Editor’s Note: This article is part of a series exploring diversity and inclusion in the workplace to be published over the next few months. If you have a story idea about diversity and inclusion in the workplace, please send leads to WRAL TechWire’s Chantal Allam at cabitbol@gmail.com.
RALEIGH – By age 40, Dr. Myla Lai-Goldman had climbed the corporate ladder to become a top executive at North Carolina-based LabCorp.
Back then, she says, it was unusual to see women in such senior roles at an American S&P 500 company.
That was two decades ago.
What she says next, though, is even more telling: “It’s probably unusual today.”
To be fair, strides have been made: Many women hold leadership roles within powerful companies. There are also laws against gender discrimination, and companies feel the pressure more than ever to deal with sexual harassment claims, especially in light of the #MeToo movement.
But it’s also clear that much work still needs to be done.
Dr. Myla Lai-Goldman, CEO and president of her own company, GeneCentric Therapeutics.
“It’s not unusual to be the only woman in the room,” says Lai-Goldman, 60, now CEO and president of her own company, GeneCentric Therapeutics.
“The world has changed, but probably not as much as we had hoped. Whatever the same thoughts and obstacles that we faced 30 years ago, to a degree, are still around.”
Few still occupy C-suite
Of North Carolina’s top 100 public companies ranked by market value, just five are led by women. That’s according to Charlotte Business Journal’s recent annual review.
Lynn Good, CEO of Duke Energy, ranked the highest in third spot, followed by Susan DeVore, of Charlotte-based health care company Premier, in 23rd place. The others include Leslie Kass, of Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises (52), Michelle Berrey, of Chimerix (56) and Renee Shaw, of Wake Forest Bancshares (87).
The low percentage of women at the top reflects a national trend. Scan down the latest Fortune 500 list, and only 24 companies are led by women – a drop from 32 companies the year before, due mostly to recent resignations.
The numbers aren’t much better for S&P 500 companies. According to a recent study by PwC, only 6.2 percent of S&P 500 CEOS are female, and only 8.5 percent of the top 200 S&P companies have African-American, Hispanic/Latino or Asian CEOs.
Meanwhile, board diversity is also a hot-button issue. With such a small candidate pool, the report says, it becomes a roadblock to adding diversity to boards.
Fight for equality at work for women is far from over a year after #MeToo erupted
As it stands now, only 22 percent of S&P 500 boards members are female. However, there is a silver lining. Around 80 percent of those boards have two or more female directors – up from 61 percent in 2012.
Recognizing the need to increase parity, some states are taking action. Most recently, California became the first state to require its publicly held corporations to include women on their boards.
“Glass ceiling” versus “concrete ceiling”
If white women are still fighting the proverbial “glass ceiling”, women of color hit a “concrete ceiling”, says Ilene Lang, interim president and CEO of Catalyst, a nonprofit studying women and work.
Women of color make up just 3.8 percent of all Fortune 500 board directors. Black women occupy 11.1 percent of board seats held by women, and just 2.2 percent of all board seats, according to a recent Alliance for Board Diversity report.
“The term ‘glass ceiling’ originated because you could look through it and see what was possible, but you hit against a barrier as you pushed up, so the aspiration was there and the expectation was there,” she was quoted as saying in a recent CNN article.
“But think about a concrete ceiling — if you’re in a bunker, you don’t even know there’s a sky out there. That’s meant to be a very visceral metaphor.”
The hurdles, and lessons learned
Part of the problem is the difference in how men and women approach career advancement, says Lai-Goldman.
“When women are looking if they are ready for the next opportunity, they try and check every box in the job description. And it isn’t until they’ve checked all the boxes that they think they’re ready,” she explains. “Men are more likely to say, ‘I’ve checked four out of the eight, I’m ready.”
Back in 1990, when Lai-Goldman applied for her first job with LabCorp, then Roche BioMedical, she was told the position had already been filled. Still, she insisted – uncharacteristically — on coming in for the interview.
A week later, when everyone had turned them down, she got offered the job. “I’d never done anything like that, and that became my 18-year career,” she recounts.
The lesson: “We all have to be willing to take more risk and not be worried about failure.”
Gender perceptions, and the mentoring question
Apart from lingering self-doubt, women must also contend with prevailing gender perceptions at work.
“It’s sometimes difficult to get noticed without coming across too strongly,” says Susan Nichols, chief executive of Durham-based Falcon Therapeutics. “I feel that as a woman, we walk a fine line between assertive and aggressive. The former being positive, and the last being negative.”
Susan Nichols, chief executive of Durham-based Falcon Therapeutics.
With such a scarcity of women at the top, “it also leaves fewer women to mentor and champion [other women] within an organization,” she adds.
Even Duke Energy’s Lynn Good can attest to that. After appearing as the final keynote at North Carolina Chamber’s Women > A Force in Business conference last month, an attendee asked her a personal question: What women do you admire the most?
“I’m not sure there is a single one that comes to mind,” she replied, after a brief pause.
Nichols, however, had a different experience, starting out as a biotech sales rep back in the 1990s. For her, it was personal. Growing up with a brother with special needs, she was always searching for the diagnosis of what was thought to be a rare disease. This early quest led her to pursue a career in advanced technologies.
Early on, a female manager pulled her aside to give guidance.
“It comes down to mentorship,” she says. “Women joining boards is a good way to begin. Women see other women on the board, and are encouraged to apply.”
But the path to becoming a chief executive is still never going to be easy. It will always come with personal sacrifice; timing also plays a big part.
“These are really time-consuming positions, and it’s a choice. You’re going to have to give up some family time somewhere along the line. I couldn’t have done it when my kids were younger,” says the mother of two.
Changing landscape
Even so, the landscape is changing, even if at a glacial pace, maintains Joan Seifert Rose, CEO of LaunchBio.
“In general, it does take some time for women, as with men, to build the kinds of careers that position them for the top spots in large corporations,” she says. “My conclusion is that we will see more women CEOs as we see more women advancing to senior management roles that will position them for the leap to the corner office.”
Joan Siefert Rose
Some women will get there by starting and leading their own companies. Others will get there by running successful divisions, building professional networks and serving on boards.
And of course, it should go without saying, they’ll get there by working extremely hard. “I don’t know any female CEO that someone handed the job to,’” said Nichols. “I don’t see the decision as being about man or woman. I see it as who is the most qualified, and who has the experience.”
