So, You Want to Be a CEO?

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Notes by Kimberly Blessing, GHC 2006 Live Notetaker

Rather than track the entire session dialog, what I've done here is condensed each panelists' comments under her name.

Penny Herscher

  • Being a CEO is all about leadership and decision making.
  • As CEO, you can only affect four things: strategy, customers, culture, and people (hires).
  • Exhaustion: you're "on" 24/7, at all times a leader.
  • Exhilaration: team building, customer interactions.
  • You must train your assistant to protect your personal time.
  • You can set company culture so that others have personal time too.
  • You must be comfortable being in the spotlight as a female leader.
  • Never doubt yourself!
  • Follow your joy AS WELL AS what you're good at.
  • Underpinnings of leadership: speaking, organizational behavior, basics of finance -- take classes at a community college if you don't have a business degree.
  • You have to choose what you want to do; if you have a partner, your partner must support your choices.

Linda Bernardi

  • Women differ from men in leadership in five ways:
    • women are more emotional
    • women lead by consensus, want approval (CEO is a lonely job)
    • women fear failure (being CEO is a risk!)
    • women take things personally (business decisions are not personal!)
    • women don't network enough (we think we need to be solo leaders)
  • There are some older generation folks that subscribe to beliefs of women not working at such a high level -- you've just gotta deal with it. (Graciously, not aggressively/angrily.)
  • If you're the CEO of a startup, you have to be comofrtable with raising money -- you can't leave that to the CFO.
  • If you want to be CEO in a big company, you need to establish a track record. Either switch jobs to lead smaller companies or take on leadership for BIG projects or divisions (that bring in BIG revenue).

Jan Willis

  • Jan has been offered CEO positions but has said no.
  • She has an MBA, because she felt like she needed it; thinks it's helpful.
  • Her considerations for not accepting CEO job: personal liability, doesn't mean lots more money, loss of "personal time".
  • There is no magical list of qualifications for CEO.
  • You never get anything unless you ask for it -- whether time, money, etc.
  • You MUST be a good public speaker to be CEO.

Marie Alexander

  • Being a CEO does mean being exhausted, making brownies at 2 AM, but you must make decisions and decide what's important to you.
  • There are those out there that will share the same values as you, so be clear about what you do/don't want. You may find a company to be flexible if they want you.
  • You can't control what anyone else is doing, you can only control how you react to it (not being a victim).


Post-conference notes by BJ Wishinsky


Marie Alexander also talked about continual improvement, always looking for new and better ways to do things. She said, "I tell my staff that the only thing your experience should tell you is that there's a better way to do it next time."

At the end, the panelists summed up with some advice for their audience:

  • Jan Willis: Have a strategy, and hope isn't it.
  • Linda Bernardi: Go do it.
  • Penny Herscher: Be true to yourself.
  • Marie Alexander: Have a strong sense of who you are.
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