• Discover the joys and pains of life without a car, which led to the…
• Founding of Catapulter
• Consume amazing food (Dandelion, Tinto, Han Dynasty, Tria…), documented extensively via Foodspotting
• Find a great set of entrepreneurial friends: Stylitics, Meeteor, Kembrel, RendezWho, Stylyt, Fritz, to name a few)
• Find my “true professional calling” in Marketing

As an entrepreneur, I know that “I am not my target customer”. While I may absolutely love the product I’m building, it doesn’t mean that others will love it too. (Incomprehensible, I know!) Inevitably there will be gaps between how the product is being received compared to how I want it to be perceived.

The same is true when we talk about building a personal brand.

Perception May Not Equal Reality

How do we measure others’ perception of us? If you work for a large company, formal 360-reviews can be extremely enlightening – asking a representative cross section of those you interact with to anonymously asses you. However, this might be awkward in smaller businesses, and depends on how comfortable the people you ask are with giving you insightful feedback. Perhaps there’s a better way?

Last week, as part of a Strategic Branding class that I’m taking, I had to pick five words to describe myself and ask my friends and colleagues to describe me in five words as well. The words I chose were “adventurous”, “funny”, “intelligent”, “caring”, and “entrepreneurial”. Here is a word cloud of my friends’ responses:

I wasn’t surprised that I was close on many themes, but there were definitely a few words I didn’t expect: blunt, fashionable, California, and hard? Hmm… And what about the one person who thought I was also “loud” – was that under a good or bad connotation? Most importantly, were there any perceptions that I would want to change?

Top brands perform this type of analysis all the time – comparing what customers are saying about them to what they had hoped they would say. They also go one step further to analyze what others are saying about their competitors. The goal here is to understand what makes them unique and special in the eyes of others. Or maybe there isn’t anything and they have to think harder about how to differentiate themselves from their competitors. Again, I think it’s important to do this exercise too for our own personal brands. If you and your peers are all seen as “smart”, “hard working”, and “fun”, what can you do to stand above the crowd?

I highly encourage you to try this exercise if you have the time. (Really, it only takes 5 seconds to set up a short Survey Monkey anonymous survey and email it to your colleagues or even your friends.) I thought this was a really valuable exercise that helped me to identify how my friends, my colleagues, and my family perceived me (thought I’d save you from this analysis). I hope you’ll find it helpful too.

(Word cloud created using Wordle.net. Thanks guys!)

Image via Wikipedia

This week, many of the world’s most powerful movers and shakers will gather in Sweden to attend the World Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting, better known as “Davos” after the little town they descend upon.  While reviews are mixed on whether or not the forum results in anything significant[1], Davos grabbed my attention by imposing a gender quota on this year’s attendees.

According to the Guardian:

The forum’s “strategic partners” – a group of about 100 companies including Barclays, Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank – have been told they must bring along at least one woman in every group of five senior executives sent to the high-profile event.

I had strong mixed feelings after reading the Guardian article. On the one hand, I was thrilled that Davos organizers were pushing for greater female attendance. On the other, I worried that by imposing such a quota, the organizers have tarnished this year’s female participants’ experience. Would it invite unspoken questions of who “really deserve” to attend and who were invited to satisfy a quota?

My conflicted feelings lead me to do some research…

Gender Quotas on the Rise in Europe: Answer to Increasing Female Participation?

Viviane Reding

Setting gender quotas appears to be gaining popularity in Europe. Norway started the movement in 2003 when it threatened its public companies with closure if at least 40% of their board weren’t women. Spain later passed similar legislation in 2007. Last year, the European Union’s fundamental rights commissioner, Viviane Reding, warned European companies that unless more board room seats are filled by women by the end of 2011, she will impose “gender quotas”. Earlier this month, France passed its own 40% gender quota as well .[2-4] These requirements may sound outrageous, but are these European countries on to something?

Globally, only 3% of the world’s 500 largest companies and a little over 15% of government positions are are led by women. Yet in Norway, their 7-year experiment has resulted in full compliance with the 40% hurdle. Initial resistance to the law and concerns that it would result in the appointment of sub-standard members have died down and since been disproved. Independent studies have since found that the women holding Norwegian board seats are just as qualified, and and that it isn’t just a select few who are sitting on all the boards:  36% of female board members had six or more years of a university education versus 22% of their male counterparts, and male board members held more memberships than their female counterparts.[5]

Norway’s success is pretty astonishing and inspiring if you ask me and makes me think twice about disliking quotas. Their success also appears to fly in the face of the issues we women struggle with here in the United States: how to balance professional success with starting/raising a family. Norway’s experience begs the question of “if it worked in Norway, could it work in the United States?” and can there be lessons learned from our Norwegian counterparts regarding work/life balance that we American women can benefit from?

I will have to dig into this subject a little more… Updates to come!

Thanks goes to Venture Valkyrie for writing “Alas, No Line for the Ladies Room” and bringing the Davos quota to my attention!

______

[1] “Stephen Roach on why Davos matters“, The Telegraph vs. “Davos hubris“, Reuters
[2]“Quotas for women on the board: do they work?” The Sunday Times
[3] “EU plans 20% women quota for boardrooms” The Telegraph
[4] “France sets quota for women on boards” Business Spectator
[5] “Norway’s Experience Shows Compulsory Quotas Work” Spiegel Online

Related articles

• More women in Davos (theworld.org)
• Can Women Save Davos? Quotas Aren’t Just Political Correctness (thedailybeast.com)
• Is a quota for boards reform we “have to have”? (thepunch.com.au)

Which is a bigger problem: lack of women in tech, lack of technical women or lack of women founders? Why?

For starters, I read “bigger problem” to be in reference to the imbalance of women to men in the startup/tech community. My response to this question is overwhelmingly “Technical Women”.

In general, women are extremely entrepreneurial. According to a SCORE report,

Women-owned businesses account for 28 percent of all businesses in the United States and represent about 775,000 new startups per year and account for 55 percent of new startups.[1]

Wow.

Additionally, I would argue that non-technical functions within a company are more gender equal. The US department of labor found that women held over 50% of positions in “high-paying management, professional, and related occupations” such as financial managers, human resources, accountants, and advertising.[2] However, these non-tech functions are luxuries that early-stage startups don’t need or can’t afford. Even when a tech startup gains traction, by its very nature, the company will never require such a giant support staff that it balances the genders. Just take a look at Google. Despite its size and I’m sure concerted efforts, women only comprise 20% of the company.[3]

Ultimately, the problem stems from a lack of technical women in the workforce. As of 2007, men outnumbered women 73% to 27% in all sectors of employment for science and engineering. While girls now take as many high school science courses as boys, and perform as well, many girls who take advanced science courses in high school do not continue to study science in college.[4] Why is there such a significant drop-off between high school and college and then professionally? Are women naturally less interested in the sciences, or are there other factors keeping them from pursuing science? This is the question that needs to be answered!

References:___________

[1] Full SCORE report: http://www.score.org/women_stats.html
[2] Quick Stats on Women Workers, 2009 (see #11): http://www.dol.gov/wb/stats/main.htm
[3] Newsweek, Interview with Marissa Mayer http://www.newsweek.com/2010/12/22/google-s-marissa-mayer-girls-can-be-geeks-too.html (Thank you Joyce for the correction!)
[4] Women in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM): http://www.socwomen.org/socactivism/stem_fact_sheet.pdf

A Genuine Support Group

I liken affinity groups to small families within an organization. The similarities that bring you together (gender, nationality, sexual orientation) create a common basis of understanding and support that transcends professional titles. As a young professional, you couldn’t ask for a better, more diverse group of  people naturally inclined to meet you and who genuinely want to help you. (Diverse in the sense of positions within the organization, seniority, points of view, etc.) Some of my best friends and supporters from General Electric are those whom I met through GE’s Asian Pacific American Forum (APAF).

Get Leadership Opportunities, Sooner

As with any organization, there are plenty of leadership positions to be filled in an affinity group. Spend time building relationships with members in the group and build a “brand” for yourself. If you are successful, leadership opportunities will quickly reveal themselves – or better yet, they may even find you! When these opportunities arise, step up to the plate and gain some valuable leadership experience.

During my first year at GE, I joined APAF and after a few months volunteered to co-chair the Communications Committee for a giant annual meeting. Based upon my prior participation and brilliant pitch (if I do say so myself!), I was granted the position despite being new to GE and lacking a Marketing background (I majored in Finance). Where else would such an opportunity be available at work? Just imagine if the role had an HR manager: “You’re a Finance major applying for a lead Marketing role? Right… (slipping application to bottom of pile)” Instead, because I had built a good reputation with the groups’ leaders, they felt comfortable taking a chance and granting me the leadership position. Later on, other leadership opportunities arose because of my prior performance, and things snowballed; I was able to build a bigger name for myself at GE beyond my reputation as an FMP (GE’s Financial Management Program).

Meet Senior Executives, Sooner

Aside from providing leadership and learning opportunities, the main purpose of affinity groups is to provide their members with exposure to senior executives in the business. My involvement through GE’s Asian affinity group, APAF, and GE’s Women’s Network (GEWN) has allowed me to speak with high level executives that I might never have had the opportunity otherwise: Jeffrey Immelt GE’s CEO, John Rice the President and CEO of GE Technology Infrastructure, Michael Neal Chairman and CEO of GE Capital… The list goes on and on.

While I won’t delude myself into thinking that these people still remember me, I think it’s important to get in front of executives in your business. It’s a chance for you to hear first hand where they think the business is going, see what kind of leadership styles they exhibit, and for you to practice Asking Good Questions. (More on this at a later time.) Practice, practice, practice.

Mentorship and Sponsorship

Ultimately, your goal for joining an affinity group should be to find people who will enrich your career, provide guidance, and sponsor you within the company. Remember to do this by being genuine!

In closing, don’t forget to give back to your communities. All the hard work and the support you received should be paid back to the younger members that are joining your organization each year. It’s never too early to start mentoring others, and I think it’s an extremely valuable exercise.

Thanks to Productivedreams.com for the free bird!

Before I begin, let’s define “successful”. Twitter is best used for finding and sharing information, and in so doing, building an online brand. Businesses leverage Twitter to engage their customers, facilitate conversations, and share information about themselves. Individuals use Twitter for similar reasons (switch “customers” for “friends, peers, influencers, favorite brands, etc”). In both cases, a successful Twitter account is one that has a genuine voice and has a growing number of followers interested in what is said and will participate in a conversation with you. We are aiming for quality, not quantity here. So let’s begin, shall we?

1. Create a Good Twitter Identity

I always recommend that individuals begin by creating an account using their real name or a variation of their name. It’s both easier for friends to identify you and shows strangers that you’re a real person. Avoid accounts with numbers at the end. It’s a quick way to identify spammers (you’ll discover this soon enough). Pick a nice or funny picture of yourself, and spend some time writing an interesting bio. Faces are received better than images and it pays to have an interesting bio, again because they convey that you’re a real person.

[Update: Hubspot conducted a survey of over 9 million Twitter accounts and found that adding a profile picture to your account could increase your following by up to 10 times!]

2. Follow Smart People

Ever heard the phrase “You are the company you keep”? It applies to Twitter as well. After you have found and followed your friends, spend some time finding interesting and smart people to follow. Who qualifies as an “interesting and smart” person? That is up to you to decide. Perhaps it’s a thought leader in your industry, or a well respected colleague, or maybe it’s a comedian that you absolutely love. Whomever you choose to follow, understand that they will be attached to your profile as well. Strangers trying to understand who you are may scan who you’re following, and Twitter may suggest you to others based on whom you have in common.

A word of caution: keep an eye on your Following to Followers ratio. Those who consider following you may judge you based on this ratio. Few Tweets + high number of people you’re following + low number of followers = low credibility, high likelihood of being a spammer. Try to manage these three variables so that they are more evenly weighted.

A blurb from Twitter’s own blog on this subject.

Every account can follow 2,000 users total. Once you’ve followed 2,000 users, there are limits to the number of additional users you can follow. This number is different for each account and is based on your ratio of followers to following; this ratio is not published.

3. Tweet Regularly and With Purpose

While the Library of Congress may be interested in saving your tweets, the reality is that your precious tweets have a very short life span. Twitter users create over 55 million tweets a day, or approximately 640 tweets per second. The more people your followers follow, the lower the likelihood that they will see your post.  Therefore, it’s important that you tweet fairly often, but with purpose! Tweeting once a day won’t get you noticed, and tweeting inane updates such as “I love cereal, good morning!” won’t win you many followers either. It’s okay to occasionally tweet fun things, but I follow an 80/20 rule on useful information to fun personal information. The goal is to generate content that others will find useful, will want to follow you to read new tweets, and to share your tweets with others. This is how you will increase your circle of influence.

4. Create Lists

I love making lists of the people I follow on Twitter. Once you start following enough people, I highly recommend bucketing them into major lists (i.e. Friends, Travel, Entrepreneurs). First of all, these lists can act as conversation filters for you, allowing you to sort through the thousands of tweets generated each day by those you follow. Secondly, lists are a quick way others can figure out what you’re interested in, and help them decide whether or not to follow you. Lastly, not only will your lists help others understand what topics you are interest in, but your lists will also show up in the profiles of the people you follow under “Lists that follow [person's name]“. More free publicity for you!

5. Create Good Twitter Karma

Generally it is good Twitter etiquette to follow those who follow you. You may even want to direct message (DM) the new follower with a short message introducing yourself. Additionally, don’t use Twitter as just a one-sided conversation tool. Ask questions, answer questions, retweet (RT) interesting tweets from from others – curate conversation.

6. Use Hashtags (#)

Hashtags.org Search for "FTW"

A hashtag is the # symbol, which is used to mark keywords or topics in your tweet. Hashtag relevant words in your tweets so that they’re more easily found by those using Twitter search. Putting hashtags in your tweets will also increase your tweets’ likelihood of being found. A person clicking on a tweet’s hashtag will see all other the other tweets with the same hashtag. As a result, it is important that you pick your hashtags carefully. I like to use hashtags.org to see how recently popular a hashtag I’m considering using is (see screen shot). FYI: “FTW = For the Win!”

1. Have A Clear Vision for Your Business

Being a great leader requires you to have a clear vision for your team and the company. This may sound painfully obvious, but when you’re wading through the day to day challenges of running a startup, it is easy to forget. Changes in finances, unexpected actions by new/current competitors, your team – they all require your attention and pull you in different directions. Having a clear vision will help you prioritize your time, and put things in perspective.

In addition to helping you maintain your sanity, a clearly communicated vision will help your team perform better as well. It is important that each member of you team understands what the business strategy is, and how his or her contribution is helping the company achieve its goals. Nothing slows down progress like uncertainty, especially in a startup where everyone is generally being underpaid and overworked.

2. Commit to Remaining Positive

Leading a startup may be the toughest emotional roller coaster you’ve ever experienced. One day you’re convinced the company will sell for millions of dollars, and the next you’re a paranoid mess worrying over finances, competition, product development, etc. As the CEO, it is imperative that you remain positive with your team. Leave your nail biting and hair pulling for when you’re alone or venting to a friend. Have I mentioned that nothing slows down progress like uncertainty? Mood swings and doubt cause uncertainty. Remain positive and insulate your team from your stress.

3. Trust Your Team, but Stay Plugged In

Remember how you agonized over the hiring of each team member? Well, now that you’ve hired these smart people, let them work! In a small startup, it may be tempting to micromanage because you can: everyone sits in the same work area and you can’t help but wonder when you don’t hear typing or notice they’re still reading Wired.com articles. Resist the temptation to perform frequent, random check-ups and peer over everyone’s shoulder.

Instead of hovering, establish a routine whereby everyone checks in on a weekly basis (if deadlines are tight, then maybe even more frequently). Make sure that the purpose of these meetings are to keep everyone informed, and not just a progress report to you. I like this strategy because it does two things: (1) it creates informal deadlines for each team member – no one wants to show up with nothing to say or having shown no progress, and (2) it allows you an venue to clearly set expectations for the next meeting. You have a lofty vision for you business (see point #1), but it is good to break it down to manageable, weekly goals.

4. Make Decisions and Move On

Startups are risky because we operate under a high degree of uncertainty on just about everything. However, the wonderful thing about uncertainty is that you have no control over it! Your competition is going to do what it has planned to do, VCs and angels will think what they think, and setbacks will happen. Why fret over the uncertainty and allow it to paralyze you? A great startup CEO is comfortable making decisions under such extreme uncertainty. Don’t let fear of the unknown paralyze you. Make the best and most informed decision you can and move on. There are many more problems you have yet to tackle.

1. Be Bold!
2. Behave Like a Fortune 500 Brand
3. Make Impactful Friends

Be Bold!

On the battlefield of business, we women may be our own worst enemy. Compared to men, we tend to undervalue ourselves and push less often for promotions. Respected SF blogger Gotham Gal wrote that she was once told by a male colleague at a meeting to “stop saying ‘I think’, women say I think and men don’t, that is why you can’t get in the conversation.” If women are to rise in greater numbers in business, we need to be bold and avail ourselves to the same opportunities as men.

Sheryl Sandberg (COO of Facebook) gave a very moving talk at TED during which she called on women to not be timid and “grab a seat at the table”. I would go one step further and add that not only should you grab a seat at the table, you should make your presence known! Early in my career, I often allowed my self-doubt to silence me at meetings; I didn’t want to seem naive or ask the dreaded “stupid question”. However, in doing so, I also failed to illustrate my value to my colleagues. I didn’t show others that I had an opinion, that I knew what was going on, and that I could contribute to the discussion. I firmly believe my timidness caused me an early promotion. So learn from my mistake – Speak up! Trust that you are smart enough to be in that meeting and deserve that raise/opportunity. Your company hired you because they thought you were smart. Why shouldn’t you believe the same?

Behave Like a Fortune 500 Brand

We’ve all heard that first impressions are the most important and last forever. However, people don’t stress enough that a positive impression needs to be nurtured and fed, like a plant, in order for it to grow into something useful. Raises and promotions aren’t based on first impressions; they’re based on the things you do consistently throughout the year.

Over time, your behavior at work will inevitably build you a brand. It is this brand that people think of when they’re looking to staff teams and give promotions. Your brand helps create opportunities for you, so it’s extremely important that you make sure it is a good one! Be clear on your brand’s message. What are your characteristics/skills/interests that make you valuable to your company? And equally important, are your “customers” (i.e. peers, superiors) aware of you as a brand? You need not turn every conversation at work to be all about you, but your manager should certainly know what positive impact you are having on the business.

Lastly, Make Impactful Friends

Before you jump down my throat, don’t read this to mean that you should be fake, or kiss ass at work. That’s NOT what I mean. My point is that, at work, you shouldn’t only make friends with those that you like and that are like you. While this may make the workplace more fun, it won’t help your career. Instead, make sure you have a variety of mentors that will be honest with you and help you grow. Myself, I benefited significantly from finding mentors across functions and levels. These people helped me see beyond what directly impacted me to how the company worked, and were able to tell me what I was doing wrong.  It doesn’t matter if you want to label them “mentors” or “advisers” but get people in your circle that will stretch you and point you towards your dream.

Ultimately, you want to build relationships and find senior mentors willing to sponsor you at work. A sponsor is different from a mentor in that they go one step further – beyond simply giving advice – and are your advocates at work. A study performed by Catalyst found that mentoring is not enough to help women advance; men have more senior mentors, which resulted in more promotions and raises than women.