The Most Admired Women Leaders in Business 2019

Volume-4 Issue-10

www.insightssuccess.com April 2019

The Most

Admired

Leaders in Business 2019

The Art of Leading Attributes of a Good Leader

Editor’s Pick The Glass Ceiling Effect: Another Perspective on Women and Leadership Admired woman of the Month

Sudha Mahajan Sr. Director Product Management (Principal Group PM)

E Gender shouldn’t be the Criteria

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re women capable to take up the executive charge of organizations? Whenever this question is put forward in front of women, they have always proved that gender shouldn’t be the factor to be considered for being a great leader. The current business world is defined by complexity, disruption, and change, which desperately need leaders with holistic approach, diverse skill sets, perspectives, and experiences and thus, gender should not be counted under the criteria.

Gone are the days when women had to face the skepticism of their seniors, colleagues, investors as well as consumers on their abilities of leading an organization. In today’s cumbersome world of entrepreneurship, women are now seen to break through the glass ceilings to make their way out to reach the top level of positions in organizations. Leaders like Sheryl Sandberg, the COO of Facebook, Indra Nooyi, the Chairman and COO of PepsiCo, Ginni Rometty, the Chairman, President, and CEO of IBM have set a noteworthy instance of women taking businesses to the new heights. They have broken all the myths about women’s inborn limitations and serve as models for emerging women leaders.

Considering the professional and personal life, women have to wear several hats, and each hat has its own set of responsibilities and expectations. Through their fierceness and firm determination, they provide an integrated view of work and family, which results in an engaged and promising personal and professional future. Maintaining balance in both the spheres, women are also constantly evolving and reaching new milestones across a wide spectrum of human activities that occur in the contemporary world.

A woman in leadership roles is a drastic transformation and has made a substantial impact across all sectors. Be it business, technology, administration, education, healthcare or government, women have gradually made their mark in almost every sector at regional, national, and global levels. By walking an extra mile, they have been at the helm of every field.

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A world where doing business is a risk, women seeks it as an opportunity

Hitesh Dhamani

Many organizations which have women in their board of directors, or are solely run by women, are changing the landscape of world by providing reformative solutions that are catering to the needs of businesses as well as individuals.

With the intent of bringing women, who are significantly contributing to the business sphere with their glorious triumphs, into limelight, Insights Success brings to you, “The Most Admired Women Leaders in Business 2019.” These women are redefining the parameters of leadership through their immense passion for their work and the drive for excellence.

An avid entrepreneur, Rachel K. Mushahwar, the Vice President, General Manager US Enterprise, Government, and nwCloud Sales at Intel, features on the cover of this issue. Rachel is someone who is in touch with the rawest of human emotions, who is sensitive and sensible, who is humble and high spirited, and who is earnest and empowering. She carries a vibrant and an enthralling aura, and certainly she is someone, what inspiration looks like in a suit.

Her work experience started in her family’s retail store in rural America where she learned from an early age about business, entrepreneurship, customer service, the value of one’s employees, and the importance of turning data into actionable insights to drive sales. She conveys how fortunate enough she was to have parents and grandparents whose role in the business wasn’t defined by gender or by boundaries of what one could see.

Delve in to more such inspiring stories and lessons from many such significant entrepreneurs in this issue and reap the fruits of motivation. Also, make sure to scroll through the articles written by our in-house editorial team and CXO standpoints of some of the leading industry experts to have a brief taste of the sector.

Happy reading!

CONTENTS

Cover Story

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Rachel K. Mushahwar When Inspiration Wears a Suit

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Admired woman of the Month

Sudha Mahajan Reaching the New Milestones of Leadership

Unbiased Future Establishing Gender Equilibrium

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Stellar’s Vision

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Success in the Venture World

Maestro’s Insights Assertive Leadership: Tips for Millennial Women in Business

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Imparting Wisdom

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HOW TO DO YOUR BEST WORK WHEN YOU'RE NOT ACTUALLY WORKING! Maintaining a personal and professional life balance

Articles Imparting Wisdom 40

Successful Personality Traits to Learn from Elon Musk

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The Art of Leading Attributes of a Good Leader

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28

Cassandra Hamel

Donna Wilczek

Conjoining Passion and Creativity to achieve Success

An Inspirational Tech Leader and Inventor

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Erna Grasz Leading Global Social Change

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44

Janaki Joshi

Kathleen Brandt

Stepping Up and Embedding Innovation in the DNA for Customers

Driving Curiosity to Seize Opportunities

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46

Lea von Bidder

Michelle Silberman

Bringing Innovative Changes in Health Sector

Baking the World a Better Place!

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Nicole Rodriguez Leading the Digital Revolution

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Nishidha Kumaresan

Sheri Atwood

Stepping Up along with the Team

An Intersection of Technology, Business and Courage

Editor-in-Chief Pooja M. Bansal Managing Editor Anish Miller

Executive Editor

Assistant Editors

Hitesh Dhamani

Jenny Fernandes Rohit Chaturvedi

Visualizer

Art & Design Director

Associate Designer

David King

Amol Kamble

Kushagra Gupta

Senior Sales Manager Co-designer

Co-designer Sapna Shinde

Business Development Manager

Passi D.

Peter Collins

Marketing Manager

Sales Executives

John Matthew

David, Kevin, Mark, Suraj

Technical Head

Business Development Executives

Jacob Smile

Steve, Joe, Alan, Tushar

Technical Specialist Aditya

Digital Marketing Manager Marry D'Souza

SME-SMO Executive Prashant Chevale

Research Analyst Patrick James

Database Management Stella Andrew

Circulation Manager Robert Brown

Technology Consultant David Stokes

sales@insightssuccess.com April, 2019 Insights Success Media Tech LLC 555 Metro Place North, Suite 100, Dublin, OH 43017, United States Phone - (614)-602-1754 Email: info@insightssuccess.com For Subscription: www.insightssuccess.com

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When Inspiration Wears a Suit

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It is outside your comfort zone where the greatest learning happens.

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Rachel K. Mushahwar Vice President, General Manager US Enterprise, Government, and nwCloud Sales

Cover Story

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o nourish the tree of opportunities and to provide an equal share of its fruits, to all those who’ve ploughed through thick and thin with unwavering efforts, is what justifies the role of a leader. The comprehension of this virtue, in its entirety, requires one to push open the muffling doors of their comfort zone and thus, setting upon the path to greatness. With the motto of bringing into limelight, those, who are entitled to be pronounced as an epitome of grit, passion, commitment and individuality, Insights Success brings to you “The Most Admired Women Leaders in Business.”

In the aforesaid endeavor, we’ve had the privilege of crossing roads with a certain someone who is in touch with the rawest of human emotions, who is sensitive and sensible, who is humble and high spirited, and who is earnest and empowering. It wouldn't be detrimental to say that one seldom comes across such a person who carries an aura so vibrant and enthralling, and this certain someone, is what inspiration looks like in a suit.

This is Rachel K. Mushahwar, the Vice President, General Manager US Enterprise, Government, and nwCloud Sales at Intel. Her work experience started in her family’s retail store in rural America where she learned from an early age about business, entrepreneurship, customer service, the value of one’s employees, and the importance of turning data into actionable insights to drive sales. She conveys how fortunate enough she was to have parents and grandparents whose role in the business wasn’t defined by gender or by boundaries of what one could see. She recalls what her parents said, “Don’t let the horizon of what you can see define where you can go.”

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“When the time came to head to university, the notion that women didn’t study computer science and civil engineering wasn’t a discussion. The discussion was, find something you love, and the rest will fall in place.

Life is about the people you meet and the things you create with them. So, go out and start creating.

Don’t let others tell you, what success looks like – it is different for everyone,” she adds. It took her a couple of restarts to figure out what she loved and how to do it right for her, in contrast to what was right for everyone else. “Rural America, cattle ranches, and small towns – that was the start of my journey – to push the boundaries and create a boundless life,” she expresses.

Throughout her 25 year career as an IT executive and now as the Vice President and General Manager of US Industry, Government, and Next Wave Cloud sales at Intel, a pioneering technology company, she has been on the forefront of digital transformation and technology across all types of businesses and government agencies.

“I’ve been blessed to work with executives who’ve encouraged me to take calculated risks and step outside my comfort zone, for it is outside your comfort zone where the greatest learning happens,” says Rachel. She believes that growth and comfort do not coexist. Her best mentors/sponsors have taught her to embrace the uncertainty and discomfort of not knowing what’s next. She comprehends that many people avoid these two things, but is of a strong belief that apparently without them, one never improves, and never learns anything worthwhile.

Rachel further adds that she has had the opportunity to work with a lot of senior executives, and she always asks them about what is that one thing they wish they'd have done? And interestingly, as she says, it is always about regret and regretting what they didn’t do in their personal life. Rachel coherently summarizes it as, “The crazy, the crying, the cuddles; the screaming, the sacred, the scared; the minutes, the magic, the mess; It’s all part of it. And it’s all worth it. Don’t regret your life. Accept that you will fall apart and do it all wrong. Forgive yourself. There are moments in your life when you will reach a fork in the road – if you are tempted to take the easy path, ask yourself why. Success and easy don’t usually go together.

Figure out what the problem is you are trying to solve. Many times, the answers are right in front of us if we ask the right questions. Take the leap and have no regrets!”

Rachel describes her approach towards business and people by quoting Maya Angelou, saying, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

With experience comes expertise Pertaining to Rachel’s experience which spans over more than two decades, her views on how technology and its volatility has affected businesses over time, evidently exhibits the erudition she’s acquired.

She asserts, “You can’t ignore or underestimate the wide-ranging impact technology and data has had on business and our lifestyles. It’s not just the markets depicting the evolution of technology and data – it’s also consumers, and significant changes in technology and consumer behavior have spurred a new set of businesses that didn't exist 5-10 years ago.”

Rachel is of the opinion that businesses must be agile and pivot quickly to take advantage of opportunities as they arise. She says that the velocity of change also means today’s business and educational institutions must create and nurture lifelong learners, so as to keep pace with the changes that technology is bringing and accelerating. This kind of environment requires strong leaders who can motivate, empower, and help teams find success, while realizing the need for flexibility to cope with the dynamic business environment that has become today’s reality.

Rachel expresses that she often talks about how her kids, as digital natives, have different priorities and a different view of the world than her generation.

She says, “As leaders, we must draw the best out of divergent perspectives from baby boomers to millennials – a generation that will dominate the workforce in a few short years and also

have a very different world view from the previous generation. And, we must build collaborative as well as inclusive work environments where all employees can thrive and succeed.”

She adds that at the same time, helping teams find balance in a hyperconnected world and clearly articulating the right priorities, so they know where to apply their focus, is also vital.

Building more leaders Commenting upon the essential traits of an ideal leader, Rachel asserts, “We all have a vision of what a leader is, or could be, but the truth is that leadership is nothing like you would expect. It can be daunting – even on the days when everything goes right. I wish I could say I glide effortlessly along as a working parent and executive, but life’s no ballet and I’m not a ballerina!

We should be willing to acknowledge that leadership’s not always easy or effortless.”

According to Rachel, a common trait of good leaders is the willingness take on big challenges – while empowering, inspiring, and trusting their teams to tackle them. Great leaders create other leaders and encourage them to take the game winning shot. “You win as a team and every great leader knows when to coach from the sidelines vs. on the field,” states Rachel.

Rachel also opines that great leaders: Ÿ

Must keep speaking up, keep pushing for progress, keep focused on closing the diversity and inclusion gaps that exist even in 2019. Being a leader is like climbing a big mountain. When climbing, look for the base camp.

That’s where you rest, meet other climbers, take in oxygen and acclimatize. Base camp is what makes summiting possible. The tiniest adjustments in the climb make all the difference and allow you to get to the top together. We aren’t alone, we have each other.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help.

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Must believe and love what they

Cover Story

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are doing, if they don’t, no one else will either. People often think that leadership is about their title, their position in the organization, the corner office, and such. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Real leadership is about creating a vision in your heart and mind and bringing the energy of manifestation to that vision so that others can see and believe in it too.

Real leadership is about aspiring to inspire others to what they never thought possible.

Must stop searching for balance and perfection. It makes me crazy when leaders talk about balance; if you are in perfect balance, you are not moving; but, standing still and trying to balance everything. So, stop trying to balance. Being a working parent isn’t a tight rope walk; it’s a beautiful, yet chaotic, dance. Strive for rhythm instead of balance and trust yourself to move to the ever-changing beat. Of course, there’s a very fine line between enjoying the chaos and barely surviving. Being a working parent, caregiver of aging parents, dealing with an illness, or just about any other personal situation will bring you face to face with the best and worst of yourself. It is terrifying, and it may break you.

But it will also rebuild you and you will be stronger than you ever thought possible but only if you embrace the rhythm.

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Must listen and observe. If you can quiet down your own mind and focus your eyes, usually the answers are there to be seen and heard. Leadership isn't about just talking and making speeches and communicating. It's about watching, learning, sitting with people, and truly hearing them. You cannot lead from your office; you must travel often, even if to the floor below you. It will require you to open your mind, your heart, and your arms to new things, to new people, to new cultures, and new ways of thinking. We are united in our differences. Life is about the people you meet and the things you create with them. So, go out and start creating.

Opportunities do not distinguish When asked about her opinion on the current challenges which businesswomen or female executives face, and why, Rachel exclaims, “First, there are no challenges, only opportunities. Today, we have unprecedented opportunities to advance our careers, we have the support to achieve our goals, and also a growing group of executives we can look up to as mentors. In fact, according to Pew Research Center, women are the sole or primary breadwinner in 40% of US households.”

Rachel expresses that woman executives have succeeded in moving the bar forward and helping companies

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in a wide range of industries, including tech, to level the diversity playing field. “We are reaching a place where building women leaders and building businesses are, and should be, one in the same,” she adds.

There couldn’t be any other way to put it other than how Rachel has, quoting, “We have made progress, but it isn't enough. It is our job, as leaders, to continue to accelerate women in leadership positions across all industries. It is our job, as leaders, to reach out and support each other. It is also our job to ensure that equality starts at home so that our sons and daughters grow into a workforce that is different than today.”

“Yes, we have made tremendous progress and yes, there is so much more to do. Yes, we are at a unique point in history where women are so excited about being able to do anything. But the biggest opportunity we must tackle is thinking we have to do everything all at once,” she includes.

Rachel expresses her pride in working for a company like Intel and is also proud of the initiatives Intel has taken as a business to foster greater diversity and engage women to advance careers in science, technology and engineering.

They’re building the pipeline in real time, and it’s starting to work. Rachel exclaims, “We recently achieved full representation in our U.S. workforce two years ahead of our initial 2020

Strive for rhythm instead of balance and trust yourself to move to the everchanging beat.

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Photo Credit: NRF Foundation 2019

Cover Story

She also comprehends that it’s not enough to cheer from the sidelines. “I am a mentor, active in my community, and involved in many leadership groups. I believe it is our social duty to help those around us, whether that’s volunteering at our kids’ school, participating in STEM learning events, or even something as simple as having a coffee with someone seeking advice on a career move,” Rachel emphasizes.

She believes that women need to support each other and be the change which is to be seen in the world. “One step, one conversation, one article, one person at a time, a great leader knows that their biggest accomplishment will be about those you have lifted, those you have made better, and what you have given back,” she expresses.

Being the benchmark Commenting upon her and her organization’s strife to prolong the market competency, Rachel asserts, “One of my favorite sayings is, if you don’t like change, you’ll like irrelevance even less. That’s never been truer than today when every person, industry and business needs to build unprecedented flexibility into their business models and move with speed and agility.” Rachel underlines that the ability to collect, harness, and gain insights from available data is now foundational to every industry.

She states, for an organization such as Intel, to remain at the forefront of an industry that’s continuing to change rapidly, requires vision, adaptability, and a culture that fosters innovation.

A business that’s content to continue operating the way it has successfully for decades will find itself irrelevant in a very short period. She recalls how one of Intel’s founders, Andy Grove, created a culture at Intel that “only the paranoid survive.” And she believes that this is true now more than ever, as

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goal. Our workforce now reflects the percent of women and underrepresented minorities in the U.S. skilled labor market. That being said, we’re not content to sit on our laurels.

There’s more to do and at Intel, we're doing it.”

You win as a team and every great leader knows when to coach from the sidelines vs. on the field.

every organization and leader must be able to identify and exploit crisis points to create the next new.

Passing on the scepter of inspiration In her advice to the future generation of leaders, Rachel narrates, “My dad always told me, if you want to go fast, go alone, but if you want to go far, go together. Too often, women think they’re showing strength by doing it alone, but we’re stronger together, and now more than ever before, business is a team sport.”

Rachel avidly shares a few more virtues and lessons which would palpably help others in their path to success, and to quote her: “Start before you are ready. There’s no magic date on the calendar. Sometimes later becomes never. Find mentors – both senior and junior mentors have different but valuable lessons to teach.

Don't try to be Wonder Woman. She's fictional and this is real life. It’s messy, imperfect and we need to figure out how to make it work without adding undue pressures. This leads to my next point.

Women are told so many times during their lives that they cannot be good at multiple things at once. We are told you have kids, and you cannot climb too high in your career. We are told we cannot run board meetings and carpools. We are told we cannot run companies and care for our families.

We are told we cannot bring home the bacon and fry it in the pan. We are told if you are pretty, you won’t be taken seriously. None of this is true. It’s our secret, that’s our power, that’s our magic, our strength. We are the contradiction – we are the AND.

We earn advanced degrees after the kids go to bed and pay the bills. We raise our kids and impact our companies’ EPS. We are executives for some of the largest companies on the planet and still answer the plastic phone when our 3-year-old hands it to us. We are ambitious and can make an amazing room mom. We work outside the home and love our friends/partners who made different choices. We are the “and” and can be both. This is your life – kids, no kids, spouse, no spouse, career or career on pause. It’s tragic and triumphant, messy and magical.

Whatever your choice, make it count.

Be the AND, just not all at once!”

Change is the future Rachel’s remark about what the future holds for her, both, in terms of her career as well as an individual, she says, “With the velocity to change in business increasing, I’ll admit it is sometimes difficult to see clearly what the future will hold and how soon.

From autonomous vehicles to AI, the only thing that’s certain is change. We must be ready and able to adapt to those changes.

It's a big part of why I love working for Intel. It's not just a company; it’s not just a promise of the future; Intel is a company that is serious about creating the future. As the world continues to become smarter, connected, autonomous, and data driven – Intel is at the forefront of creating the extraordinary from 5G, to artificial intelligence, to autonomous everything. Intel is the only company on the planet that has the ability to connect everything from the edge autonomous cars, smart machines, etc. to the data center, to the cloud. Intel continues to help transform our world, our communities, our governments,

and our environment for the betterment of humanity. I couldn’t imagine working anywhere else!

And, while I think leaders of tomorrow will face challenges and technologies we can’t fathom today, Robert Noyce, another Intel cofounder, eloquently stated, don’t be encumbered by history. Go off and do something wonderful.”

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Whatever your choice, make it count.

Be the AND, just not all at once!

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For my four children, I have no doubt it means they will be working in jobs that haven’t been invented yet, and for those of us in the trenches, we must foster a culture that values lifelong learning as part of a growth mindset to keep pace with the changes around us. We must help our education systems keep pace with the changing landscape so that as new jobs are created, we also have the education systems in place to fill the pipelines.

Cover Story

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Admired woman of the Month

Sudha Mahajan Reaching the New Milestones of Leadership

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t is certain that ‘Initial struggles often lead to Success’. The success story of Sudha Mahajan, the Sr. Director Product Management (Principal Group PM), aptly exemplifies this line. Sudha came to United States from India in 1999 for her master’s in computer science with her two suitcases and lots of dreams.

She did not have a support system in the U.S, but all she knew was that the U.S. is a land of opportunities.

With little money in the pocket, her first struggle was to pay the bills and maintain high grades to continue teaching assistantship, which was granted on a merit only basis. As a student, money to buy a mattress was a luxury, so she decided to live without one for the entire first year and slept on the carpet instead. She spent many nights in the lab since she had no access to a PC at home and every assignment needed to be completed in the lab.

She graduated in 2001 with a Master of Science degree in computer science but struggled a lot in getting a job where she lived in Texas. The recent dot com burst, a weak economy, and hurdles due to visa requirements, all added to her fight to get into the job market.

Suddenly all the opportunities in this dreamland seemed impossible, but the struggle was far from over. During this time, she met her husband and after their marriage they moved to San Francisco Bay area in California.

Every morning after her husband left for work, she would pick up the car and drive to every office with positions listed online or in newspaper hoping her resume will make it to right hands and not sit in a database.

During one such day, she handed her resume to Lynne Kelly, HR lead at Macrovision. After few rounds of interviews in January, she was offered her first role as a tech support engineer in Macrovision (which became Rovi Corp. and is now known as TiVo). For

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her, this meant the world as it was her first real opportunity and her only shot at proving herself. She started volunteering for any extra projects coming to her team. During one of her projects working in a cross-functional tiger team, she was offered a role in Product Management (PM). Her journey in PM started from there. This is exactly what she was meant to do.

Her MBA from India complimented with a MS from the U.S. was a great combination to understand business and technology.

From Struggles to Opportunities Having started as tech support gave Sudha a new fond respect for the customer experience. Her outlook towards building any product changed and is fundamentally based on three principles even to this date, which include three questions; Is it simple? Can it be explained to a 10-year-old?

April 2019|

Be the change you wish to see in the world. When you see something needs to be changed, step up, take the lead, and execute.

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Sudha Mahajan Sr. Director Product Management (Principal Group PM)

April 2019|

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What problem does it solve? A problem well understood is half solved.

Women in Leadership Positions Women are now seen coming into the limelight with their exceptional talents. Even Sudha believes that the corporate world is changing and is much more receptive to change than it was about 15 years ago. In her opinion, companies are being far more open to hear diverse perspectives and promote diversity. Microsoft, for example, has women in 19.7% of its leadership positions as reported in its annual comprehensive workforce demographic report released in November. Sometimes it becomes difficult for female executives to find their voices in leadership forums. “To make a true difference – we need more men who support women. Men that are willing to create opportunities for women, willing to give them a voice and have them heard.

This is not “him” vs. “her”- this is “us”. We are in this together to make a change!” says Sudha. While there is still a lot of work that need to be done in this area, many companies have started to recognize the benefits of a diverse workforce. They are offering platforms like WIT (Women in technology), support groups, better maternity and paternity benefits to encourage women and help them become future leaders.

Is this the right solution? Do we have data that supports it?

Thereon, the journey of Sudha started reaching new heights.

She has led various managerial roles and has now become passionate in building new products and solving complex problems. She served almost 8 years at Yahoo! as a director of product leading its largest display advertising and data platforms. She also held an important role of Head of Product-Customer Experience at Flipkart, where she managed product management, design and product operations. Currently, she leads a Product team in Microsoft Azure heading Customer excellence and cloud security.

It’s not about Limitations of Technology Sudha has accumulated an enriching experience in tech sector. According to her, every technology has limitations but it’s the limitations that spark the next opportunity for innovation. Over the last decade, many new expansions are been witnessed people never thought of before. Examples like Uber, Airbnb, Waymo, VR, Vimeo, Square are just few that filled an important gap. Uber connected people to transportation like no one else. Self-driving cars are becoming a reality. Mixed reality is close to real world experience that it is opening new markets in areas like travel, healthcare and retail.

Many companies have made it a requirement to have diversity training before conducting hiring interviews, some companies have requirements like including at least one woman in interview panels, and now many companies are considering having at least one women sitting on the board.

These are positive changes that will hopefully encourage more women to grow their careers in technology.

Many of the above are not perfect but improving every day.

The fear of new technology failing due to unpredictable embracement by masses can impact the next big thing to be invented.

Being Fearless is the Key According to Sudha, a business leader should be fearless and a risk taker. The data says that majority of the businesses are unsuccessful, not the business leaders. A true leader is one, who tried and never gave up and the one who either succeeded or learnt. “Fear no one, seek solutions, find a mentor and be decisive. It’s ok to fail, its ok to accept failures, its ok to try again and again. There is no single person who knows it all – so reach out deep and wide. And lastly help others who are in need,” advises Sudha.

Sudha believes that it is not limitations of the technology that impacts the markets, but that fixed mindsets to not try out new things which impacts growth. An organization should embrace a growth mind set without the fear of outcome and continue the path of change.

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April 2019|

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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April 2019|

Unbiased Future

Establishing

Gender A

say “I want to be a director, but I still have children that I 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 April 2019|

E uilibr um

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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Cassandra Photo by: Melissa Katherine

Hamel

Conjoining Passion and Creativity to achieve Success

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t is certainly a passion about any particular thing that makes an individual keep moving towards his/her goal. And when, creativity is accompanied with passion, the outcome is absolutely enchanting and favorable. One such individual is Cassandra Hamel, the Founder of Milton Country Retreat “The Chocolate Cottages”, who is smartly combining her passion and creativity to reach a new milestone in her business.

Cassandra is now known as “The Chocolate Lady” but this isn’t how the story started.

Cassandra Hamel Founder Milton Country Retreat “The Chocolate Cottages”

A creative mind, Cassandra, enjoys art and had the desire to make beautiful edible chocolate creations. When her second child was only a year old, she decided to embark on crazy mission to become a Chocolatier. She owns a cottage, which was then providing chocolate strawberries to its guests at the time and she wanted to expand its offer to be something more unique. After her chocolate studies, she spent hundreds of hours creating edible art pieces for her cottage guests. As she was still learning at that stage, she decided to make them a complimentary gift for her cottage guests and this gesture converted into an opportunity for her to be creative and master her craft. The joy of giving a special gift that was deliciously beautiful became the motivation & vision of the business. Thereon, the company decided to re-brand to become Milton Country Retreat “The Chocolate Cottages”. It is now a chocolate retreat providing extremely unique chocolate experiences, chocolate sculpting workshops, chocolate antiquity experiences & chocolate champagne picnics just to name a few.

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with exceptional service is paramount in sustaining a leading position. Many businesses have a vision of what they want to achieve, they throw money into marketing and then sadly don’t initially get the outcome they desire, they try again and again each time with a new marketing plan, a new idea. This leads to their detriment and they lose their brand identity and market place to their competitors.

Encouraging to Take Ownership Before starting up her own business, Cassandra worked for over 20 years in various management roles, in fields such as retail, human resources & merchandising management.

Every management position she was offered was due to her openness to learn and undertake training courses. She jumped at any chance to learn something new, which then leads onto the next opportunity. She also opines that one should apply for everything, even if he or she is not qualified enough. It is captivating to know what people can achieve when they stop listening to the negative voice in their head and just truly go for it.

Learning from Mistakes The significant thing Cassandra has learnt recently is that one should dream, but one should also learn to “Let Go”, as people can get blinded with being stuck on one particular idea or a one-track mind to reach their ultimate goal. She says, “Business is like the weather, ever changing and unpredictable, so you need to be able to adjust with the seasons, dance in the rain so as to speak, and to make sure that you are open to new ideas and opportunities which may actually be exactly what you need to succeed.”

Cassandra hopes to continue to learn from her mistakes, enjoy the ride and continue to live a life filled with decadent passion.

Also, for Cassandra, nothing compares to owning a business. When she left the corporate world, she finally felt free to truly follow her passion, find her niche and embrace all her strengths and skills to create something truly beautiful, something she is extremely proud of.

Utilizing Technology to Strengthen Brand In the opinion of Cassandra, the advancements in technology and the growth of using social media as the advertising medium of business are paramount in its success. Cassandra believes in the power of knowledge. She also wishes that she had the knowledge she has right now back then when she started this journey. Being in the accommodation game she had to learn to use Online Travel Agents to her advantage and not any disadvantage. The fresh new accommodation owner sadly falls often into the trap of using these companies to bring them business in their peak periods. Instead, they can use them as a secondary tool to fill slow selling rooms and instead investing their time and money establishing their own branding & driving sales to their own webpages. This is the true key to long term success of any accommodation owner in today’s flooded world of competitors. With so many accommodation choices especially since the successful growth of Air BNB, businesses need to use technology to their advantage to stand out from the crowd. They should have a unique selling proposition and ensure that their social media marketing, their SEO and their services are all aligned to continue to strengthen their brand.

Being Passionate is the Key According to Cassandra, being passionate is an essential attribute every leader should possess. If one is not passionate about what one does, he or she won’t last through the dark days. Business is hard and exhausting, and huge investment of time and money is needed especially in the beginning stages. Cassandra has a young family, so it’s a daily balancing act of being a mother and a so-called business entrepreneur. But, it is her passion that helps her through when she makes mistakes, that inspires her to try again. It’s the unwavering hunger to achieve the goals she is incredibly passionate about that have helped her believe in herself when she has doubts. She asserts, “If you go to sleep thinking about your business, if you constantly day dream about your goals, then I believe you are on the right track to great success.”

She also adds, “Be brave; don’t listen to any negative talk, especially your own, if you have a deep hunger to achieve something, don’t let anything get in your way. I won’t lie to you, it’s not going to be easy, but if you are truly passionate about something you have to dig deep and give it everything you have to achieve it.”

Addressing the Importance of USP Cassandra believes that a unique selling proposition, paired

“Not all girls are made of sugar and everything nice.

Some are made of adventure, dark chocolate, intelligence, cuss words, and courage.” – Brooke Hampton April 2019|

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Donna Wilczek An Inspirational Tech Leader and Inventor

“

People are the center of business.

The more you genuinely care about making the other person successful, the more successful you will be.

“

Donna Wilczek Vice President of Product Strategy & Innovation

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s technology continues to impact all sectors, women have been instrumental in empowering the tech space and have acquired coveted positions in leading organizations. Increasingly, women entrepreneurs are contributing to the technology space with an extra dose of grit, perseverance, and strength of purpose.

One such tech leader is Donna Wilczek, the Vice President of Product Strategy and Innovation at Coupa. Donna is an energetic software executive with more than 15 years of experience in both fast-paced and large technology companies. She is a dynamic leader with a particular passion for working with colleagues to make customers wildly successful. She engages this passion for customer success through such vehicles as the Coupa Executive Advisory Board, of which she is an executive sponsor. She is also an inventor with three software patents created with her Coupa colleagues.

Born and raised in a working class neighborhood blocks away from Midway Airport in Chicago, Donna could never have imagined a career in the heart of Silicon Valley as a leader at a NASDAQ-listed company. As a child, she was surrounded by people who made their living through manual labor and sheer hard work. Naturally, she began on the same path but her love of learning changed her course.

“Growing up, extreme hard work was at the center of everything I saw, but learning was at the center of what I loved. Starting at the age of 14, I spent many summer mornings working on a factory floor packing tea boxes and trying to be faster and more efficient with every pallet that went out the door,” said Wilczek in a recent

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interview. “After my morning job ended, I would then go to work at a video store. But I had a book ready to read in any spare moment.”

Even though Donna was a straight A student, her love of knowledge propelled her to spend the money she earned on after school classes.

“To this day, my mom teases me that I must have been the only 15 year old around that had a goal of using their personal earnings to pay for tutoring to get even more A’s.” But it was also Donna’s mom that inspired her to strive for excellence and who encouraged her that she could do anything she put her mind to.

Donna’s very large immigrant Polish family and extended family demonstrated the true meaning of community. “My parents and relatives helped everyone and always looked out for one another,” said Wilczek. “I was the middle child with five siblings. My two older sisters were incredibly supportive and I did everything I could to help with my three younger siblings.” This combination of grit, hard work, love of learning, empathy, and a focus on results would prove to be the very foundation of her success.

In our interview with Donna, we talked about these critical success factors.

The Spirit of Innovation Donna fundamentally believes that “none of us is as smart as all of us.”

She brings a collaborative spirit to problem solving, engaging customers, end users, colleagues, and other experts around the world, diving in and turning over every rock to understand both the big picture and the details of the market and its problems. When asked about her views on tech innovation she shares, “It starts with a

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deep passion for solving problems and empathy for the people experiencing them. You need to truly care. If you dig in on something you deeply care about and set your sights on understanding every angle of the problem, it makes it easier to create an innovative solution.”

Winning Together Donna finds tremendous joy in helping others succeed. She is a firm believer in the exponential impact created when you lift, encourage, and support one another. In her words, “This is how 10 people can execute as 100, or 100 as 1,000; it creates an exponential impact of every individual. As we grow as a company, the key is infusing this spirit by modeling this spirit daily and creating a community filled with people (both colleagues and customers) wanting to win together.” Donna also encourages men to understand and embrace the value of diversity and to support women leaders. When men and women are united in this goal, an environment is created in which women can more smoothly and effectively rise to leadership positions and be successful in these positions.

Shooting for the Stars With Coupa since 2011, Donna has held a variety of key leadership roles that have helped propel Coupa from early startup days to a public company with $260 million annual revenue.

Donna spoke to us about the principle of striving for excellence. “When I was a little kid, my mom instilled in me that nothing is impossible. It’s no wonder I thrive on working with my colleagues to reimagine and create our industry’s future. The lofty shared vision creates a huge sense of purpose.

Over and over I find that my mom was so right - get rid of self limiting thoughts and shoot for the stars.”

Stellar’s Vision

Ms. Nin Desai President & CEO NIN.VC

in the

Venture A

s of 2017, 6% of the venture capitalists were women and only 2.7% women owned businesses received venture capital funding. Being a VC in this startup economy, where 90% of startups fail, is a tough job. However, it has noting to do with gender.

World

While there are number of factors responsible for success in the venture capital industry including timing and luck, top of that list is a disruptive technology. A disruptive technology is an innovation that changes the way an existing industry functions and also helps create a new market and value network, displacing an earlier technology or a way of doing business.

“Hi. I am Nin Desai. I head a crowdfunded technology venture capital firm, NIN Ventures (or NIN.VC). We invest in Series A & B rounds of disruptive technology companies.”

E.g. 3D printing has been used for rapid prototyping and is being applied in a number of industries today, including

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About the Author manufacturing, automotive, consumer, aerospace, defense, and especially healthcare. As the accuracy and materials market have improved, the medical space shows great potential for this technology. There are about 114,000 people currently on the organ recipient list in United States; and only 34,770 transplants were performed in 2017. Every 10 minutes a new person is added to the waiting list and 20 people die every day because they cannot find a right organ.

What if 3D printing tissues can help save some of those lives?

Ms. Nin Desai, the President and CEO of NIN.VC, is an experienced fund manager and a technology geek. Her sweet spot is investing in disruptive technologies. Ms. Desai has been awarded 2015 CEO Of The Year – Illinois, for innovation and contribution to the Venture Capital & Private Equity industry by Acquisition International magazine and Private Equity Fund Manager to Watch for 2017 by Corporate America. She has been featured in VentureBeat, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun Times, Forbes, Inc, WGN’s After Hours with Rick Kogan, NBC Weekend Web with Charlie Wojciechowski, Bloomberg’s Taking Stock, Crowdfund Insider, and CIO Review to name a few.

Every sector at some point is up for disruption. E.g. Ad Tech. Over time as consumer behavior patterns changed, Digital has now replaced Traditional Television. People are now spending more time on their personal devices like phone, tablets, & PCs. An average American spends about 3 hours everyday on their personal devices, and this is the first time, the time spend on personal devices have surpassed time spent watching Television, which is a big change and opportunity for the Ad Tech Industry.

E.g. 4th Industrial Revolution. We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. The First Industrial Revolution used water and steam power to mechanize production. The Second used electric power to create mass production. The Third used electronics and information technology to automate production. Now a Fourth Industrial Revolution is building on the Third, the digital revolution that has been occurring since the middle of the last century. It is characterized by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the 3D, 4D, digital, other smart and biological spheres.

Ms. Desai’s experience spans all facets of mergers and acquisitions, and corporate finance including public offerings and private placements. She is a Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE) and has a technical diploma in E-commerce by IBM, holds Series 7 and 63 licenses from NASD, and is a B.B.A and M.B.A in Finance/International Business from Loyola University of Chicago. She recently attended a leadership program in Private Equity and Venture Capital at Harvard Business School.

However, great ideas and technology needs to be backed by a solid revenue model in order to attract customers as well as attain profitability for the company to be an attractive investment opportunity for a VC. E.g. our new initiative, Total Capitalism. A startup needs an ecosystem to thrive upon, thus it is very important for a company to understand the market dynamics, its impact on their industry, product, and also have a good understanding of the competitive landscape in order to achieve long term success. A disruptive technology needs to scale and a through analysis helps gage those risk and rewards.

compliment. However, flexibility and choices an entrepreneur / the team makes determines the future of the company. An amazing entrepreneur with a disruptive technology, a solid revenue model, and good understanding of the competitive landscape goes to vain, if the company does not communicate effectively or has a good execution strategy.

A CEO is the captain of the ship; and at NIN.VC we start with an entrepreneur because entrepreneurs build companies and not the other way around. Some of the qualities VCs look for in an entrepreneur are ability to dream big with ideas that scale, certain personality traits and work ethics like being focused, disciplined, and hard working. It’s important to have industry expertise and knowledge or surround yourself with people that April 2019|

Venture Capitalists are known to invest in unicorns that prove to be home run for their LPs and while there is no secret recipe for success, hope this helps in understanding the art and science behind each of that investment.

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Erna Grasz Leading Global Social Change

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meaningful life in its entirety is defined by what we understand as our true purpose.

Those who apply their skills to helping others, whether locally or for a global cause, nurture within themselves patience, fortitude, and selflessness, often showing how to go out and change the world.

Similarly, the intention of this issue, Most Admired Women Leaders in Business, is to shed light upon individuals working to fulfill their personal purpose. The results of our search to find such people wouldn’t be complete without Erna Grasz, the CEO and Co-founder of Asante Africa Foundation.

Pioneering unknown territories, tackling complex challenges, and making the impossible possible—all of these challenges are nothing new for Erna Grasz. Grasz laid the foundation of Asante Africa Foundation with two visionary women, one from Kenya and the other from Tanzania. Grasz refers to herself as a “Systems Engineer turned Systems Entrepreneur for a Global Impact.” Originally trained as an Electrical-System Engineer, Grasz spent her early career at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and then in Silicon Valley as a Vice President and General Manager.

During her 25 years in the corporate world as a senior executive, Grasz earned a reputation as an effective strategic leader, known as “the organizer of chaos,” with substantial success in diverse industries. In 2012, she transitioned her leadership skills

from her role as Chief Technology Officer in the medical device market to the non-profit world as CEO of Asante Africa Foundation.

Grasz not only brings her business savvy to the global non-profit world, she’s also one of its visionary leaders, developing many innovative programs and practices. She maintains a strong belief in the power of leveraging locally available talent and partnerships to ensure the foundation’s success and long-term sustainability.

Erna has been recognized for her work worldwide, receiving the national Jefferson Award for public service and the Distinguished Engineering Award for innovation in developing countries.

In 2016, she was a HULT Prize Judge for Innovation in Urban Slums (Clinton Global Initiative). Recently, Grasz received the 2018 Gratitude Network Award. In 2018, Asante Africa was honored with the USAID Young Women Transform Prize, receiving recognition for the organization’s Girl-Led Leadership and Entrepreneurship Program. To date, Asante Africa Foundation’s programs have empowered almost a half-million youth and teachers directly and through its alumni’s ripple effect.

The Scepter of Leadership and Compassion In Grasz’s view, over her progressively diverse career, the one thing that has remained constant is change. An optimist at heart, she sees chaos as a potential opportunity for creating a ‘new normal’ and for improving existing systems.

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“Technology provides a collaborative platform and creates reality from what was only a dream a decade ago,” she says. As an engineer, she is constantly looking at technology as part of a system’s solution, but not the only solution.

As a team leader, Grasz defines what can be a program’s “true north.” She then brings the appropriate talent on board, and helps the team become comfortable with the unknowns, while navigating toward the collective “true north.” She also fully recognizes the need to have a Plan B, Plan C, and Plan D as things unexpectedly weave and change, upending the original plan.

Grasz has frequently been told that getting from point A to Point B will be messy. Her response? “Part of being a good leader is helping a team minimize the messiness—but also assuring everyone that sometimes messy is okay.” “The journey to true north is never guaranteed to be in a straight line,” she says.

When asked what vital attributes a business leader should have, Grasz says that number one is the ability to adapt. Also, a strong leader must remain humble, she says, because he or she might not have all the answers at any given moment-- and that’s okay.

Another quality is authenticity—to be able to develop the trust of colleagues and teammates to struggle together for a shared vision. “If you have no followers, you’re a lone nut and not a leader,” Grasz says.

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’Paying it Forward’ Grasz passionately believes is mandatory to successfully grow the next generation of talented leaders. As the first in her family to go beyond high school, she’s achieved what she has because other people recognized her potential and helped open doors for her.

Their encouragement led her to college and later to become an electrical engineer. Each of these steps helped propel her toward her global success today.

toolkit. In her 30s, she developed her reputation and street credibility. And she spent her 40s going global in the corporate marketplace. Now in her 50s, Grasz immerses herself in creating global change, using all she’s learned in her previous decades.

Grasz will tell you that developing a social-mission focused on global issues is the hardest effort--and equally the most rewarding one—she’s ever undertaken. She says: “Developing the next generation of leaders is a global-sized challenge, yes --but it also reaps global-sized rewards”.

As for confronting cutthroat market competition, Grasz believes that regardless of the market, the leaders of the organization, as well as the implementers, must always stay alert, listening to the “ground truth,” while staying abreast of market data and trends. Her guideline: Continuously learn, grow, innovate, and adapt or you will become irrelevant.

“

No one travels their road alone.

Having fun and travelling your road with trusted friends and colleagues, is the real definition of success.

“

Overpowering the Stereotypes Grasz believes that we should recognize that leadership isn’t a title but a sphere of influence. Everyone has the potential to lead from wherever he or she stands at any moment. And each of us has the personal power to be a positive role model, regardless of job title or formal position.

Grasz recommends several ways to nurture positive growth: Women and girls should be encouraged to raise their hands, even when they don’t have 100% of the information. All of us need to recognize that we don’t have to be 100% correct all the time. Women typically have brilliant instincts and intuition, as well as the intellect to make good decisions.

Women and girls need to use their networks, support each other, advocate for each other, and not be afraid to use their voices on their own behalf.

Today’s global and workplace dynamics are very different from yesterday’s, and no one has the exact recipe. In her advice to future generations of business leaders, Grasz says, “Trust your instincts and intuition, as well as your intellect.

I have always thought that young people need to face, not fake, it while they’re figuring it out and to recognize that to some degree everyone is figuring it out! So--be bold, stay humble, and rally experts around you. You don’t have to do it alone!”

Envisioning Global Development As a young professional, Erna Grasz always knew her many diverse skills and talents would come together at some point for a higher purpose--but she didn’t know what! She spent her 20s developing skills and adding tools to her

Erna Grasz Co-founder & CEO Asante Africa Foundation

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Janaki Joshi Stepping Up and Embedding Innovation in the DNA for Customers

n this highly competitive business world, the success of any company is reliant on three key factors: ability to innovate, discipline to implement and an adept commercialization of the product or service. Businesses that excel in these key factors can thrive on a global scale.

I

For the last twenty-ďŹ ve years, New York based company Iris Interactive is enabling its customers to transform new ideas into successful brands through its secure collaboration platform that fosters excellence in innovation, commercialization and execution.

The biggest challenge for innovation is cherry picking the right ideas and achieving launch success by aligning cross functional teams. This requires real time access to information as the innovation progresses through the stages of commercialization. However, keeping the cross functional team aligned on the same page is impossible without an innovation platform that provides real time information on the feasibility or issues that occur along the way to launch.

Meet Janaki Joshi, the CEO and prime innovator behind Iris Interactive. Under Janaki’s leadership, Iris and its cloud based solutions are empowering its customers to bring innovative products faster to market.

The solutions developed by Janaki and her team provide complete insights to the entire company. R&D, manufacturing, product management, marketing, ďŹ nance and sales can manage end-to-end innovation and achieve

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breakthrough success in product commercialization. The company revolutionizes the innovation process through the Iris Innovation Hub, the virtual platform, by making both open as well as and challenge-based innovation part of the DNA of its customers., Iris has a proven track record in helping hundreds of large, mid-size and small size companies. In the last two decades, Iris has helped companies transform their innovation and product commercialization with unparalleled success across 25 countries.

Curiosity, Converting an Idea into a Venture Back in the 1990’s, during the early stages of her career, Janaki was trained as an accountant and had opportunities to work in large consumer, pharmaceuticals and telecommunications companies. During this time, Janaki witnessed the need for technology in innovation and product commercialization. She recognized that although there were automated systems to track every activity related to accounts, essential processes like innovation and product commercialization were managed in an ad-hoc manner leading to wasted investment, resources, reduced chances of success and loss of competitive advantage.

Women wiling to prove their mettle in business world are expected to be a great mother, wife and a leader. It creates external pressure on them and sometimes weakens their will power. However, Janaki highlights the landscape is now changing with the millennials not relating to the stereotypes. Thus, things will be different for women a decade or two from now. This shift is extremely positive as it will enable women to own their power. They will step up to the challenge and will speak up, breaking old stereotypes to become more open minded and acceptable to the change.

In order to catalyze this, Janaki advises budding women entrepreneurs to believe in themselves even when everyone around them is doubtful, be bold and follow their vision.

She encourages them not to be afraid to fail, as failure in the first attempt is a stepping stone for success in the next venture. She exclaims, “The future is promising, so go forth and make a difference!”

Janaki’s curiosity and vision to bridge this gap led to the formation of Iris Interactive. Realizing the need and potential of the technology Janaki along with her team created a system that helps the entire company achieve faster time-to-market, higher sales and stronger brands.

While describing about the innovation powered approach of Iris Interactive Janaki notes, “Our philosophy is to innovate and stay ahead of the curve both technically and in the way we engage with customers.” The company aims to deliver exceptional value to customers by understanding the factors driving their business, and envisions making a difference with the Iris Interactive platform in the way they innovate and commercially succeed in their markets.

Shifting Gears of Entrepreneurship Janaki asserts vision, passion, authenticity, perseverance and respect are five attributes that are a must for a business leader of the 21st century. According to Janaki norms of entrepreneurship are changing. She believes we live in the age of transparency where even an intern in the company can find out crucial things about their leader and have a choice to be part of an organization or not. Hence, it is an absolute must for a leader to lead from the front and win the heart of every team player.

Work and Life Balance for All Janaki is driven by the vision to alter the corporate environment as it has become more stressful and everyone is looking for work life balance. She believes technology can empower teams to work from anywhere, connecting them with key activities and strategic initiatives in realtime, which will assuredly help in finding the work life balance. She is passionate to fuel such environment in Iris.

She has managed to transform the work environment for managers to telecommuting and coming to work only 1-3 days a week, making meetings shorter and more effective. It is satisfying for her personally and professionally as this customer centric and employee centric approaches kept Iris way ahead of its competition even after 20 years of its inception.

Stepping up Beyond Stereotypes A globally successful entrepreneur Janaki claims, “We still live in patriarchal society which is a byproduct of our agricultural heritage, and so the challenge stems from how men and women relate to each other not just at work but also at home and in other social interactions.”

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Successful Personality Traits to Learn from Elon Musk

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egends never need an introduction. They tend to be victorious despite of their uneventful histories. They stick to captivating traits such as Discipline, determination and self-belief which help them accomplish wonders in the long run. One such example of an extraordinary person is Elon Musk, a South African Business Magnate, Investor and an engineer.

employee of the company, setting standards for his colleagues to follow and implement. Since the field of work lies inside his radius of interests, he enjoys it to every moment and bit when it comes to learning and execution.

Strong Risk Tolerance Founding a start-up involves a great deal of uncertainty and risk. A study found that after 10 years of being in business, 96 percent of the start-ups fail. Going by the statistics, Musk must have faced the same odds against him, when he had decided to leave an otherwise comfortable life to start a risky and uncertain business venture.

Musk is the founder, CEO, and chief architect of SpaceX; co-founder, CEO, and product designer of Tesla Inc.; and co-founder and CEO of Neuralink. As of February 2018, he is the 53rd-richest person in the world and has a net worth of $20.8 billion, which is far more than the net GDP of Greece taken into consideration.

For instance, Musk left his PhD program at Stanford University to find a company called Zip2 with his brother in the year 1995. Later, the company was sold to Compaq computers, profiting Musk a bit over $20 million.

Following this, Musk once again took a great risk by investing millions of dollars to found a company called X.com, one of the world’s first online banks.

While each entrepreneur possesses a unique set of traits that makes him/her successful, this Tech founder has a few traits much different from any other ordinary CEO, which has allowed him to build some of the world’s most respected and innovative organizations. Musk once quoted, “When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.”

‘Always Be Learning’ Attitude An astounding and less-known fact about Elon Musk is that he is self-taught in programming and in many advanced level subjects. He read and understood a variety of books, which helped him gain endless and persistent knowledge and understand diverse concepts.

Let’s have a look on these personality attributes and characteristics that make him a contender for the most innovative intellectual entrepreneur of the century alive.

Hard-work and Characteristic Work Ethics Elon Musk is a hard-working innovator, working for about 100 hours a week, and has been productive since many years. He may even be considered as the hardest working

The best piece of advice on learning and implementation is to constantly think about how things could be done in a better manner and question self to seek the answers.

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Imparting Wisdom

It is equally essential to maintain clarity of doubt in any large scale organization. Under his supervision, Musk encourages in creating a positive and comprehensive environment across his firms.

Feedback Loop It is of prime importance to recognize the present symbol or otherwise ‘status quo’ in the market as an organization and re-position accordingly. Musk solicits constant feedback of the companies and executes ‘selfanalysis.’ He induces efforts and divergent strategies to improve customer feedbacks and strives towards perfectionism.

Preferring to Stand Out From the Crowd Musk elects to bring up innovation at every level of his understanding. He tends to impart theoretical knowledge at the base level, applying changes and executing the same on the practical level. He relies more on transitional aspects such as research and development, thereby increasing the probability of ground-breaking inventions.

Tesla Motors, a far headed firm headed by Elon Musk, is anti-ordinary. Its compelling marketplace has become a one-stop destination for potential buyers where they can interact about product specifications. They also have video testimonials that far outperform in the sales-dominated industry.

For example, he seeks out his critics and tries to converse with them. This habit of self-reflection at regular and considerable periods is pivotal for any entrepreneur or organization to succeed in the long run.

Tendency for Vertical Integration Vertical integration is a strategy where an organization or a firm acquires business operations within the same product vertical. Both Tesla and SpaceX embrace this concept. For example, Tesla not only produces electric cars; they also generate public awareness about their cars via Tesla showrooms across various countries. And SpaceX does not only have the primary goal of rocket propulsions; they develop their own rocket architecture as well.

There is no ambiguity that Musk, by far, has been a pillar of inspiration for budding entrepreneurs and investors because of his prolific and optimistic approach towards life All these traits possessed by Musk, in some manner or the other, coincide with most of your habits. The only thing that stands as a potential barrier between these two is identifying your strengths and working on them on a continual basis. Go on, apply these traits into your daily life, and you may become the next big CEO the world is in need of today!

Faith in Self and the Founding Team Musk undoubtedly possesses a profound belief in his own capabilities as well as the potential-seeking factor of its founding team. He does not hesitate to gamble on large scale unless he is genuinely aware of the expected endresults.

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Kathleen Brandt Senior Vice President of Technology & Chief Information Ofcer CSX

Kathleen Brandt Driving Curiosity to Seize Opportunities

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t is curiosity that bridges the knowledge gap between what one currently knows and what one needs to know. It fuels a leader’s capacity to go the extra mile. Curiosity not only enables competence, but also helps navigate challenges. This trait elevates the leadership game. For a leader it serves as a means to expand knowledge, build relationships, seek alliances, and gain a deeper understanding of self and a way to succeed across different cultures. A profound leader, Kathleen Brandt, aptly exemplifies the phenomenon of curiosity by possessing the ultimate combination of an insatiable thirst for

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knowledge and a desire to make the world a better place. Driven by curiosity and a desire to make a difference, Kathleen began her career at CSX, a leading North American transportation company with a 21,000mile rail network serving customers in 23 states, in 1985 as a software developer. She progressed through positions of increasing responsibility, across many functions within CSX Technology, gaining a unique perspective of railroad operations and eventually earning a leadership role as Senior Vice President of Technology and Chief Information Officer.

talented innovators and delivering tools and best practices that advance the company toward that objective. Agility is her trademark approach in both technical value delivery and her professional leadership style. She leverages benchmarking, frequently communicating with leaders from various sectors, and then using their insights to identify opportunities to improve CSX’s systems and processes.

She also partners with key business leaders, as well as leading suppliers, researchers and academia, to maintain a fresh perspective.

Inculcating Technology to Build Topnotch Solutions

Exemplifying Agility CSX’s goal is to be the best railroad in North America, and Kathleen takes personal responsibility for developing April 2019|

Kathleen has always had a thirst for knowledge that motivates her to seize opportunities to learn as much as possible about the business and her customers, and to create those opportunities when necessary. For any leader, continuous learning and a healthy dose of curiosity are paramount to success. This life-long pursuit of learning and growing – not just in your craft, but across many functions of business and industry – keeps leaders in touch and winning, she believes.

A Skill to Be Developed

Empowering Women to Take the Charge

Leadership requires effort. It is a skill developed through discipline, experience and humility. Kathleen embodies CSX’s leadership model, which defines key requirements of effective leaders. First, they must produce results, understanding that they must lead their teams to achieve aggressive objectives that deliver value for the company as a whole. Second, they must embrace change and actively foster a culture that rejects complacency and stagnation. Third, CSX leaders inspire excellence by setting a high bar and motivating their teams to create value.

Kathleen is involved with many organizations that focus on encouraging and engaging the next generation of women in STEM. She is on the Board of Directors of Railinc, Northeast Florida Regional STEM2 Hub, and Dreams Come True. She also serves on the executive advisory board of the Jacksonville University Davis College of Business, is a sponsor for SOAR, and is involved with the National African American Women’s Leadership Institute and Women in IT. Kathleen encourages women to take risks in exploring new roles and stretch assignments that will help them advance their own professional development and careers.

Kathleen takes a service-oriented approach to business leadership. She advises emerging leaders to be consistent, follow through on commitments and meet deadlines. By consistently doing what they say they’re going to do, she believes, young leaders will prove their value over time. Moreover, aspiring leaders should strive to make a difference for their teams, colleagues and companies.

They should focus on communicating to employees, clients and customers what’s in it for them, not what’s in it for the leader. Finally, emerging leaders should focus their energy on the things that truly add value and produce meaningful progress.

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Successful leaders are reliable business partners who deliver results, inspire excellence and make a difference within their organizations.

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According to Kathleen, technology is embedded in every aspect of modern railroading, playing an indispensable role in the industry’s constant evolution to become safer, more efficient and more service oriented. As a critical part of CSX’s transformative operating model that is driving unprecedented service to customers, technology enables the company’s progress toward reaching its strategic objectives. Now more than ever, technology is supporting CSX’s efforts to increase service agility, reliability, and – above all – safety. This creates a stimulating environment for tech development that draws people who are diverse, talented, innovative and seeking challenges. Kathleen’s leadership and strategic vision fuel her team’s delivery of exciting solutions for CSX, such as leveraging artificial intelligence for capacity planning; employing predictive analytics for engineering asset reliability and safety; and implementing progressive cybersecurity solutions that support workforce productivity.

Never Stop Learning

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Lea von

Bringing Innovative Changes in Health Sector

Bidder omen’s body endures many changes on different levels due to the impact of menstruation. This menstrual cycle states a lot about a women’s health condition on physical as well as mental level. Periods between puberty and menopause outline the good condition of the body. Similarly, having an irregularity or painful period shows the sign of a serious health problem. Ignoring these signs can lead to major health problems, including pregnancy problems. Bearing in mind these women’s problems, and to alleviate the pain and suffering Mrs. Lea von Bidder, the Co-founder and President of Ava Science, Ltd. is delivering significant solutions through her company towards women’s health safety.

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30 under 30 in 2018 and will become the CEO of Ava in January 2020.

An Admired Personality Lea has earned a master’s degree in global entrepreneurship from EM Lyon in France, Zhejiang University in China and Purdue Krannert University in the US. She completed her bachelor’s degree at the University of St. Gallen and at HEC Montreal in Canada. During her studies, Lea worked in the Marketing Department of Procter & Gamble in Frankfurt and for a strategy consulting firm in Paris. Lea was also a co-founder of L’Inouï, a company that produces and distributes high-quality chocolate in Bangalore, India.

A Visionary Approach Ava has the vision from very beginning of what AvaScience will be one day. Lea believes that the company, the team and the organization will develop together and an inspiring company’s vision and mission is to solve a problem. She also firmly believes in “hiring smart people, people that are smarter than you.”

Emphasizing on the Importance of Decision Decision making is the most essential trait which is critical skill for effective management and leadership. Indecision is a downfall for a person who wants to become a leader. Lea strongly believes that speed in execution is a critical success factor in fast-changing times and in order to bring true speed to an organization, decisions are needed to be taken non-centrally. And only leaders that communicate a clear vision and mission will be able to trust those decisions and get success.

The tracking of a woman’s cycle, fertility, and pregnancy is just the start of many exciting possibilities. In Ava science, Ava intends to further develop its technology, so that the Ava bracelet can also be used in the future to detect pregnancy complications and be used as a hormone-free method of contraception. Lea is conducting several ongoing clinical trials to these ends. With the Ava bracelet, the company is adding quality in women’s health effortlessly.

The bracelet is designed with comprehensive technology which has many features such as-

Ava was founded in 2014 by Pascal Koenig, Philipp Tholen, Peter Stein, and Lea von Bidder after Lea’s return to Switzerland. The company specializes in new developments in the field of medical technology related to reproductive health. Ava was voted as startup of the year in Switzerland in both 2017 and 2018 and won the Swiss Medtech Award in 2018. The Ava bracelet is the firm’s first product for the consumer market and uses state-of-the-art sensor technology together with clinically proven methods to pinpoint a woman’s fertile days in real time. The Ava bracelet has won several international awards such as "The Bump Best of Baby Tech CES 2017" award in the fertility and pregnancy category and the "Editor’s Choice" Award from Women’s Health magazine. Lea was awarded Forbes

It tracks sleep, physiological stress levels, and resting heart rate—so woman can see whether her lifestyle is supporting optimal health. Ÿ The device helps to understand how the cycle impacts the health with features like symptom tracking, trend analysis, graphs, and more. Trend analysis shows how Ÿ

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the menstrual cycle impacts the way someone feels throughout the month. Ÿ Ava bracelet is clinically proven to detect the very beginning of the fertile window—in real time, as it happens. That’s totally different than LH tests, which only detect the last day or two of the fertile window, and the temperature method, which only confirms ovulation after the fact. Ÿ After getting pregnant, one can get a whole new app experience with detailed explanations about what to expect in each week of pregnancy. Ÿ During pregnancy the device will continue track sleep, physiological stress, and resting pulse rate, as well as compare weekly weight gain to standard recommendations.

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What would Emily from Ohio think about that?

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Mrs. Lea von Bidder Co-founder & CSX Ava Science Ltd.

Encouraging Emerging Women Leaders Being a businessperson, Lea advises emerging women leaders that, “Find your tribe – It’s easier to not do this alone. It’s so important to do something you have a strong connection to and that really gives you fulfillment, because founding a startup comes at a price.” She believes that for empowering women for leadership position it is necessary to reduce gender bias. There are perceptions which should be changed such as women who bring their kids to work couldn’t find a babysitter; whereas men who bring their kids to work are adorable, and when kids grow up boys are good at math, girls good at languages. To encourage women it will be more effective if there are more female role models and mentors in workplace.

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Photographer: Nathalie Saruhashi

Demi Markogiannaki co-founder WeTeachMe

About the Author

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Maestro’s Insights

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omen in business have come a long way since Katharine Graham, the first female to lead a Fortune 500 company, assumed the role of Washington Post CEO back in 1972. Here in Australia, women now comprise 42% of all employees and more than 30% of all business owner-managers. In the large Australian corporations, the story is quite different; women hold the reins at only 10% of today’s companies and 14 of our Top 200 firms.

Has my journey always been easy? Far from it. A lot is expected from an expat like me. Or from any woman in business, for that matter. If we want to get promoted at work, we need to appear assertive, confident, and even dominant. We become chameleons and adjust our behaviour, according to what the situation requires, as we navigate our way from the war room to the board room.

The data suggest that it’s becoming more difficult for women to make the jump from key executive to chief executive. Macquarie Group founder Mark Johnson believes it might take another 20 years for the scales to tip again in our favour. It’s the story of many of today’s women CEOs.

How to Be an Assertive Leader Below, I share some lessons I’ve learned along the way, to help other young women navigate the different challenges and demands that a leadership role requires. To be more confident and decisive but also constructive and empowering, incorporate these five habits into your daily conversations and interactions, and learn how to fine-tune your ability to adapt.

Being Chameleon-in-Chief As a founder of the Australian company WeTeachMe, I can’t say I agree with Mark. After all, today’s world and business climate look nothing like they did 20 or 30 years ago. I hope that my own story will inspire courage and pave the way for others to create businesses that will create value, especially for other women.

Listen for cues. To be a good leader, at times, you will need to be a psychologist, a counsellor, an expert, a sister, a mentor, a friend. At WeTeachMe, I have worked in sales and in marketing. Both roles required me to master the art of active listening and hone my ability to quickly read the room. To be aware of what a customer or stakeholder is thinking or feeling is crucial to building trust and rapport, and helps foster the creation of long-term business relationships.

Before founding WeTeachMe, I had barely just arrived in Australia from Greece, to complete my masters in global media communications at The University of Melbourne. I had no background in business, and some may say I had no “business” entering into the arena of entrepreneurship. And yet, through sheer grit and desire to pursue our passion for education, my team and I grew WeTeachMe into the largest school in Australia, with thousands of classes available and even more learners enrolling every day.

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Mind what you say, and also how you say it.

Assertiveness doesn’t mean being overbearing or abrasive.

Be direct and communicate respectfully so that the other person can focus on what you’re saying, instead of how you’re saying it. Getting the message across is half the battle.

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Express ideas from your own point of view.

Starting your sentences with “I” can spell a world of difference. Instead of saying “you’re not listening”, put it in your own words: “I think what you’re saying is...” Rather than instructing someone to “work this way” say “I’d like your help with...” Convey your feelings and let your empathy come through.

Photographer: Nathalie Saruhashi

Learn how to say no. In the early years of WeTeachMe, I wore multiple hats. Most days, I took on more responsibility than was physically possible. Because that’s what a founder does; you go above and beyond the call of duty. From cold calling one minute to providing customer support the next, juggling tasks requires flawless execution. As WeTeachMe grew, I had to give up some of my hats. This was not an easy lesson to learn!

Today, with a better understanding of the value of focus, I pick three important things to accomplish every day and then, delegate the rest.

Maintain a professional demeanour. If you’re entering into a negotiation, present your case with confidence, without getting argumentative or emotional. Create a winwin situation for everyone, and they will see you, not as an adversary, but as a partner.

Leadership That Inspires Being in business is not always about cutthroat competition, winning at everything, and having it all; it’s also, if not more, about creating personal connections and nurturing the relationships that get us to where we are.

In and out of the workplace, we need to be effective and diplomatic, not just goaloriented. Lead through trust and respect, not through fear. Teach, don’t micromanage. And never stop learning.

Leadership is about having the ability to influence those around us, to rally everyone around a shared vision, to inspire people, and to get those who follow us excited to come to work day after day.

Leadership means celebrating our victories.

But it’s also about forgiving ourselves for our failures, because that is how we become wiser and better. Failing is the best way to learn, and a good leader never stops learning.

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Michelle Silberman Baking the World a Better Place!

H

ow often do we comprehend that painful void in our lives?

Sometimes it seems, as if it’s taking a good chunk of emotions out of us, as if it’s inevitable, incorrigible and unquenchable. We can safely say that this void is nothing but hunger for some good, gut filling, heart melting, and a ride to heaven kind of delightful food! And something similarly delicious is coming fresh out of the oven. An enchanting legend of how milk and cookies were magically combined by Michelle Silberman, the dessert fairy from Philadelphia.

Through times unknown, till being the CEO aka, the Chief Cookie Officer of Snackadabra, Michelle has always believed that life is a tapestry which encompasses the difficult as well as the beautiful times, and embracing the ‘now’ will unveil to us the lessons hidden in the adversities we face.

Talking about Michelle’s chef d’oeuvre, the Cookie Cup, it was an idea between two best friends in seventh grade. They thought, cookies and milk are the best snack, so why not combine them into one delicious, effortless and mess-free experience?

Years later, Michelle pitched the concept to her professor in an entrepreneurship class at Drexel University. She began prototyping the Cookie Cup in her dorm’s kitchen, and after countless hours, heaps of flour and thousands of chocolate chips later, the impeccable Cookie Cup was born.

Snackadabra’s commitment to quality and innovation is fueled by its mission to inspire a smile for every taste bud, every person, every time!

collaboration,” says Michelle.

importance to the Snackadabra team and for the evolution of the Cookie Cup is technology. For the first batch of Cookie Cups, Michelle flipped over a muffin pan to mold the dough. One side of the cookie burnt to a crisp. With the help of her father, who is also an engineer, she customized machinery to perfect the Cookie Cup. The second important thing is the comprehension of efficient leadership.

According to Michelle, a great leader is relentlessly committed to her vision, and with confidence she embarks on her journey in search of incredible people to join a dream to make it a reality. “It is important to admit your mistakes and fill in the gaps with the talent of the team you hire. It takes a village – and there is no substitute for

Entrepreneurial Epitome The first thing of paramount

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Michelle understands the strengths of her team. The talent at the company is exceptional at what they do and they do it with passion. Through experience, she has also learned to hire people who embody the organization’s core values, or its 10 Cookie Commandments. “The company rises and falls on its leader, so it is important to remain a strong example for the rest of the team,” Michelle expresses.

She adds, “In order to effectively motivate and inspire people, a leader must first have a deep sense of selfawareness. That’s not to say that a leader is 100 percent certain at all times. The truth is that everybody makes mistakes and a capable leader accounts for that. If you are the type of leader who screams at the troop, do you honestly think they will raise the flag and take responsibility when something goes wrong? Your team is your family, but you must set it up that way. Respect does not come easy, so cherish every opportunity you have, to truly deserve it from your team.”

When it comes to sustaining her knack for innovation and Snackadabra’s distinctiveness in the market, Michelle is always thinking of creative ways to enhance the experience of her customers through her sweet delicacies. Whether it’s about releasing new invigorating products, upgrading event displays, dressing up the team in memorable costumes, or organizing programs for local schools – she is always focused on quality and experience. Most of all, she is open to feedback from the team and the people she looks up to in business. Her April 2019|

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Chief Cookie Officer (CEO) Snackadabra – Food Magic

willingness to keep evolving is the very reason she is able to sustain a leadership position. Knowing that it takes time, she ceaselessly strives to provide the best experience for the Snackadabra squad and her cookie customers as well.

The world is run by Women too Michelle believes that the women on her team are a crucial part of its success. In order to encourage women to take leadership roles, she continuously takes a stand for women through her speaking engagements, hiring practices, and overall daily demeanor. She has shared her personal journey with confidence and in her pursuit has invited numerous women to the team who are inspired to do the same.

In early 2019, Michelle plans to launch a ‘Dessert and Dreams’ workshop where everyone on the team will jot down their personal goals and come together to express them through writing and crafting dream boards.

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This is extremely important to Michelle because she is committed to supporting her team in their personal goals.

In her advice to aspiring women leaders, Michelle says, “be very mindful of the people you surround yourself with. Especially as the leader of your ship, the entrepreneur gets to pick the team – so develop a fine tuned process for assessing people to make sure they are a fit for the company culture. Also, learn to focus on contributing in the best way possible.

One of Snackadabra’s core values is, understanding. This reminds the team to develop, and always be a student in life. Michelle treats this business as her Master’s and PHD degree. Even in the difficult moments, she looks at them optimistically as an opportunity to learn and grow by experiencing difficulties. She always says, “The magic only happens outside of your comfort zone!” Snackadabra is her vessel for growth and now that the

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Michelle Silberman

No matter who is sitting at the table, good food made with quality ingredients has a magical way of bringing people together.

team has introduced the Smart Cookie Education Series, Michelle has already begun to lead workshops within schools to help support and inspire students to be courageous and chase their wildest dreams.

Michelle’s journey, of grit and compassion, of humility and passion, and of creativity and inspiration, compels us to open the doors and step out of our comfort zone, and also to understand what she learnt from her mother, “everything that happens and everything that doesn’t is all for the best.”

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n an interview with Insights Success, Nicole Rodrigues, the Founder and CEO of NRPR Group, shares the insights behind her glorious voyage as an entrepreneur. The fervent and admired leader has driven the ascension of this distinctive public relations and social marketing agency with her contemporary and innovative entrepreneurial expertise.

Below are the highlights of the interview conducted between Nicole and Insights Success: Can you give us a brief overview of your background and the evolution of your career towards being a recognized business leader?

I have based my career path on following my dreams while being a pillar of professionalism and strength. My first professional PR job was at an enterprise software company until I left to pursue a PR role with the Oakland Raiders. Through my early career experiences I’ve learned to blend knowledge of tech and consumer/entertainment worlds to help tech, digital entertainment, consumer and consumer tech companies, be more relatable through clearer and relatable messaging.

In 2005, when I moved to the PR agency life, working on tech launches for eHarmony and Become.com before joining MOBITV as PR Manager and started building my expert reputation in the industry. Post MOBITV, I became Senior PR Manager at Voce Communications, managing accounts including Dolby, Yahoo!, and Sony PlayStation. I learned the beauty of incorporating social media and owned-media strategies into all account efforts. I was then recruited by Demand Media as director of consumer marketing, managing the marketing strategies for eHow, and LIVESTRONG.COM. I served as VP of digital entertainment at Bender/Helper Impact, where I led strategy for YouTube, Hulu, Hallmark’s Video Platform, M-GO, and others.

I leveraged every position I held as an opportunity to build expertise needed to succeed as CEO of my own agency. I worked hard, built a reputation for being accountable, reliable, and creative, knowing my reputation would follow me.

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I want NRPR Group to be the public relations agency of the future, serving consumer, digital, and enterprise technology companies. Public relations, digital marketing, social media, marcomms, events, and thought leadership impact a company’s marketing mix. We work closely with CEOs, executives, and internal PR/marketing teams to uncover specific passion, vision, and differentiators, and share those stories with appropriate audiences.

Pertaining to your leadership experience, how, according to you, do the changes in technology utilization, volatility of the market and talent recognition, affect the overall development of any business/organization?

A company must evolve to stay ahead of the changing industry circumstances. NRPR works largely with disruptive technology companies, which means we need to be ahead of the curve in using connected technologies. NRPR is dispersed with offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and the east coast. Through texting, email, phone, Slack, a shared cloud-based drive, shared software databases, and more tools that allow us to remain connected, though many of us are dispersed through multiple offices, the agency works as though in one location. Work-from-home days every Friday, provide the staff with freedom to accomplish personal tasks without lost work time. We are also able to serve clients outside of traditional office hours with full remote access to office resources. This flexibility empowers employees and increases satisfaction. Because the US is experiencing low unemployment, staff can easily leave jobs not meeting financial and personal goals. NRPR has low attrition and employees have the opportunity to grow their careers.

What according to you are the vital attributes that a business leader should possess?

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A leader gives back. Everything a leader does should be meaningful, informed and in top form. Leaders inspire others—especially future leaders—through feedback, mentoring, motivating them to pursue dreams and achieve their goals.

In terms of market competency, how do you strive to sustain your organization’s leading position?

NRPR is as an award-winning agency, known for its public relations and digital marketing expertise. I have created a continually updated playbook detailing best practices and standards for conduct, and have implemented weekly reading periods and discussions to assure staff are abreast of industry news and trends for pitching and

A leader gives back.

Everything a leader does should be meaningful, informed and in top form.

thought leadership. These activities translate into success—increased media coverage, sales leads, and revenue-generation in the millions for each client.

Considering the dire necessity of encouraging women to take up leadership positions, in what ways according to you, can this be achieved?

To achieve success in leadership positions women—regardless of marital status or age—can and should be amazing at work, without guilt. I know firsthand that it’s okay for moms to have a career and to be incredible at what they do—meaning thoroughly knowing your role, and also the roles

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of those you manage, so you can step in when help is needed.

Every time I walked into a job, I wanted to do my best for the company, and also for myself. I gave every job 110 percent, because I knew if I did a good job, not only would my employer be happy, but it would help me to improve and motivate them to give me more responsibility. I moved up quickly because of it.

What would be your advice for the aspiring/emerging women business leaders?

Don’t let anyone tell you that something is not appropriate for a woman. Do not change who you are to fit into sex-role stereotypes. Being feminine, caring, understanding, cooperative and organized has helped me grow as a professional and be respected along the way.

If you want to be taken seriously, don’t bring emotion, drama, and outside “stuff” to work with you. Your bosses, especially men, don’t respect that. I’m true to myself in every way, but as I grew in my profession, I try to always keep a level-head and be focused on work when I’m in the office.

I want my daughter to know that it is OK to chase her dreams and still be a nurturing mom. Your kids will understand, and they will admire you for the hard work and hustle you put into your work. I want to encourage working mothers and future working mothers to take pride in the fact that women in power, who are great at work, are great at life.

How have you envisioned your future with regards to your career as well as your personal growth?

My mom always told me I could do or have anything I wanted, provided I work hard for it. She’s living proof. I give my daughter the same advice, and I show her through my actions.

Attributes of a Good

Leader

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The Art of Leading

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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.

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 April 2019|

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 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.

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, Ÿ

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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.

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.

Empowerment Ÿ

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.

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

I Tessa Clarke Co-Founder & CEO

OLIO

n my role as chief evangeliser for OLIO – the world’s only neighbour-to-neighbour food sharing app – I speak about our work and journey at a lot of events. And without fail I’m almost always asked something along the lines of “How do you juggle having a family with a start-up?” Whilst this is an extremely valid question – and it touches on a topic that’s very close to my heart, it really frustrates me because I never hear the same question levelled at male peers. As a result, this seemingly innocuous question is laden with an enormous amount of gender bias, generally to the exclusion of men. I would suggest that if we want to achieve a fulfilled balanced life for all – male and female – we have to ensure that we’re all participating in this debate about work/life balance, and that inclusivity needs to be the starting point.

Another challenge in this area is, funnily enough, the gender bias experienced by men who choose to be the “stay at home Dad”! Several years ago my husband and I decided that given our respective career paths and motivations in life, it made sense for me to be the “bread winner” and for him to look after our two kids and home, whilst developing property in his remaining time. This has given me the flexibility to pursue the opportunities for OLIO with full vigour, and has been absolutely invaluable in terms of helping me to achieve a balanced life. However, sadly, my husband experiences more than the occasional disparaging passing comment and has even been asked “When are you going to get a proper job?” Thankfully he has no self-

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Imparting Wisdom

esteem issues, and thinks he has the best job in the world!

But I highly doubt that in this day and age anyone would ever dare say this to a woman; and so why to a man? If women are to be truly equal in the workplace – and to achieve a balanced life, then we need to adjust our perceptions of what it means to be a male in a modern society, and accept that this will require men to taking on an increasingly prominent role in the delivery of childcare – which is to the benefit of all involved, not least the children!

employee’s induction, we talk about the importance of a balanced life, and in our line manager training, we stress that the line manager is responsible for working with their direct reports to ensure that they are achieving a balanced life. What this means is that on a day to day basis our team chat will often show someone walking the dog at mid-day, someone else with their kids at 3pm and others heading off to swim or yoga. Each team member is responsible for ensuring that their work is done, according to whatever schedule best suits them, and as a result, we have an incredibly motivated and productive team, the majority of who say that working for OLIO is the best job they’ve ever had! If you aren’t already talking about how you can achieve a balanced life as individuals and as a company, then I can highly recommend spending some time on it, as the rewards will be enormous!

Gender issues aside, I spend a considerable amount of mental energy working towards achieving a ‘balanced life’.

I prefer the terminology of a ‘balanced life’ rather than ‘work/life balance’, because when you’re an entrepreneur (and especially an entrepreneur working from home), the two can become very mixed! And to suggest that ‘work’ and ‘life’ are the antithesis of one another surely isn’t what we should aspire to. In the very early days of setting up OLIO, it was pretty much impossible to lead a balanced life because we had to achieve so much, in so little time, and with virtually no resources. As we’ve grown the business and the team however, both Saasha my Co-Founder and I have achieved a much more balanced life – which is important, because the start-up journey is a series of marathons, not a sprint, and so it’s essential to avoid burnout. We find that working predominantly from home is extremely helpful in achieving balance (5-10 hours per week gained back through not having to commute!), and we both carve out time during our working days to exercise. In the early days we used to feel quite guilty about exercising when we ‘should’ be working, but now we recognise that if we’re to perform at our best then we need to be mentally and physically fit and exercise is absolutely critical for this.

Plus, I find that I have many of my best insights and inspirations for OLIO when working out, so it really is killing two birds with one stone!

Tessa Clarke is the Co-Founder and CEO of OLIO, a free app tackling the problem of food waste by connecting neighbours with each other, and volunteers with local businesses, so that surplus food can be shared, not thrown away. Since its inception in 2016, 850,000 people have joined OLIO and have together shared over 1.2 million portions of food.

OLIO also publishes ZeroWasteWeekly.com, a website and newsletter that aggregates all the best zero waste news from around the world.

Prior to founding OLIO, Tessa spent 10 years as a digital Managing Director in the media, retail and nancial services sectors, and gained her MBA from Stanford. Tessa is passionate about the sharing economy as a solution for a sustainable world, and is equally passionate about the importance of leading a ‘balanced life’.

As well as working towards a balanced life for ourselves, we’ve really baked this into the DNA of the company too.

And this has manifested itself in a couple of important company policies. The first is our holiday policy – we have no cap on the number of day’s holiday an employee can take; however we do have a minimum and insist that everybody has at least 20 days off. This is because we saw research from other companies who had adopted a limitless holidays policy, and it actually showed that the number of days worked by employees increased, not decreased! We also think it’s really important for the team to have a collective break over the Christmas holidays so everyone can really relax, confident in the knowledge that their email inbox isn’t rapidly filling up! We also ensure that in every April 2019|

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Nishidha Kumaresan

I

t is certainly believed that leadership is more about influence than authority. It is indeed an influence through which the change that a leader wants to see in others can be achieved. There is a thin line between managing and leading the team, whereas an influential leader is the one who could excel well in both.

One such leader is Nishidha Kumaresan, the Founder and CEO of Pioneer Technologies Inc., who has taken her business along with her team to the new heights.

Born in India, Nishidha came to the United States to pursue her Masters in Business Administration at Pittsburg State University. Upon graduation, she worked as an IT consultant providing Business and Systems Analysis to various Fortune 500 clients. Growing up in an entrepreneurial family she knew that she always wanted to be an achiever. It was not until 2010 when she had a financial responsibility and her mom fell ill that she decided to take the plunge and start Pioneer Technologies.

Pioneer Technologies started as a two women team and so far it has made careers for over 300 people. The company continues to work diligently to provide the best services to its clients as well as making sure its team is always taken care of. When Nishidha exited the corporate world, she had a good understanding of what client expectations are and so far she has been able to keep up to that through her company.

Stepping Up along with the Team

do face stiff competition. With many companies offering similar services in the market, they have to think more about what is going to set them apart and how to secure brand loyalty by anticipating trends and staying ahead of the curve. In the opinion of Nishidha, the key is to think outside the box and yet still give customers what they need. Businesses should improve their services over time by having direct communication with customers. The key processes are innovativeness, functionality and customer feedback which are necessary for managing competition and creating growth.

not include only delivery and the service provided but all other supporting elements as well which seem like simple components but are the most important. The team at Pioneer Technology knows how to differentiate on service and make sure to provide the highest quality services to all of our customers.

For Pioneer Technologies, its employees are its asset and the company makes sure that their growth is not just limited to professional but overall as well-rounded individuals too. When employees are well taken care of there is a lot of positive outcome.

Efficiency and Innovation According to Nishidha, customer satisfaction, relationship building, and retention along with employee satisfaction establish a highly differentiated position. Pioneer Technologies started with providing services in the area of business and systems analysis and soon after it started with system administration, software development and quality assurance.

Creating Growth

Nishidha believes that employees with customer interface are responsible for executing day-to-day client-facing communication so they link the business and customer. If that breaks down, the business is destroyed.

Pioneer’s employees becomes a trusted member for its customer’s team, ensuring that the product is delivered on time and works as it is supposed to, while resolving any issues quickly and accurately.

In the IT services industry businesses

Secondly, as for service, it just does

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It is a highly competitive market and there is a constant need to innovate and do things differently both in terms of technology as well as retaining the workforce and customers. So that’s what Pioneer Technology strives for “Efficiency and Innovation.”

Nishidha is looking forward to build a great company by meeting customer expectations with exceptional deliverables, mentoring and coaching her amazing team, and giving back to the community.

Encouraging Women to Grow Besides coming from a patriarchal society, Nishidha grew up among men who encouraged women to take on leadership roles. Not being ever told that she couldn’t do something because she was a girl helped her achieve what she has so far. After stepping out from that environment, she realized that it’s not the same everywhere. She believes that people should raise girls by encouraging them and supporting April 2019|

“

Let fear drive your

“

passion to succeed

and not hold you back.

Nishidha Kumaresan Founder & CEO

Pioneer Technologies Inc. them. More girls should be encouraged to take on STEM degrees. “As women, we have to confidently move forward while dealing with the biases. It is about showing up, speaking up and contribution,” says Nishidha.

Imparting Wisdom When asked about the essential attributes a business leader should possess, Nishidha asserts, “I think it is self -awareness which is understanding who we are, what we do and what we want. When we get ourselves, it’s a lot easier to define where we are heading and how we can be impactful. It’s also about leading by listening, being a role model and being authentic.”

Besides, she also advises emerging entrepreneurs to be confident and fearless, not to limit oneself, reach out to mentors, focus on networking , stay humble and grounded, and empower yourself to be able to empower others.

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Sheri Atwood Founder & CEO SupportPay

Sheri Atwood An Intersection of Technology, Business and Courage 66

April 2019|

C

an a woman run a technology business? This question always made investors or consumers skeptical about woman’s capability of leading a technology business. But, when a woman steps up, she doesn’t stop until she makes things happen.

Similarly, an avid entrepreneur, Sheri Atwood has taken vigorous efforts to eradicate this skepticism by inculcating evolving technology in building a top notch solution for making family life easier for parents who no longer live together. Serving as the Founder and CEO of SupportPay, Sheri is changing the way modern families live, manage finances and communicate.

She sets a noteworthy instance of dedicated and determined leadership.

Reformation Tale After spending 12 years in high tech and accumulating an enriching experience, Sheri decided to risk it all and start her own company. She taught herself how to code and became an expert in front end development. Her first company, Ittavi, Inc built SupportPay and successfully rose over $7M in venture funding by top Venture Capitalists including Tim Draper, salesforce.com & Aspect Ventures. She was fired from her own company after 7 months of raising a Series A and the company was liquidated 3 months later. She was devastated as it was the darkest time of her life.

But, this was not the end as she went an extra mile to reform SupportPay. During that time, she met another female founder who turned out to be her guardian angel. Not only was she there for support, she also helped Sheri in negotiating the purchase of the SupportPay’s assets. In the early 2018, she took out a personal loan and used the rest of her savings and successfully acquired the SupportPay assets back.

She formed a new company Smart Family Tech, Inc. Now, Sheri is continuing on her mission to help the millions of parents and children who deal with child support, sharing child expenses and financial conflicts in order to make everyone of their lives just a little bit easier.

April 2019|

“Don’t talk about it, BE ABOUT IT!” Sheri firmly believes that every business leader should possess the vital attributes of determination, grit and courage to get back up after one fails because failure is where one learns.

Child Support Management Platform Most of the modern families, which also include single parents, blended families, divorces, multi-generational households and many other combinations find it difficult to manage and track their child support and their shared expenses. Since child support is not just a single monthly payment but also a broad collection of shared expenses, parents must continually manage, communicate and negotiate over child related expenses.

The entire Listing 10 Sheri Atwood process is complex, time consuming and very stressful. SupportPay seeks to eliminate child support conflict and enable collaboration with an easy to use online application, providing both parents transparency while saving time & money.

SupportPay® is the first-ever automated child support payment platform, poised to transform the complex, time-consuming & stressful process that impacts nearly 300 million parents exchanging more than $900 billion in child support and child expenses worldwide. With SupportPay, today’s modern families can spend less time managing and arguing about child support, expenses and alimony and more time focused on raising happy, healthy children.

Heading towards the Future Despite the roadblocks that Sheri has faced, she is now striving to make SupportPay successful. She is now looking forward to mentoring more woman / minority entrepreneurs, as she believes that the journey of women

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entrepreneurs is very different than the typical young white male. She has learned plenty of things over the past several years and hopes to be able to share that wisdom with others so that they don’t repeat the same mistakes that she made.

Encouraging Women Entrepreneurship There is a dire necessity of encouraging women in taking up leadership positions. According to Sheri, this can be achieved by uncovering the potential of woman as well as young girls that demonstrates what is possible. Secondly, a way to enforce some of the equality is making the law of pay equality a requirement.

“Right now everyone talks about how woman only receive 2.2%of venture capital and only make up less than 5% of CEO’s for fortune 500 companies yet consistently deliver higher levels of return. Despite the data and proof there it seems nothing has changed.

Until there is an incentive or reason for a change nothing will. There has to be a compelling reason for white men to change,” says Sheri. She believes that hopefully the recent push of woman being unafraid to voice their stories will slowly make a difference in bridging the gender gap.

In order to encourage the emerging women business leaders, Sheri says “Have tough skin. Know you have to do better because the standard is higher but you bring a unique perspective to the table. Don’t be afraid to voice that perspective.

Support other woman, if not, none of us will ever succeed.”