecting a lot of businesses. So businesses have tremendous opportunity to benefit from such technological advancement. There is no doubt that technological innovations are largely followed all over the world and it will revolutionize the businesses.

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|October 2019 |

J

ust today I had a young and enthusiastic women call me up asking for advice and maybe some pointers on how to bring her vision to life. During the call I could almost see her deflating while I piled up the list of challenges that came with fundraising, developing tech products and gathering the right team.

I know exactly what that feels like because I, myself, have experienced it many times before. The mountain of work that faces an entrepreneur is sheer unfathomable, and that’s probably a good thing: who knows how many companies would still be out there if the founders had known what awaited them!? That feeling in mind, I did leave the call on an uplifting note (I hope), but what I also did was send her a list of female founder groups as well.

large amounts of wisdom on you. Sometimes there are drinks afterwards, but the emphasis is on learning from and networking with the speakers. I have made the best out of them by targeting events with speakers that could be important for my business and that I would otherwise have difficulties accessing. To my greatest sorrow many events are early morning breakfast meetings at 7 or 8, where I pretend that it’s a normal hour to be about for me.

My favourite one: SheWorx

Having a female led and populated ecosystem that can absorb some of the pains any female entrepreneur has to face can be the difference between succeeding and giving up. I choose the words ’giving up’ on purpose, because we can all fail, but it should be for technicalities all start-ups face, and not because we are lonely, overwhelmed and unsupported women.

Ÿ

From experience I have recognized three sorts of female ecosystems that are important for different challenges within the journey, each adding their own individual value, and I am grateful for each and every one of them: Ÿ

Ÿ

The Community: these groups are more motivational and empowering than having an actual impact on your business. Especially at the beginning of founding a company they are important. You get to meet other women, hear their stories, recognized that it’s not only you and make friends along the way. I think these groups are very important for your mental health, especially when your new company also means a change of lifestyle. You can meet other women and have a tea or a drink without feeling like you should be working because you ARE. Panels with talks, meetups and even workspaces distinguish these groups from strictly social events.

My favourite one: Blooming Founders.

The Platformers: These groups offer mostly awards and events. While on the surface you often don’t win anything tangible like prize money, the award itself ads huge value because it is highly respected in the field and opens doors. During the events you get to network from a privileged position which is invaluable for companies that are fundraising. It is also one of the few visible social markers that all your hard work, blood, sweat and tears has been acknowledged and rewarded - something you can show to your painfully neglected friends and family.

My favourite one: TechWomen100

During the development, the fundraising and the pivot of my digital mental health company with our emotional fitness game, eQuoo, there have been multiple times that these groups were there at the right time and place, offering me support, information and a platform.

Women are still vastly underrepresented in the tech world, and while the #MeToo movement has unearthed many of the people abusing their power against women, it can still be a hostile environment if you’re unlucky.

And statistically speaking you will be unlucky a few times.

The VC world is slowly starting to understand that a mentally health founder is a productive one and having communities that support us is a vital ingredient to our wellbeing.

The Educators: these groups offer talks, workshops and one-on-one’s with highly successful men and women in the start-up world. Here you need to bring your pen or laptop and stay on top of what is being said because the lecturer/guest speaker will dump

It takes a village to raise a child? Well, it takes a city to build a start-up.

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|October 2019 |

Leader’s Desk

Silja Litvin is the Psychologist, Founder and CEO of PsycApps Digital Mental Health, a company that uses AI, gamication and psychology to help people help themselves. She is a developer of the multi-award winning eQuoo – the Emotional Fitness Game.

Silja was born in Germany but moved to southern California early in her life. Exposed to many diverse cultures early in life, she developed an insatiable curiosity for the human condition leading to her pursuing a degree in psychology. During her 17 years of international modelling she began her Masters at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich, graduating in Clinical Psychology and Systemic Family Therapy in 2013. Alongside her education as a Systemic Family Therapist in 2015, she began her PhD in Clinical Psychology.

A child of the digital generation, Silja was looking for ways to use apps and social media to help people suffering from mental issues. She went on to create a psychological mobile app that helps users identify and self-manage depression. With this idea, she undertook her PhD thesis, thus ensuring it to be evidence based and ethically sound.

Now she is venturing into the world of AI, gamication and chatbots to nd a way to be able to help people help themselves, launching her emotional tness game eQuoo in the UK, USA, Canada and Australia. The game has been featured in major news outlets such as Forbes and TechCrunch and she won multiple prizes with PsycApps such as THE EUROPAS Pitch Awards and Pitch@Palace on Tour.

Silja Litvin Founder & CEO

PsycApps Digital Mental Health

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|October 2019 |

Leader

Martina Klingvall Founder & CEO

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|October 2019 |

I

n today’s ever-evolving world, ‘telecommunication’ plays a vital role in business operations. Telecom industry has low customer satisfaction rate and there has been no modern and customer-focused alternatives to the major operators.

Knowing this situation and to provide real time customer centric solution, Martina Klingvall, Founder and CEO of Telness is working to provide telecom solutions in an attempt to leave a positive experience to the customer. Martina completed her engineering studies from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm in 2011 and started her career as a trainee at Telenor.

Several years later, and several leadership positions later, Martina found her calling.

Becoming an entrepreneur was something that “just happened”, she says. “I never dreamt of becoming an entrepreneur, I dreamt of solving complex problems and this is my way to channel that dream”.

Telness is an independent company owned by the employees and the Board, together

If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito in your room.

MARTINA

KLINGVALL

SIMPLIFYING TELECOM COMPLEXITY PROFICIENTLY 23

|October 2019 |

As a startup, Telness have had the opportunity not only to build tech from scratch, but also to form company's culture and a strong team. The company has actively recruited all people to contribute positively to its values and adding new perspectives, personalities and competence into the company.

Martina firmly believes, for a leader, "it is important to be able to engage people in today's modern businesses. But also to be able to share a clear vision and strategy, and the expectations that comes with that. I think communication, passion for people and ability to change is the key to succeed as a leader." Since fewer careers is about monotonous work with today's digitalization, leadership plays a far more important role in engaging people to develop both the company and their own work every day.

In 2016 and 2017, it has invested in developing a modern and solid technical platform that enables a unique service for its customers. Telness's competitors are big mobile operators and the company has chosen not to play on their arena and instead use benefits of being small, agile, personal and passionate about its customers. Before providing any solution to its customers, the company mainly focuses on what is hard for the customer and where can it make a difference?

And the answer is by staying close to the customers and build services based on customer needs.

with a number of selected and long-term investors. It means thinking new and doing things differently. Its services are specially developed for the new business community and its goal is to create transparent and problem-free solutions for entrepreneurs. The company is a modern and customer-focused alternative to the major operators with clear basic principles: no paperwork, transparency, hassle free and exceptional customer experience.

‘Telness’ is challenging the traditional telecom sector, which is currently suffering from very low customer satisfaction in general. Martina presents Telness as a next generation mobile operator that works to change the expectations in terms of customer experience, and making business telecom digital and simple to use. She continues, “we are the first mobile operator soley built upon the needs for entrepreneurs and those working for them. Telness customers always get full control and can themselves handle the company’s mobile telephony themselves. Turns out, our customers really love us. We’ve been holding the #1 ranking for mobile operators at Trustpolit quite a while now.”

Martina believes in transparency, trust and challenging both individuals and status quo. Currently, it is more important to adapt to the changes and having both the engagement and courage to do so. If people are truly engaged in the company’s vision, knowing and living its values, and get the opportunity to know what drives the company, through transparency, it becomes much easier to live the values.

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|October 2019 |

Attributes of a

Good L

eadership is about using the power of a position to empower a group of people in order to attain a common goal. A leader’s task is to implement the plans that usually look good on paper, through a delegated team, in a specific time with an ongoing motion. She/he may use the traditional method or may think out of the box. It depends on the leader as how to do it; the ultimate motive is to get the job done. Although, each and every individual has a different approach on leadership, some might say it is about setting examples, some might say it is about sharing the authority; what matters is, taking the right decision when it is most needed.

Leadership varies from one organization to another. An organization is a dynamic body and

creates new probabilities every now and then. And with new probabilities, come new challenges.

Although, it is impossible to overcome every challenge, the business environment has adopted certain leadership styles for the efficiency of business: The Participative Leader Participative Leadership is the process of sharing authority with the work force in order to get optimum efficiency. The team, after getting access to certain powers, works responsibly to accomplish the goals set by its leader. The shared leadership also helps in case of any requirement of change, as the employees adapt quickly in such environment. Incidentally, this style of leadership fits best in a scenario when there is a limitation of time.

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The Transformational Leader A transformational leader inspires the team through effective communication and an intellectual environment. However, these individuals require more detail oriented managers to successfully implement their strategies.

Transformational Leadership is considered among the most effective employees of the organization. One of the examples of this type of leadership is when a leader is assigned on a higher level for effective environment.

The Transactional leader The transactional leadership, as the name suggests, enables the leader to incentivize the team corresponding to their performance.

The team gets rewarded when it attains the goals and the Leader has the power to review the results and

|October 2019 |

The Art of Leading act accordingly when the team fails to do the same. The goals and the strategy to attain them are decided by the leader and the team itself.

The Situational leader Situational leadership is a theory that the best leader will adapt to the required leadership style according to need of the hour. A Situational leader may adopt democratic style while discussion business with senior executive, but may switch to transactional at the time of team review. However every individual has a natural style of leadership and it may be difficult to switch roles at a certain point of time.

Qualities of a good leader There is an old proverb that says, “Give a Man a Fish, and You Feed Him for a Day. Teach a Man to Fish, and You Feed Him for a Lifetime.” So is the case with leadership. One of the basic qualities of a Leader is to pass on the leadership skills.

Integrity C.S. Lewis said, “Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one is watching.” Be it giving credit to one of the team members or be it admitting a mistake, a leader wears integrity as a badge of honor. They do what is right, no matter what. Ÿ

Empowerment As mentioned earlier, Leadership is about using the power of one’s position to empower a group of people in order to attain a common goal. A good leader shares his authority with the team in order to get the job done. By doing this, he shows confidence in the team and obliged by the gesture, the team works with full enthusiasm to accomplish the goal. Ÿ

Decision making There is risk in decision to making.

Great leaders take great decisions when the stake is high and it is the success of those decisions that make them great. To add up, a good leader takes right decision at the right time.

In conclusion, a good leader can be defined by the dynamics of his style in leadership, the values that he brings to the organization, the methods he uses to make the best of the resources, and the kind of decision he makes in the given situations. At the end it is about the attitude of an individual to bring the change for good. Ÿ

Following are some of the qualities of a good leader: Communication Skills Communication is the basic requirement for efficiency in a business. As the level of hierarchy elevates, the requirement of communication grows. Especially, when it comes to leadership, there is no scope for lack of communication.

A Leader who fails to develop this skill is looked up as incompetent, because it is his job to send the message loud and clear. Although, it is also important to listen as it is an integral part of communication. Ÿ

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|October 2019 |

Leader

Michelle Beyo Passionate about Payment Innovation, Financial Inclusion and Diversity!

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|October 2019 |

“

M

y goal is to help the future of payments come to life.” This is the statement of Michelle Beyo, Founder of FinAvator, a consulting firm with expertise in Payments, Prepaid, Loyalty and Blockchain focused on Digital Marketing, Product Strategy and Sales Acceleration for Startups, FinTech’s and Enterprises. She is a strategic advisor to Uulala, a California based FinTech company focused on financial inclusion; she is a strong supporter of entrepreneurs and women as a SheEO activator; a Women in Payments’ mentor and a Money 20/20 US 2019 Rise Up Academy Member. Michelle is also a wife, mother of two and just competed in her first sprint triathlon.

After eight years in Loyalty, she made the move into the payments industry and took on the challenging Senior Director role of managing three departments at the world’s largest prepaid provider InComm. She was extremely fortunate to have an inspiring, balanced and diverse executive team lead by an incredible GM, Felipe Papaleo. Felipe shared “Michelle is a driven and committed leader, with innovation in her DNA. She is always eager to explore new ways to enhance sales while ensuring a consumer-centric approach. She was responsible for creating, designing and implementing some of InComm’s main initiatives during her three year tenure and did so with determination and poise.

Innovation and leadership are at her core, and so is her passion for it!”

Michelle’s desire for continuously learning and improving led her to apply and attend Ivey Business School inaugural “Mastering FinTech Program” in late 2017. This allowed her to quickly grasp emerging digital currencies, blockchain technology and exciting FinTech’s that were starting to change the world of payments while also connecting her to senior bank executives and industry innovators. It was soon after this insightful program that Michelle jumped into the blockchain sector in a new role on another balanced executive team for a passionate CEO, Bruce Silcoff.

Her new role as a Chief Client Officer at Shyft Network, a Blockchain startup focused on building the world’s first modern, secure, multi-stakeholder trust network allowed her take a deep dive into consent frameworks while working towards proof of concepts and engaging strategic partnerships.

Michelle’s journey to leadership included experiencing struggles, success and failures with each phase teaching her something new and valuable. Her leadership skills come from many different experiences: Her resilience and confidence come from watching her parents run their own businesses. Michelle’s strong commitment to a project and teamwork come from playing ten years of rep soccer and her ability to plan ahead and believe in herself come from lessons learnt living in Australia on her own as a young adult (all invaluable lessons to the future entrepreneur!).

Michelle started her first career in Telecom while still in high school she worked to buy her first car, she spent her nights and weekends helping a Telus franchisee grow their team and locations. She soon fell in love with the excitement of learning new technologies and having the opportunity to be at the forefront of emerging digital mobile phones over her six years. She then moved to the Loyalty sector, where she had the pleasure of working for her first female leader and lifelong mentor Kelly Lee Smith. She learnt so much from her positive attitude and ability to drive results as the only female in the boardroom. Michelle adds "She inspired me in many ways, as I led my first team and managed multiple online shopping malls for major airlines such as United, Delta and Lufthansa" She then gained key leadership and marketing skills in her following Director role focused on credit card loyalty acceleration of Aeroplan for major Canadian banks CIBC and TD as she helped retailers, restaurants and spas increase consumer spend.

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After spending a year at a startup Michelle realized it was time to venture out on her own by launching FinAvator, a FinTech advisory firm to help enterprise and startup companies add an innovative twist to their business. She is able to share her unique multi-industry knowledge on digital payments, prepaid innovation, loyalty incentives, blockchain ecosystem and her ability to combine corporate expertise with startup agility.

FinAvator works closely with each client to understand their challenges and create a plan to drive growth through customer centric products, digital marketing and strategic partnerships.

“Life is short, take risks, be courageous; our impact can be much greater when we focus on self improvement and driving change.”

On leadership Michelle asserts “A true leader focuses on long term vision and finds the time to help colleagues strive towards their potential."

Throughout her career Michelle has built strong rapport with a group of diverse mentors that have inspired her to take risks and continue to grow as a leader. She believes “It is important in business and life to forge genuine relationships, help each other and challenge the status quo” Michelle enjoyed working on diverse and balanced executive teams as she witnessed the unique innovative ideas and team work that it creates. She considers herself lucky to have been apart of many diverse management teams and has the goal of building FinAvator with the same vision.

According to Michelle, the first step to understanding your competition is deep industry research and customer discovery followed by finding ways to differentiate. Then building clear goals for your team, marketing the benefits of your company, connect with your community as well as partner with some competitors to leverage each other.

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Leader

Nancy Ze man N

ecessity is what brings update to old technologies and systems. Whenever a certain system, method or product no longer serves its purpose; changes are required. These changes are often recognized by business minds who understand the requirement of change, seek for it and transform it into an opportunity. One such business mind is Nancy Zeffman, CoFounder at Cucumber Clothing .

Nancy understood the problems with women's nightwear and clothing and took a step forward to modify it.

Defining Creativity with Innovative Fabric Solutions

edge fabric tech and married it to gorgeous design that helped solve a problem.

It took about two years from having the idea to reaching market. The two years were spent researching the m a r ke t , m a t e r i a l s , m a k i n g u p samples (and testing them), fine tuning our designs, photography and setting up our website, plus so much more, in time for our first capsule collection that launched in September 2017.

How is your company impacting your customers?

In so many ways! We have a very high repeat customer rate, so we know that our products work and we love the fact that we get so much positive feedback. Some women are telling us that they just can't go to bed in anything other than our nightwear if they want to get any sleep. It travels the world with them.

Below are the highlights of the interview: Kindly take us through your journey on becoming a leader.

It has been both crazy and amazing – an incredibly uplifting and challenging journey. The idea for Cucumber Clothing was born on a hot holiday. We (my co-founder Eileen Willett and myself) were with a group of female friends and there was a lot of talk around sleeplessness, heat and hormones.

When we returned, we did some research and were astonished to find that the only garments on offer either looked ‘medical’ or were d e e m e d s e r i o u s l y d o w d y. W e decided there and then to create a brand that took the latest cutting

When we first launched, we were just about sleep for the 40+ market. It is from customer feedback and requests, that we then widened our range to include breast feeding friendly tops and dresses (new and breast feeding mums suffer from raging hormones, just like the menopause) and multifunctional holiday wear and leisurewear. Every

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“Don't sweat the small stuff, but attention to detail is everything.�

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woman will get uncomfortably hot at some point in her life for a multitutde of reasons.

What are the anchors of your management philosophy?

Be kind! One of the best things about starting a business has been all the amazing people we have met along the way. We've found from day one of our Cucumber journey that almost everyone, male or female, have been encouraging and full of ideas to help us. We've tried to do the same for others.

Kindess is the best.

How do you cultivate a diverse workplace at your company?

There are only two of us in this business – the two founding members. We do everything ourselves, save for some freelance work around design and obviously we employ outside manufacturers, pattern cutters and so on.

We are both women. I am London born and Eileen is a Japanese Canadian who moved to London over 30 years ago. That's a pretty high diverse percentage, but who knows how expansion will change this…

What do you feel the role of leadership is in developing careers?

I think it's important for people to have role models, which is why diversity in all its forms is so important. Leaders should be both inspirational and offer guidance and mentoring.

How do you strategize your game plans to tackle the competition in the market We are a fabric led, solutions based brand. Our customers find and buy us for a reason. Our clothes look and feel great and they perform. Although our brand was first inspired by the menopause, these are not menopausal clothes. They are stylish clothes for any woman, no matter her age, because it isn't only menopause that causes women to have temperature problems: pregnancy and breast feeding, medications, being curvier, travel – they can all turn the thermostat up, as can cancer treatments or thyroid issues for example.

We see part of our job as educating consumers about the benfits of technical fabrics. So many women, particularly older women, have been brought up to believe that natural fibres are the best for everything.

We are heavily focused on sustainability.

We know that creating anything has an

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Nancy Zeffman Co-Founder

enviromental cost and we want ours to be as light as possible, and we can do this because of the flexibility a small company gives us. We source everything bar our fabric from inside the UK, meaning we know all our suppliers.

We have just launched a new range using an even more revolutionary fabric that incorporates an innovative material made from naturally derived volcanic mineral called 37.5 technology. We are always researching new fabrics and looking at interesting ways of using them.

We want to be at the forefront of fashion fabric technology.

We are trying to do so much more than just sell clothes. We are trying to build a Cucumber community through our blogs and vlogs where we interact with (mainly) women of all different ages and backgrounds that we feel have something interesting to say to our newsletter subscribers.

As part of this community, it is also very important to us to support causes we believe in. We have donated 50p off every purchase of our cashmere mix range to The Eve Appeal and donated all our samples to an event held

by Prevent Breast Cancer and have more collaborations planned with them in the near future.

We want to be the go-to brand for ‘hot’ women – key wardrobe pieces that are worn and loved for many years.

What are your future endeavors/objectives and where do you see yourself in the near future?

We've been expanding into luxury spas and you can find us at the Four Seasons in Hamsphire and Park Lane and at Beaverbrook Hotel and Spa. There are other possible venues coming soon too.

We hope that the near future will bring Cucumber more brand awareness. Although we have made sales all round the world, the majority of our sales have been in the UK. The US in particular is proving a strong second market for us and we would like to grow our market here.

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About the Author Ineke Kooistra is the CEO of YoungCapital, a leading Dutch recruitment agency, since 2013. She has been working in the recruitment and secondment branches for 25 years.

Additionally, she has also set up and expanded various specializations within the IT stafďŹ ng market. Her role as the CEO of the company is to get people moving, motivate them and coach them.

Together with three male founders, she directs a predominantly female management team and 1,300 employees, of which 80 percent is also female. This is pure coincidence, because Ineke doesn’t believe in selecting her employees based on gender.

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Unbaised Future

Establishing

E uilibr um

A

need to bring to school. Is that possible?” As if there are no male CEOs that bring their kids to school. The big difference is that men don’t ask these kinds of questions.

They just do it!

t the top “It’s all about finding someone’s strengths. Women don’t outperform men and vice versa. But I won’t deny that it takes a lot of discipline to stay at the top as a woman,” Ineke expresses. Just like men, women have a lot of qualities that match perfectly with a leadership role. It’s important that leadership comes from the heart. And you need to have the intention to help others grow and make them better through your role. I call it Servant Leadership. If you want to make your company a success, you need to be of service to the company and its people. This has nothing to do with gender or background.

Balance It’s all about balance. Recently, I attended a forum on female leadership, where I talked about my role as a CEO. In the audience, were female students who were just about to graduate. When the moderator asked which of them wanted the same job as me, only three of the four hundred students raised their hands. The moderator was shocked, and asked the audience what was going on. “She works too much”, was the answer. “And we also want to be able to go to parties, exercise and have a social life.” That shocked me a little. It’s not that I don’t do anything else besides work. My downtime, social life and work activities are just one big mix. It’s true that I’m constantly thinking about work. But I also allow myself to go for a run in the morning or see my hairdresser during the week. To me, it’s just one full week in which I can do a lot.

That’s why a quota for women at the top is completely nonsense, according to me. All women who really want to reach the top, will find a way to break through that glass ceiling. No bias in the world will stop a woman on a mission to reach that top position. But it’s wrong to think that anyone with the right capabilities – man or woman – can work anywhere they want. There should be a match between your personality, the company’s values and its culture. And sometimes it’s just a case of pure luck. Being at the right place at the right time. If this match doesn’t come naturally, it’s just not meant to be.

Did I have this go-getter mentality as a child, since I already knew I wanted to one day reach the top? I think so. But, at the same time, all the things I hoped for as a child didn’t come true. What I got is a lot better. I definitely don’t regret the choices that I’ve made. I started a family, got married, and am the CEO of a young and ambitious company. I should therefore be the last person to decide whether or not one should have a leadership position based on a ‘home situation’. How you combine the two is up to you. And yes, that takes a lot of discipline. But if you have natural leadership qualities, I believe everything is going to be alright.

But if there is a perfect match between you as a leader and a company, it’s the first positive step, in my opinion. It’s still a lot of work. Having all that responsibility takes a lot out of you. You shouldn’t be afraid to make choices, and that also means saying no to certain activities in your personal life.

I am a mother of two and am not home every day. My husband and I have been able to make it work. I notice that a lot of women still find it difficult. But you can’t run a company part time. You need to dare to go full in. Those doubts often appear during the initial job interview. Women say “I want to be a director, but I still have children that I

The key to achieving this? As a female – or male – leader, you need to learn to let go and prioritise. Just do your best and focus on making things better for other people.

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