3 views on leadership from Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

We were delighted to hear Yahoo! has appointed Marissa Mayer as its new chief executive, making her one of the few female CEOs in Silicon Valley. In the UK also women are underrepresented in technology and the more high profile women in this sector the better - role models play a key part in inspiring others to follow in their footsteps.

She’s the firm's third CEO in the space of a year and in last five years, Yahoo's stock has tumbled 41% which means she certainly has her work cut out. Turning Yahoo’s performance around will require exceptional leadership, great vision and strong execution.

Mayer was with Google for 20 years and in her final years there, she was Vice President of Local, Maps, and Location Services and, before that, Vice President of Search Products and User Experience. She’s certainly demonstrated vision and the ability to deliver great things. Intrigued, I wanted to find out more about her views on leadership and after a bit of yahooing! it didn’t take long to stumble upon a short interview on CNBC and this is what she said:

Her definition of leadership. “…. Really, leadership is about painting a bright vision for the future and what can be achieved. I think that’s true in good times and in bad”. I agree communicating a bright and clear vision is key as it keeps everyone focused on the end goal. It’s particularly important when times are tough as it keeps the team motivated and focused on the task in hand rather than spiraling into negativity.

Do you have to fail to succeed? “I think in order to be a good leader you need to be very pragmatic and try lots of things and that ultimately means really freeing yourself up and being open to failure so you can ultimately learn from it”. I’ve spoken to many female leaders who’ve told me that coming through failure or situations that didn’t go according to plan has made them stronger, more determined and less risk adverse. As a leader you can’t afford to dwell on the failure, you do need to learn from it, pick everyone up and move on.

Can you learn to be a good leader? “I think leadership can definitely be learned, I also think that leadership emerges in different situations based on skill set and circumstance.” Strong leaders we’ve spoken to, know they need to keep learning and that’s what makes them great. People are not simply born leaders there are many elements to being a great leader and these skills can be developed over time.

Finally Marissa, if you’ve yahooed! yourself and found this blog, a huge congratulations on your appointment and we wish you all the very best of success in your new role!

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Business Women in Technology Focus on Their Leadership Skills

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

Businesses thrive on technology, our day-to-day lives are shaped by technology and the world is ever-changing because of technology. Yesterday, we met some of the women who work behind this exciting industry at the inaugural everywoman in Technology Leadership Academy.

Held at the beautiful Cisco offices in Feltham, it was a day to hear from successful women working in the industry, learn about the opportunity that exists within the sector and allowed attendees to grow their confidence to excel as a leader in technology.

India Gary-Martin, Managing Director - Global COO, Investment Banking Technology & Operations of JPMorgan, provided the keynote address for the day. India, who never expected to end up in role such as hers, was personable, friendly and a character whom everyone in the audience could relate to, regardless of their level within the industry. Moving from New York to London, adopting two children and becoming Global COO of an international company have just been a few of her life highlights. Through all of these achievements however, she encouraged the audience to "know your personal boundaries" and to not compromise your values or yourself. She also emphasised the importance of "being yourself. Be who you are, and people around you will see something is great about you". Her work-life balance was incredible and clearly shows this was a key in her business success. She let the audience know that clearly someone saw something great in her, and that everyone in the audience had that in them too.

Following India was the panel session led by moderator Rebecca George OBE of Deliotte; with an introduction by Wendy Mars of Cisco. Rebecca was joined by Polly Burtinshaw from Cisco; Mandy Chessell from IBM; Sheila Flavell from FDM Group and Lyn Grobler from BP. The panel topic of how to navigate your path to success provided a great opportunity for attendees to ask direct questions to successful women working in the industry. Polly talked about the road blocks she has encountered in her career in sales and how to get past them, while Mandy stressed the importance of visibility within the company; sometimes a lack of visibility can cause one to not progress at the level they should be. Sheila encouraged everyone to pick an issue that was bothering them in their workplace and to make a change with it, and Lyn talked about how to make it easier for women entering into the IT industry. All agreed that women working in the industry should be committed to their jobs and assertive in their roles.

The lunch break offered some time for networking, before attendees began their afternoon masterclasses. ‘How to influence and communicate effectively in a male-dominated environment’ was hosted by Sara Parsons and covered how to make effective decisions, shift out of your comfort zone and stretch yourself in your career. She told the audience that you can’t influence others if you first don’t look at yourself – and the interactive tools she used made the masterclass that much more exciting. Kate Turner, who hosted ‘Learning to become a leader from within’ encouraged attendees to share the same views as their colleagues and to work hard to get their colleagues to share the same views as them. She expressed the importance of reinforcing to your team what you want people to demonstrate.

Closing off the day was the motivational session hosted by the vibrant Ros Taylor. Ros let everyone in the room know the perfect ingredients to create The Confidence Cocktail. Taking chances and challenging yourself were just some of the areas she wanted everyone in the room to focus on. She then went on to encourage everyone to think of four key words that explains them, and to use these words in the future to promote themselves.

Although a long day, the energy that came out of the attendees when the clock struck five was startling. The attendees’ enthusiasm showed that the day really did set out what it intended to do – it provided a great environment for women in technology to learn, grow and develop – something which is crucial in the industry.

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