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 Diversity at Work - The Crowded House |
| As progressive companies invite more groups into their diversity and inclusion programs, can multicultural women afford to share the space--especially as the crumbling economy shrinks it? |
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By: Lisa Takeuchi Cullen ,
Illustration: Jitesh Patel
When Mary Bynum first interviewed at state farm 16 years ago, she didn’t even ask about diversity programs at the nationwide insurer. Bynum, who was born in Thailand but grew up in upstate New York, was one of the only multiracial kids in her hometown. But when colleagues suggested starting up an Asian affinity network, she was eager to help. Before she knew it, she was also convening a monthly lunch for women and mentoring ...
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| Featured Articles |
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Why Diversity Matters Now  |
| The economy may be in turmoil, but the Top 5 Best Companies for Multicultural Women refuse to retreat. Diversity leaders at General Mills, Goldman Sachs, ... |
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| Reaching Out and Raising Up |
| Reaching Out and Raising Up
A decade ago, Catalyst, a nonprofit membership organization, asked 1,700 multicultural women—all managers and professionals— to pinpoint what they felt ...
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| Worlds Apart |
| Working abroad can be a ticket to adventure—and advancement. Yet women of color often face unique challenges when cultures collide, especially with family in tow. ... |
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| Gender Trumps Race | |
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A look at women in business: Working Mother Media unveils the results of the Best Companies for Multicultural Women survey.
Research results from Working Mother Media's 2009 Best Companies for Multicultural Women shows a surprising trend in the position of multicultural women in business. Between 2003 and 2007, the rate of total multicultural women hires at our winning companies continued to outpace attrition, 18% versus 15%, respectively. All told, multicultural women represent 12% of managers, 6% of senior managers and 4% of both corporate executives and the boards of directors at our winning companies. By contrast, according to government statistics, ...
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| Xerox's New CEO: Ursula Burns | |
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Two tiers of women of the top to run Xerox.
A company with a strong history of a woman at the top has done it again! Xerox veteran and president, Ursula Burns has been named to replace Anne Mulcahy as Chief Executive Officer, while Mulcahy will remain Chairman of the Board.
At a time when America is beginning to realize that women’s voices and a diversity of voices in the C-suite and in the boardroom is increasingly important, Xerox continues to walk the walk. Both women have moved through ...
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| Women Of Iraq: Leaders Cry For Hope | |
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Despite continued violence, a delegation of courageous Iraqi women leaders look for hope in the women of America.
As a physician and politician in Iraq, Dr. Nara Ibrahim is no stranger to risking her life in the name of progress. “As a female politician, I was subject to killing threats. Some of my friends and colleagues were kidnapped and killed,” she said calmly, adding intently, “I hope for a better future.”
Hope is what brought Dr. Ibrahim and a delegation of nine other Iraqi women to the U.S. and to the offices of Working Mother. Their three-week ...
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| Small Slights, Big Problems | |
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Blatant racism and sexism are against the law, but what about more subtle slights that demoralize talented employees? Is that discrimination--or are we just being too touchy? Learn how diversity leaders are fighting back against "microinequities."
It was a seemingly innocuous comment. When white colleagues saw Michelle Hernandez, who is African American, with two of her coworkers—one African American, one Middle Eastern—many would say jokingly, “That looks like trouble!”
Michelle and her friends laughed it off at first. But as the comments became more pointed, the women—three of only ten minorities on a 100-person staff at a Richmond, VA, nonprofit—began to feel the remarks were racially motivated. “My boss told me, ‘When the three of ...
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| Taking Charge to Create Change | |
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To make the most of opportunities for advancement, a multicultural woman must first cultivate her own personal brand.
June Lee, MD, knows firsthand how often wrong assumptions are made about Asian women. Dr. Lee has been mistaken for a nurse or medical student by both patients and other doctors. “There are people in some key positions who still operate in a different world, a world in which a small Asian woman couldn’t be doing what I’m doing,” says Dr. Lee, who is senior medical director of clinical development for Genentech, a South San Francisco–based biotech firm. “If there’s ...
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| Women in South Africa | |
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South Africa Boasts a constitution that guarantees both women and gays equal rights. What's next? A push to get more women into power positions--in both the public and private sectors.
As Americans were witnessing presidential campaigns last August that broke race and gender barriers, Working Mother Media traveled to Johannesburg, South Africa, to learn about the challenges faced by its working women and what they’ve achieved in spite of the obstacles. The South African Advancement of Women Conference, sponsored by IBM, coincided with the country’s National Women’s Day, and it brought together some of the nation’s top female professionals to share experiences, create a dialogue on diversity and discuss best ...
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| International Woman's Day | |
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Our Day Has Come
Ever heard of International Women’s Day? Most Americans haven’t, but women in Russia, Iraq, Vietnam and many other countries celebrate March 8 by sharing gifts, celebrating hard-won rights and motivating women and girls to fight injustice. Now it’s our turn.
Victoria Faykin will never Forget international women’s Day in 1978. a young teenager at the time, living in rostov, russia, she received a flower and a lottery ticket from a boy in her eighth-grade class to commemorate the day. ...
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| Secrets 0f Success | |
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For multicultural women, the corporate track is still strewn with hurdles
In her new book, Double Outsiders , Jessica Faye Carter reveals the unspoken rules for reaching the executive suite.
Getting tapped as a high-potential employee to fast-track your career is not an exact science. Companies generally select high-potential employees and develop succession plans at high-level meetings, behind closed doors. A combination of factors—including excellent performance, professional image and exposure to key sponsors, mentors and informal networks—is necessary for women of color to get ahead in corporate America.
If ...
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| Inside the Top 5 | |
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Working moms give the inside scoop on our best companies.
When it comes to diversity and inclusion programs, the five firms that top our Best Companies for Multicultural Women roster offer a plethora of choices—from affinity groups and leadership training to mentoring and networking initiatives.
To get the inside scoop on why these companies excel, we asked a working mom at each one to talk about the programs that mean the most to her.
American Express
Anne E. Robinson
VP, Senior Counsel for Open from American Express
Mother of ...
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| Blazing Trails in Brazil | |
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Many Brazilian women are forging successful careers and enjoying benefits like generous maternity leave. Still, they lack basic work/life protections that we take for granted.
Imagine being asked to discuss your birth control in a job interview. While almost inconceivable for women in the United States, it’s par for the course in Brazil, especially for executive women. Though Brazil leads South America in its share of female workers, with women making up more than 50 percent of its workforce and 30 percent of its executive ranks, the country still offers little support—or protection—to working women trying to balance career and family.
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| Celebrating Women Globally | |
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A virtual event focused on the professional advancement of women
How best to recruit, retain and promote women is a top concern in many countries, even as socioeconomic factors, cultural values, infrastructure issues and inadequate international laws continue to impact the lives of female workers in different ways in various parts of the world.
As a presenter for Working Mother Media’s WebSeminar Celebrating International Women’s Day, sponsored by IBM and Shell, Laraine Kaminsky, executive vice president of Graybridge Malkam, an international consulting firm, called the event “an opportunity for ...
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| Great Expectations | |
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Multicultural Gen Yers are redefining attitudes about race, work/life and job advancement.
For Gen Y’s multicultural women, inclusion doesn’t mean joining an affinity group—it means having a say in where your career is going and how fast it’s moving. That’s why our top companies are pulling out all the stops.
Kelly Tharp doesn’t hold much back at work. The 27-year-old marketing rep for Chubb Group of Insurance Companies talks freely with colleagues about her Latina roots, her family, even her social life. While she’s generally an open book, Kelly says she ...
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| What Men Say Behind Closed Doors | |
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What do white male bosses really think about their women-of-color employees?
Some think they run from feedback, while others believe they don’t know how to network. Here, the most common (and most powerful) misperceptions you need to know about—and how to deal with them so they don’t hold you back.
Janet Crenshaw Smith has heard it all. As president of Ivy Planning Group, a Rockville, MD–based consulting firm that specializes in diversity and strategy, she’s listened to white male execs talk candidly about women. Some readily admit that they’re more ...
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| Show us the Money | |
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Top Women in the financial industry tell how to crack the glass ceiling
It’s no secret: In sectors like law, IT and finance, it’s still tough for working moms and women of color to break into the executive ranks. While there’s been considerable progress in the past three decades, the pay gap between men and women reminds us that equality at the top is not yet a reality. “It’s true that men still have an advantage in some industries, but that doesn’t mean women can’t get ahead,” says Subha Barry, head of global ...
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| Speaking the Same Language | |
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Miscues show up in subtle ways for women of color at work, where small errors in perception may have a big impact. Here's how to fix broken lines of communication.
For as long as she can remember, Lisa Ong, a Chinese American, has been polite and has respected her elders. It's how she was raised. This behavior is so ingrained in her that it's become part of her personality. As a result, early in her career she always deferred to senior managers and partners. And when colleagues expressed their views in meetings, she'd nod, sending the message that she agreed with them. She often didn't agree—a fact she'd share after ...
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| Build Your Skills | |
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Lessons on increasing your workplace clout for multicultural women.
Though it might often seem that the doors to advancement in the workplace are locked shut for women of color, women like Ursula Burns, president of Xerox Corporation, and Indra Nooyi, Chairman and CEO of PepsiCo, are proof that they can be opened—you just need to find the right keys. And though there are many ways to get ahead in the workplace, multicultural women in positions of power often mention three keys in particular—having a mentor, networking and self ...
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| Have Faith | |
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Things are changing as the number of workplace religious groups surges--and multicultural employees are shouting hallelujah.
Ramona Moore Big Eagle lives her life by a biblical credo: "In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct thy paths." These "paths" include both her personal and professional lives. In her two years in sales at Pitney Bowes in Charlotte, NC, Ramona, who is Native American, was known to utter a joyful "praise God" when colleagues shared news of their promotions. Today, God's words inform her work as a motivational speaker who runs her own company, ...
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| WOW Facts! | |
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A sneak peak at some surprising data.
Hard-hitting truths on diversity and women-in-the workplace taken from Working Mother's sister organization, Diversity Best Practices. U.S. Women's Political Participation 65% of women citizens voted in the 2004 presidential election, higher than the 62% of their male counterparts. *U.S. Census Bureau. (2005, May). U.S. voter turnout up in 2004, Census Bureau reports. Women of Color Congresswomen - of the 87 women serving in the 110th U.S. Congress, 21, or 24.1%, are women of color, all serving in the House. ...
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| Top Five 2007 | |
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Innovative programs that benefit women of color professionally and personally propelled five trailblazing companies to the top spots on our list of the Best Companies for Multicultural Women.
These corporations lead the nation in the representation, recruitment, mentoring and leadership training of women of color. Here, employee moms from our Top 5 discuss programs that have helped them balance work and family, achieve their dreams—and, as one woman put it, offer "food for my soul." PepsiCo Esperanza Teasdale Senior Marketing Manager Mother of two "One of the best experiences I've had here was participating in Power Pairs. The program facilitates deeper learning between a direct report and ...
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| All the Right Moves | |
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Whether you're vying for the top spot or looking to break into the managerial
ranks, boldness, risk-taking and getting the right kind of experience are crucial.
Our must-do career moves will propel you ahead. For Alice Rodriguez, the path to the top took six years and a leap of faith—in herself. "Early in my career, I had to step out of my comfort zone," recalls Alice, who is now an executive VP at JPMorgan Chase. "I'd heard about an opening for a bank manager, a position with lots of financial responsibility—something I wasn't used to." She wondered if she could handle being in charge of all ...
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| Agents of Culture Change | |
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Working Mother Media is proud to have acquired Diversity Best Practices (DBP), the preeminent organization to promote diversity and inclusion in America's companies.
Here, some of the working mothers of DBP —who are hard at work on your behalf creating cultural change in America's most important companies—tell how they've overcome professional and personal challenges. Redia Anderson Banks Deloitte & Touche, CDO Mom of Jarred, 17, and Taylor, 14 Raised as an Air Force brat who was constantly on the move, Redia Anderson Banks wasn't defined by her physical environment. Instead, she relied on messages from her family to help realize her identity. ...
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| Super Stress Syndrome | |
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Our Best Companies come to the rescue, with meditation sessions, affinity groups, sensitivity training and more.
Feeling that we sometimes need to be all things to all people at work can be tough. But for women of color, the added stress of representing one's entire race can feel overwhelming. As Ursula Mejia-Melgar stood before a conference room full of colleagues one morning, her mind suddenly went blank. The marketing manager at General Mills in Minneapolis was in the middle of an important presentation and wanted to explain a crucial point about customizing recipes for consumers. ...
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| Double Duty | |
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For black women, the daily migration from home to office can contain all the fears, doubts and challenges of leaving one?s country for a foreign land.
African-American women often feel the need to switch personas, presenting a workplace facade from 9-to-5 and revealing their true selves only at home. Why do they live in two worlds—public and private? From the book Shifting , some startling answers. The workplace is where black women feel they must shift most often,
engaging in a grown-up game of pretend as they change their voices,
attitudes and postures to meet the cultural codes of a workaday America
as well as the broader societal ...
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| Paths to Power | |
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True power can be within the reach of every woman of color. But grabbing the reins requires more than hard work.
It also takes a little risk, a lot of networking and the ability to recognize hidden opportunities. Though she's an accomplished pianist, exceptionally brilliant and remarkably poised, Condoleezza Rice is notable to many because she's the most powerful African-American woman in the country and the first black woman to hold the office of secretary of state. But the two qualities most often used to define her—her race and gender—are of far more interest to others than they are to ...
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| Pharmaceutical Town Hall | |
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Executives at the biggest pharmaceutical companies in the industry drop their competitive guard to fight racial divisions in the workplace.
They came from Pfizer and Bristol-Myers Squibb, from Merck and Novartis. In one corner, top managers from Abbott and Schering-Plough exchanged business cards. Nearby, human resources executives from GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca and Genentech shared a laugh. Across the room, diversity leaders from Wyeth and Johnson & Johnson traded "I'll call you" signals. Reps from TAP Pharmaceutical Products and Sanofi-Aventis were there, too. It was a rare occasion of cooperation in the competitive pharmaceutical industry when companies convened to address key ...
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| Keeping It Real | |
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Hiding who you really are at work may be hurting--not helping--your career. Here's how to show your true colors and get ahead.
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The first day Mary Cofer wore braids to work, she was nervous. She'd spent ten years at American Electric Power just trying to blend in, with her hair relaxed stick straight, dressed in the corporate uniform of navy blue suit and pencil tie. "I started at AEP in 1976. The Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964," says Mary. "Technically, African Americans had only been human for twelve years. I felt that I had to assimilate." For Mary, then a ...
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| Methodology 2008 | |
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Taking the Lead
METHODOLOGY
We selected the 2008 Working Mother Best Companies for Multicultural Women based on a detailed application completed by each company. Private and public firms based in the United States are eligible to apply. Government agencies, companies in the human resources field and nonautonomous divisions of companies are not eligible. Companies supplied 2007 data about the hiring, pay and promotion of multicultural employees. The application covers a wide variety of questions about a company’s workforce (such as number of women ...
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| What Color is Your Rolodex? | |
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Four Life-Changing Questions to Ask Yourself
Think about all the people you encounter throughout your workday—and
how wide-ranging their ethnic backgrounds are—and it's easy to believe
you have the diversity thing down. But think harder: How many of these
diverse people do you have lunch with or invite to your birthday
dinner? How many are top-of-mind when you have to staff a new project?
How many would help you out in a pinch and vice versa?
"Just because you're surrounded by different kinds of people doesn't
mean you embrace diversity," ...
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| Trust | |
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White Women: Read This
After our Town Hall polling revealed that white women are the
least-trusted race by women of color, we asked experts to help explain
why—and what you can do about it.
Whenever she thinks back on the meetings, Dina Beach Lynch is as
perplexed as if it all happened yesterday. As a diversity consultant at
a major corporation a few years ago, she often sat in on meetings where
white managers discussed promotions. Each time these talks turned to a
qualified white woman, you could ...
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| Sponsorships: The New Mentors | |
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Want to fast-track your career? These advocates help women of color rise up the corporate ladder--sometimes putting their own careers on the line to do it.
Sponsorship programs represent a shift within corporate America, a
realization that while mentors have coached and supported women of
color, they haven't necessarily boosted them to the executive ranks.
Unfortunately, sponsors and mentors aren't always in ready supply for
the women who want their help. In instant polling conducted at Working
Mother Media Town Halls across the country, mentoring consistently
rated as a top need. For example, at the Atlanta, Boston, Redmond, WA,
Houston, Chicago and Washington, DC, town halls, attendees rated the
lack of sponsors or ...
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| Speaking Up | |
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From our Multicultural Town Halls across the country, here are the powerful voices of five exceptional women.
Why aren't I tooting my own horn? That's what Rosalind Brewer, now a
president at Kimberly-Clark and a mother of two, once wondered as she
gazed up the career ladder. What she lacked, she realized, was vision.
She shared this insight with an audience filled with African-American
women like herself, as well as Asian-American, Latina and white women
(and a few guys) at Working Mother Media's Multicultural Town Hall in
Atlanta last year. Our town halls, which highlight the intersection of
race, gender ...
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