Here is a brief excerpt from article written by Robin Madell for U.S. News & World Report. To read the complete article, check out other resources, and obtain subscription information, please click here.
* * *
The world is rapidly changing, and work along with it. When it comes to assessing what women still want and need to change in the working world, who better to ask than Marilyn Nagel, CEO of Watermark, a community of executive women who have risen to the top of their fields.
Nagel notes that while women have made progress in proving the business case for gender diversity at the executive level and on boards across many industries, there’s still plenty of work to do. “We have not gained the level of traction that we need in terms of representation as CEOs or even in the C-suite,” Nagel says. To help increase this traction, Nagel shares some insights about what women want in the workplace.
[Here is the first of five subjects discussed.]
Visible role models: With the emergence of executive feminism in the media, a number of top-tier spokespeople are bringing women’s career issues front and center. Nagel believes that having spokeswomen like Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook COO and author of the book Lean In), Marissa Mayer (Yahoo CEO), and Pamela Ryckman (author of the book Stiletto Network) inspires younger women to understand that they have more options for advancement.
“These are more visible role models than we had in the past,” Nagel says. “When Sheryl’s book came out, and she was endorsed and had conversations with the media providing press support, that positioned her in a different way to get her message out.” Nagel adds that no role model should expect to represent an entire gender. “They are individuals, and they represent a perspective,” she says. “I may not agree with everything they say or do, but what I admire about them is that they are pioneers.”
* * *
To read the complete article, please click here.
Robin Madell has spent two decades as a writer, journalist, and communications consultant on business, leadership, career, and diversity issues. She has interviewed over 200 thought leaders around the globe, and has won 20 awards for editorial excellence. Robin serves as a speechwriter and ghostwriter for CEOs and top executives, with a specialized focus on women in business. She is author of Surviving Your Thirties: Americans Talk About Life After 30, which is scheduled for publication in September 2013.