Anika Khan, Vice President and Economist at Wells Fargo, said one key to advancing your career is cultivating a broad knowledge base – but also developing an expertise in a field you are passionate about.

She explained, “If I was to think of one thing I wish I knew when I was starting out it would be to be an expert in something, but know a little bit about everything.”

“When you begin your career, you’re trying to get a sense of everything. But when I became a subject matter expert my career really gained upward momentum.”

Career in Economics

Khan began her career at legacy First Union and then moved to legacy Wachovia in the late ’90s. “I spent a good part of my career on the deal side,” she said. “I wanted to learn about sales and trading, so I moved to the trading floor.”

Then, she said, “I went back to my love: economics. I’ve been an economist for five years. I made a series of lateral moves, which ended up being wonderful opportunities for me.”

Khan said one of the proudest achievements of her career so far has been being invited to the White House as part of a special delegation on the economy. “I was the only economist to update the President’s economic advisors and staff. It was also a great opportunity for Wells Fargo,” she explained.

She continued, “And I’m even more proud of a paper on state economic activity which we presented at the 2012 American Economics Association Annual Meeting. They have a very high threshold and we got accepted. It’s always a goal for economists.”

Advice for Professional Women

Khan said she’d like to see more women at the top. “Getting women into the C-suite in general is a challenge – we need to have more of a presence there. And specifically for African American women, there just aren’t enough of us.”

She continued, “The next generation of women coming out of school is outpacing males in undergrad and grad school. Many are not choosing banking as a career. One reason is that they are looking for what they perceive as work life balance. This can be a challenge for any individual.”

“I mentor a number of young women who are just as smart as males, but sometimes they don’t actually know it. The advice I always give is to know your worth,” she continued.

When it comes to senior women, she said, “It’s very important at that level to be a sponsor, mentor, advocate, for some of the young women trying to navigate or enter the industry.”

Diversity at Wells Fargo

As a member of Wells Fargo’s Diversity and Engagement Council in her area of the bank, Khan believes that individuals should see diversity as an advantage. “Diversity can be an asset – in many cases, I’ve definitely felt that instead of holding me back, it’s propelled me forward.”

She continued, “At Wells Fargo, diversity is part of our key goals. It’s not only something I value, but the bank values. “

“One of the things we continue to do in this organization is to have a number of diversity initiatives. Through diversity initiatives you get exposure to senior management on a pretty consistent basis though diversity networks and events,” she said.

“You have the mechanisms to get in front of senior managers and for them to see how capable you are outside your area of expertise.”

In Her Personal Time

Khan, who is married and has a nine-year-old son, says she believes in spending quality time with her family when she’s outside work. “I take time so my son knows he’s number one,” she explained.

She also enjoys photography and, she added, “I don’t go a week without doing zumba!”

Networking is critical, according to Lisa Davis, Director and Global Product Manager, Citi Global Transaction Services. She said, “I want to mention the power of networking. You need to develop a network of people who can help you. Be sure that you’re networking on various levels.”

According to Davis, “Networking is a necessary tool that is underutilized. I believe the sooner you realize the power of networking, the greater your chances are of successfully navigating your career. This is especially true for women, minorities, and the LGBT population.”

“Many people are afraid to network,” she continued. “I for one am a typical introvert and I’m not always comfortable taking the initiative to meet people and interact – but when you talk about true networking, that’s what you do! Its not just about meeting people, it’s about developing relationships rather than just collecting business cards.”

She added, “When networking, you should always have your elevator speech ready and you should always make sure you have an intelligent answer and something relevant to add.”

Managing Big Career Shifts

Davis graduated from Long Island University with a degree in Sociology and Anthropology. She spent 13 years working in conference planning and executive dining services for Equitable Life and American Express before moving over to Citi, where she has spent the last 13 years. She explained, “I was recruited by the former Smith Barney Company to head their conference and dining services in several locations within the New York metropolitan area, and I did that for a few years.”

When Citi began a Women’s Council initiative to focus on the retention and development of high potential women and introduce them to other roles and areas in the company, Davis was tapped to participate.

“I started networking and making contacts, and I realized that I wanted to get out of conference and dining services and move into a core business within the bank. Through one of my networking contacts, I learned of a position within Global Transaction Services.”

She continued, “I worked on the Global Client Delivery team developing and implementing best practices in customer service across regions. Through another contact I made on the Women’s Council, I moved into project management, working on large global implementations for our customers. After working in the Project Management Office as a senior project manager for four years, I moved into a product management role as the Global Lead of Billing. “

“Being able to transition out of a traditional hospitality function and moving into banking and finance was an important achievement for me. It wasn’t something I knew I wanted to do until I got involved in the Women’s Council. However, I realized early on that the work I was doing in conference planning wasn’t so different from banking in the sense that its all about listening to what customers want and finding solutions.”

Davis recently graduated from the Zicklin School of Business, Executive Masters program at Baruch College. “Once I moved into core banking functions, I went back to school so I could hone my skills in banking and finance,” she explained. “That was a huge milestone for me.”

Challenges for Diverse individuals

Davis said, “When it comes to diversity in the workplace, we still have challenges. There are people who are not as comfortable with women, minorities, and LGBT individuals.”

“As a woman in this industry, we need to be more aggressive in terms of how we communicate what things we’ve accomplished,” she suggested.

“Tell your own story, toot your own horn. Women are less inclined to do that, and in this industry, your work can go unnoticed if you don’t self promote. We need to raise our hands and take on bigger challenges because our male counterparts are already doing this.”

Davis was also concerned with the small number of women at senior levels in the financial industry. “It becomes a little more challenging to remain relevant when you’re suddenly the minority in the group,” she explained.

Lesbians also face challenges, she said. Davis, who came out many years ago, explained, “As a lesbian in a corporate organization, the challenges are all about how people perceive you, your appearance, how you dress, how you carry yourself.”

But, she said, “You need to stick it out. You need to be able to bring your whole self to work – and I couldn’t bring my whole self to work if I was hiding something, or not being myself. I would encourage people to stay true to themselves at all times.”

She also encouraged people to speak up when they are made uncomfortable by negative comments. “When people need to be corrected, be very clear and crisp when you correct them. They don’t necessarily realize the impact they may have on you.”

“But,” she concluded, “you never have to worry about what people think about you if you stay true to who you are.”

Advice for Professional Women

Davis advised young women to think carefully about their career path. “It helps to know or have some idea when you’re first starting out, what you want to do, and what career path you want for yourself,” she said. “When I think about my career change, it was certainly a lot of work and there was a lot of catching up I had to do. It helps if you know what you want to do early on.”

She continued, “This is an industry that is very demanding, and it will take a lot of your time if you want to be successful. You have to acknowledge that.”

Diversity at Citi

“I’m not just saying this because I work at Citi,” Davis said, “but Citi really does a good job with diversity initiatives, within the bank as well as within the communities we serve. At Citi, individuals are valued based on the diversity they bring to the Citi culture. We have over 45 Employee Network programs in the US alone and many more in the over 100 countries in which we do business. Some of the employee networks include African Heritage, Hispanic Heritage, Asian Heritage, Pride (LGBT), Disability, Military Veterans, Women and Working Parents.”

She continued, “Because of the work that Citi has done to define and promote a diverse workplace, I can bring my whole self to work each and every day.”

Davis is involved in many initiatives around diversity, focusing on women, African Americans, and the LGBT community. She serves as co-chair of Citi’s NYC Pride network and sits on the GTS North American region’s Diversity Operating Committee.

She also created and chaired GTS’s DCU (Diversity Council University), which works to develop minority AVPs within the organization. “When I was chair of the Training and Development committee, we graduated 35 people through the DCU program, most of whom have been promoted and have taken on bigger jobs,” she added.

In Her Personal Time

Davis’ partner of eleven years, Debbie Brennan, is a Fixed Income trader at a boutique broker-dealer in New York City. The two have raised Brennan’s two adopted children, current ages 23 and 25, together.

In her spare time Davis is also a well-known and talented DJ, having received the 2004 NYC Night Life Award for best female house DJ. Davis said, “I was introduced to DeeJaying when I was 14 years old, fell in love with it, and have been doing it ever since. I love being able to make people dance and feel good. Making people have happy feet on the dance floor is very important to me.”

Anne Izzillo, President of the Financial Women’s Association, believes sincerely in the power of networking – in fact, she said, that’s how she got involved in the group in the first place. “I lived and worked in London for 14 and a half years and I came back in 1999, basically without a network.”

“Everybody had gone to the four winds in the almost 15 years I was away,” she explained. “And somebody I know, a friend of a friend actually, suggested, because I was bemoaning the fact that I didn’t have a network anymore… that I join the FWA.”

“You can join and meet some great women and foster some great relationships, or you can actually join a committee and get involved in the organization and that’s what I did from day one.”

On Tuesday, The Financial Women’s Association of New York celebrated its 2011 Holiday Party at the NASDAQ Tower in Times Square with networking and discussion. Hosted by NASDAQ CEO Robert Greifield, the event featured an interview between Greifield and CNBC reporter Scott Wapner.

A new partnership between the FWA and The Daily Beast’s Women in the World project was also announced at the event, whereby the FWA will have a page on the WITW website and partner on events.

Kim Azzarelli, Vice President, New Ventures at Newsweek Daily Beast and President of the Women in the World Foundation, announced the project. Azzarelli, whose background is in corporate law, said the partnership would connect different sectors to benefit women globally. She explained, “If we could connect the dots across all of the sectors, we could really do a lot for women and girls, and connect the dots across the generations as well.”

The partnership is one step in making the FWA a more global organization, which, Izzillo said, is one of her key goals for the next year and beyond. “Eventually, someday I’d love to see the FWA be an international or a global organization,” she said.

Working in a Global Economy

Izzillo said the FWA’s recent trip to Brazil opened her eyes to the importance of working globally, both in terms of business and in terms of fostering gender equality. She explained, “I’ve started a task force to reach out to some of the women we met in São Paolo and Rio because, when we met with them, we talked about the economy and we had the economic conference, [and discussed] the issues of the country… but when we had the cocktail parties and the dinners with them, we talked about the same things that we talked about here at home.”

She continued, “It was gender equality, it was work life balance, it was how do you get to the next level in your career or in your business. And I thought we’re talking about it in New York, they’re talking about it in São Paolo, they’re taking about it in Rio… let’s talk to each other. Because maybe – maybe – there’s some global solutions here.”

“But if we don’t talk to each other we’ll never find those global solutions,” she added.

Izzillo explained that this year, the FWA is focusing on learning more about the Middle East, planning a trip to the United Arab Emirates in 2012 and partnering with the Arab Bankers Association on events in New York. The Middle East, she said, “is an area that I believe has great importance now and certainly will in the future economically.”

Women in finance can’t afford not to make these global connections, she said. “[Considering] the global economy and looking at global investments or global business opportunities, there are issues that are very important to a good deal of our members because we do live in a global society and many of our jobs, our positions, have a global outlook to them.”

The FWA is planning a Middle Eastern economic forum, slated for March. Izzillo explained, “I want us to explore the Middle East and its economy, and how it affects the world economy.” She continued, “What do economists think, projecting in to the future, it will mean? Because I think it will have more and more of an importance.”

The Importance of Sponsorship

Izzillo emphasized the critical importance of sponsorship for the advancement of women in the corporate space. She explained, “We’re certainly advocates for more women on corporate boards, more women in senior management, more women in the C-suite, and especially in CEO positions. Because we’re at 3% of the Fortune 500 CEOs. We’re 50% of the population. So you’re leaving out the thought leadership of 50% of the population. We don’t think that’s a good thing.”

She continued, “Without sponsorship women will not break through that glass ceiling. We won’t have more women on corporate boards. We will not have more women CEOs.”

She described a sponsor as someone at your firm, willing to spend his or her political capital on you. “That’s the person who is in the room where your future at the firm is being decided – your pay raises, your bonuses, who gets the crème de la crème accounts, who gets the projects that are going to be the projects that senior management is going to sit up and take notice about. That’s sponsorship.”

Women tend to have a more difficult time gaining sponsorship than men, simply because leaders tend to sponsor people who remind them of themselves – and currently, most leaders in the business world are male. But, Izzillo said plainly, “Without that we don’t believe women will advance, that we still will not break through what Sylvia Ann Hewlett calls the last glass ceiling.”

Izzillo said sponsorship has had a tremendous impact on her own career. She tries to actively sponsor other women, and hopes to influence others to think about the importance of sponsorship going forward.

Karen Wimbish, Director of Retail Retirement at Wells Fargo, refers to herself as a “second half champion.” Having been in the industry for over 35 years, and worked in several functions, she saw her career pick up significantly after her kids were high school age – and she said, women in particular can benefit from a new, more flexible vision of the workplace.

She explained, “The old notion is that you have to sky-rocket up through the ranks. You can actually do it a little later.”

At a time when people are living and working longer, Wimbish said, women shouldn’t feel locked into a particular career path. “I never managed anyone besides my part time assistant until I was over 40. I was always an individual contributor. But now in the second half of my career, I manage hundreds of people. I don’t believe in career paths – I believe in opportunities.”

A Wide Range of Experience

Wimbish explained that while she has spent most of her career in the financial services, the path has been “circuitous.” She started out in community banking, working in relationship management and then project management. “Then I left the industry and tried small business for two years, but in the second year, I just found out that I’m not a small business person.”

She continued, “Then I began working in asset management for a brokerage, and then I ended up in the retirement business at Wells Fargo.”

Wimbish explained that she’s thankful for the experience she’s gained working in so many parts of the financial industry. “In this role that I’m in today, so many of my past jobs have all contributed to make this the perfect job. I absolutely love it,” she said.

In fact, she continued, successfully navigating across different channels within the industry is something she is proud of. “I have seen a lot of people now who have grown up one primary path. You don’t get an opportunity to cross over a lot – particularly as specialization has increased, and there are some issues when it comes to licensing. It’s challenging to move across if you try to do it, but I’ve had the opportunity to do some really different things within the business.”

Pounding the Table about Financial Planning

Wimbish said one issue she is driven by is the importance of financial planning for women. “It’s a message that I continue to pound the table about,” she said. “You cannot delegate it and you cannot ignore it.”

“Women have achieved parity in so many disciplines. But we are still lagging behind men when it comes to taking responsibility for our financial planning. We’re so busy taking care of everyone else rather than our own financial futures.”

And, she continued, there are three reasons women must begin to take this responsibility more seriously. First of all, she said, we tend to live longer than men – so our assets need to last longer.

Second, she continued, women tend to make less money than men over the course of a lifetime – so we have less to work with. And third, because many women take career breaks, we have less time in the workforce to accumulate wealth.

“We almost start out with three strikes against us,” she explained. “It sounds trite, but it’s true. If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there. But having a written plan will give you so much more confidence.”

Wimbish added that she has begun blogging on Wells Fargo’s new retirement website for women, Beyond Today.

Challenges for Professional Women

Wimbish believes that change needs to happen more quickly when it comes to gender parity within her industry.

She explained, “We’ve been so slow to achieve parity in leadership in the financial services. Women are highly concentrated at the bottom. In my career – over 35 years – I see many more women in management now than there were when I first started. But, that’s 35 years! It’s been inexcusably slow.”

“I knew it was going to take a long time, but this has just been excruciatingly slow.”

One challenge, she said, is the human tendency to hire people that look like ourselves. “We’re less comfortable giving stretch assignments to someone who is not like us.”

Additionally, she said, work life issues come into play. “I still see women making choices around marriage and children. I see a lot of women who have chosen to forgo children, or who have found a partner who is willing to be a stay-at-home dad.”

She continued, “Or they’re like me, and never traveled until their kids were in high school.”

“I’m really what they call a ‘second half champion.’ I didn’t move very fast early in my career. But then, when my children got to be high school or college age, I really have done a lot,” she explained. And given that people are working longer these days, she continued, “you’ve got a lot of time.”

Nevertheless, Wimbish believes that she could have gotten farther in her career in a shorter amount of time if she had been less intent to follow the rules.

“I was a very disciplined student,” she recalled. “I was very focused on achieving academic success. In school, you have a set of rules, and if you follow them, you will succeed and get an A.”

She continued, “I was very much a rule follower. But progressing your career is not about following the rules. It’s about taking risks, being innovative, being flexible. There’s no syllabus to getting ahead and I had to stretch in ways that were uncomfortable to me.”

“Looking back I was much too timid,” she added.

“My advice to young women is ‘don’t be in such a hurry,’” Wimbish said with a laugh. “Who you are is so much more important than what you do, and don’t forget that.”

“Be flexible, be willing to take a lateral move. And be willing to take stretch assignments whenever you can. It has risks, and you’ve got to deliver, but it can be worth it.”

Women at Wells Fargo

Wimbish said she participates in several programs at Wells Fargo designed to attract and retain women. “I love working with women in our company,” she said.

Wells Fargo’s affinity groups, called Team Member Networks, are located in each of the company’s geographic locations. She has served as an executive sponsor in diversity groups in two of the cities she’s lived in. “A lot of our members are younger women looking for guidance, and I love doing that,” she said.

She has also participated in focus groups for senior women at Wells Fargo, and speaks regularly to women’s groups in the organization.

“I’ve always believed that women need to help other women. There was a time when you used to hear about how women weren’t good at helping other women. And I think we absolutely have to be advocates for each other and mentor other women at any chance we get.”

In Her Personal Time

“My family is very, very important to me,” said Wimbish, who has been married for 36 years and has two children and one granddaughter.

“I’ve told people before that I don’t believe you can have it all. Was I the kind of mother I thought I would be? I was a good mother, but, no, I didn’t get to go to every event. You have to make sacrifices.”

Wimbish said she loves to travel, and also enjoys working in the non-profit world with the Girl Scouts and United Way. And, she added, her guilty pleasure is reading mystery novels.

Deborah Farrington, Co-Founder and General Partner of StarVest Partners, said one of her key career themes has been an ability to take risks at the appropriate time and seize opportunities as they presented themselves.

She encouraged women to be more open to taking on new challenges when they arise – to walk through doorways when they are opened. “Don’t shy away from things. I think you’ll be surprised at how well you can do them,” she said.

Farrington is now a leading venture capitalist, and as one of only two women named on the Forbes Midas List of top tech investors this year, she is enthusiastic about getting more women into the field.

Taking on New Opportunities

Farrington began her career in Chase Manhattan’s global credit training program, with her first job at Chase, lending to small businesses. “It was very good preparation for venture, because small business is all about managing cash flow to survive,” she explained. Next, she pursued an MBA at Harvard Business School, and after graduating took a job at Merrill Lynch in investment banking.

When her husband, who worked for Salomon Brothers, was transferred to Hong Kong, Merrill Lynch was able to find a role for her in Hong Kong as well. “I was covering emerging markets in the ‘80s, which was all about high growth,” she said. Then, when they moved to Tokyo, she took a job as a securities analyst. “In Japan, at the time, they didn’t really know what to do with a female investment banker,” she explained. So, when Merrill asked, “How about being a securities analyst?” she responded “I can do that!”

She recalled, “It was the beginning of the Asian growth miracle, and I joined a Hong Kong merchant bank called Asia Oceanic Group in the late ‘80s. Our mandate was facilitating the flow of capital and technology between Asia and the US. That was my first exposure to private equity and to being  a principal instead of an agent and I loved it! I headed corporate finance in New York and then Hong Kong. Our firm started co-investing alongside our clients in tech companies which were just beginning to outsource to China from headquarters  in Hong Kong at the time.”

When she came back to New York, Farrington ran a small public company controlled by Asian Oceanic. “I said I’d never done that before, but I’d certainly give it a try!” she said with a laugh. “I then approached a group of friends from Harvard Business School about backing me to buy the public company I had been running. They declined, but invited me to join them and we started a multi-strategy private equity/venture group. We had a thesis about business services going on the web and made an investment and it did extremely well.” This was the first investment at what became Victory Ventures where she was CEO. And, she noted, the group eventually did end up buying the public company she had been running.

After four years, she decided that the time was right to start her own fund to invest in Internet-based business services and joined with three other partners in 1998 to start StarVest, which invests in software as a service, e-commerce, and internet marketing technologies.

She said, “Venture capital is by far the most interesting thing I’ve ever done. Every day part of my job is to think about what’s the next big thing in technology. And, a key part of the job of a venture capitalist is  to help guide and grow our companies, and work with CEOs, mentoring them and providing resources. The primary responsibility of a venture capitalist is to successfully exit our companies to send money back to our Limited Partner investors. This requires judgments about economic trends and opportunities for liquidity in the public IPO market and through mergers and acquisitions. Being an investment banker was good training for this. ”

Finally, she added, because the majority of StarVest’s investors are state and city pension funds, “We have an important fiduciary duty to provide investment returns to fund their pension obligations.”

Getting More Women into Venture

According to a recent survey by the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) and Dow Jones VentureSource, only about 21 percent of the industry is female. According to Farrington, increasing the percentage of women in the field would yield important benefits.

First of all, she said, “You always have to think about who your customers are. With e-commerce and social media increasing steadily in importance as venture investments, at least half of your customers are going to be women. That alone is a reason for having more women go into venture.”

“Second, in my experience, women have a better ability to come to collective decisions. Men are more frequently confrontational, while women tend to be better collaborators. One of the things I always find important to making good decisions is bringing together a lot of different views and focusing on the best of those without pride of authorship. Women are particularly good at that, especially at the board level.”

“I’m often the only woman on a board, and I find myself asking the question where are we now and how can I edit and synthesize that in order to move forward?’” she added.

And third, she continued, “Getting as many views as possible into a room is important. Particularly in venture, it’s very important to have people who will look at things in a different way than the prevailing wisdom.”

Where are the women then? She answered, “This is something I have thought a lot about. I look at it in the historical context of finance. Waves of women went into different areas at different times. First, it was commercial banking in the early ‘70s, then investment banking in the ‘80s, then private equity in the ‘90s. As these areas expanded and became more mainstream, women turned to the opportunities as they became available, but there are always special challenges for the pioneers.”

She continued, “Venture came to the forefront in the late ‘90s and early 2000s with some of the huge wins like eBay, Intuit, salesforce.com and such, which tend to be technology oriented. But fewer women have a background in technology and engineering – and this is one challenge.”

“I have marveled at the opportunities afforded by each of the fields I’ve worked in, but especially venture. There’s so much going on right now. There’s so much value creation possible and I think this area is best able to be an engine for job creation by backing entrepreneurs, which is a particular challenge in our economy and now and very important for our society. In StarVest’s portfolio, the companies we’ve backed have created thousands of jobs. I want to make sure women are more aware of and can take advantage of and participate in these opportunities.”

She continued, “As women, it’s important that we guide our own destinies, gain financial independence, and contribute to and have a real voice in society and the economy. I think by having women more  involved in  more parts of the economy, it will create a better society by enabling all the best minds to be involved.”

Overcoming Challenges

Farrington said that one of the main barriers for women in getting into the field is just that: they don’t. “Venture has not done a particularly good job with outreach. I do think there are other ways for people to get involved in venture, for example my background in finance gave me expertise in analyzing business models.”

Besides an awareness issue, she said women can develop the expertise necessary for getting into venture by going into related fields that provide training, such as an investment banking analyst or developing expertise in the area of venture they’d like to participate in, such as e-commerce, technology product management or digital media.

And, she said, she wants the industry to realize the value that women bring to the venture conversation. “The field needs to recognize that women are additive to the firm and in the boardroom. I believe the dialogue in the boardroom is richer and better when women are involved.”

She continued, “The excellent returns generated from investing in social and digital media and ecommerce [where women are more concentrated] should do a lot to open the eyes of the men  at VC firms.” Farrington cited companies like Gilt and Birchbox, which were founded by women. “You want someone analyzing them from the customer’s, i.e. woman’s, eyes.”

“There are more women CEOs, and there need to be more women VCs too. It’s time to recognize that women are much more involved in some of the areas that these firms are making most of their money in,” she added.

In Her Personal Time

In her non-StarVest time, Farrington follows her two passions: women’s education and women’s economic empowerment.

“Most of my philanthropic activities revolve around these.” She is a board member of Opportunity International, a leading international microfinance institution that makes loans primarily to women, and traveled to Uganda in each of the last two summers for them with her 16 year old nephew, as well as to Nicaragua.

She is on the Investment Committee of her alma mater Smith College, and is a member of the Dean’s Visiting Committee at Harvard Business School, where she recently endowed a Fellowship for Women Entrepreneurs.

Farrington also loves sports with her favorites being running and yoga at least three times a week, as well as skiing, which she has done all her life. But most important of all to her is her family. She asked, “What would life be without the love of those close to you?”

According to Alison Maitland, co-Author of Future Work: How Businesses Can Adapt and Thrive in the New World of Work, it’s time for companies to adapt to employees’ needs – rather than the other way around. By doing so, she believes, companies can unlock untapped potential and productivity – particularly when it comes to women – and that’s good for business.

She explained, “We need corporate cultures to adapt to the two new realities of workforces and careers. First, that women are nearly half the workforce in most advanced economies. And yet many organizations are still built and designed by and for men of another era. That is no longer suitable for today’s workforce. “

“There is a connection between the way work is done and women’s lack of progress to the top.” Location should be removed from the equation when evaluating work, she continued. “Really, it’s results that should count rather than hours spent in the office.”

Future Work was released in the UK in October and in the US on the 8th of November, and discusses the urgency with which corporations need to address a changing workforce as the global marketplace becomes more complex. The book is co-written with Peter Thomson, a former HR director and a long-time expert on new ways of working.

She explained, “We both thought the way we work is crazy, and that there are much better ways to be doing it, and change is on the way.”

Maitland and Thomson interviewed over 60 executives and experts around the world and surveyed managers in their research for the book. “The majority of these managers expect there to be a revolution in working practices in the next decade. The book has a driving vision to explain how work can be done better and how people can be more productive, in a way that is good for people, good for companies, and good for the environment,” she said.

The Future of the Global Workforce

The second new reality that Maitland called critical for corporations to embrace is the rise of the emerging markets. These regions are growing in importance and companies are now drawing talent from them. “One of the questions we ask is how new ways of working will play out in new cultures, and it’s an important one,” she said.

“In the US and UK it is increasingly acceptable to work from home. But in some other cultures – even within Europe – it is not so acceptable to work from home.” And in some emerging markets, there are other factors at play, like a lack of infrastructure, or responsibility for extended family, which may limit employees’ ability to work from home, she noted. “We have to realize that, in terms of new ways of working, one size does not fit all.”

The benefits of flexibility have not been lost around the globe, however. For example, Future Work discusses South Korea’s efforts to implement “smart working,” equipping employees with mobile technology to work remotely from the office. Maitland explained, “They have a fantastic telecommunications infrastructure there, but they also have very long working hours and a very strong culture of presentee-ism – and a very low birth rate. They also have amongst the lowest productivity levels in OECD countries.”

She continued, “The government is trying to make it possible to accommodate women’s desire to work from home, as well as building ‘smart work centers’ near people’s homes so they can avoid a long commute.”

Why Culture Matters

“We’ve known for fifty years that people are best motivated and productive if you give them autonomy and the tools to do their job, and they can just get on with things,” she said with a laugh. “Yet, there was huge resistance to that and there still is.”

“Now we have the technology, but what is standing in the way is management’s fear of losing control. They’re thinking, ‘If we can’t see them, how do we know they’re working?’”

Corporate culture is an incredibly powerful force in how work gets done in each company, Maitland said. “Culture is critical in terms of the successful transformation of work.”

She continued, “What we call ‘future work’ provides much more autonomy and [personal] control over your work.”

In fact, she said, a workplace culture of presentee-ism is often based on management mistrust of employees, when in fact, most employees are perfectly capable of managing their own time and work flow. “We see that people are being treated as children rather than adults in many cases,” she said.

Additionally, Maitland said, in many cases companies are working to implement technologies that enhance workplace flexibility, but, without the appropriate training and mindshift for managers, more innovative and efficient ways of working will go unused, or be used incorrectly. “It’s not enough to introduce new technology to the workplace,” she said. “And it’s not enough to redesign workplaces. Those are just they physical manifestations. It’s critical for leaders and managers to examine their attitudes toward flexibility and they may need to change attitudes and practices.”

Flex as a Business Strategy

Finally, Maitland suggested ways to change the culture of work so that flex becomes more accepted. First of all, she said, the business case for flexibility must be communicated. “If organizations are going to do it effectively, they need to come at it as a business strategy, rather than an HR strategy.”

The message should come from the top, she advised, and should bring together senior management across corporate functions. After the infrastructure is in place, companies must rethink the way they are managing people. She explained, “Have good, honest conversations with mid-managers so they can overcome their fears about losing control. In the book, we show how the companies that are doing this well have had these conversations, and have people at the top managing and modeling flexible work. Our book is really addressing leadership 2.0, the kind of skills you need to be a leader when organizations are flatter, and the ability to inspire and motivate a dispersed team.”

She added, “And the skills we find are important for this new world of work are skills in which women tend to be ranked higher than men – such as team- and relationship-building, emotional intelligence, tenacity, and awareness of the wider picture and the social impact of business decisions.”

Alison Maitland is speaking on “The Future of Work: Why and How to Make the Shift” at the SHRM/Families and Work Institute Conference in Washingon, DC today.

“My biggest piece of advice,” said Ellen Galinsky, Co-Founder and President of the Families and Work Institute and a pioneer in the study of work-life issues, “is don’t think that tension will totally disappear. We will always have some work-life tension.”

Galinsky’s work has spanned decades and subjects – parents, children, men, women – and she’s gained key insight into the evolution of the problems faced by working parents.

“I think a lot of mothers worry about how their work will affect their child. But the fact is, the real impact on your children comes from the kind of relationship you have with them. Decades of studies have shown that work doesn’t have that much of an impact — you as parents do! So ask yourself, “what kind of parent do I want to be?”

Galinsky’s most recent work shows that more men are reporting work-life conflict than women. The Institute’s new report, The New Male Mystique [PDF], examines the reason behind it – and why it’s important for women.

Finding and Following the Work-Life Question

“My career has been following questions,” Galinsky began. “I’ve followed questions I thought were the most important to ask and begin to find answers for. I think of my work as an adventure.”

Galinsky’s interest in work and family issues stemmed from her background in child development. “It’s been the anchor of my career,” she said. After graduating from Vassar College, she went to Bank Street College as a teacher in its lab school, at the same time enrolling in its graduate school, from which she earned a Master of Science in Child Development/Education. She spent a number of years as a teacher and then as a coordinator of an early childhood program, she said, to gain experience and understanding into what children were learning – “as opposed to what we thought we were teaching,” she explained.

“During this time, I began to hear parents talking about what they thought was a unique and personal problem – work and family life. There weren’t even words to describe it. It wasn’t a field,” she said.

She explained that her colleagues in Europe reported hearing about similar concerns. She realized it wasn’t an isolated problem, and together, they applied for a grant from the Ford Foundation in the 1970s to study work and family issues.

Based on this research, Galinsky wrote a book was called The Six Stages of Parenthood, which focused on the ways parents grow. “We think about how kids grow and change, but how parents develop is often ignored,” she said.

“Each question leads to an answer, but to more questions too,” she explained. “In the beginning of our studies on work and family life, we didn’t know what which variables to put into our studies.”

Galinsky and FWI went on to research work-life questions as they pertain to parents and children, elder care, technology, and how the work-life conflict affects men.

“Looking back on my work, though, I’m most proud of my latest book Mind in the Making. I have always hoped that what I do will make a difference and will change the way people think about an issue. I am proud to say that in this book, I have found that there are life skills we can cultivate in our children that will help them thrive now and in the future.”

She continued, “At the Families and Work Institute, we always try to break new ground. We were also among the first to find predictable patterns in parents’ growth and the first to ask children how they felt about their employed mothers and fathers.”

The Male Mystique

In 2008, FWI published a paper entitled “Times are Changing.” Galinsky explained, “We saw that men were now experiencing more work-family conflict than women. It was very surprising, and frankly, we didn’t understand it.”

Galinsky said she worries about the lives of men these days. This may seem strange, she continued, considering the shockingly low numbers of women at the top of corporate America and the wage gap between women and men. “We haven’t solved the issue of women and advancement and pay – so why should we worry about men?”

But, she pointed out, “We know that now women are now more highly educated than men. We can also see in our data that males’ health is declining. We thought there must be something happening.”

The Institute decided to delve further into the data, with FWI researcher Kerstin Aumann taking the lead. “It wasn’t until we saw the finding that fathers are working more hours than non-fathers of the same ages that we had an idea of what was going on,” she said.

“We know that fathers want to be more involved with their children, and it led to the notion of the “new male mystique,” finding that men are now facing almost what women faced when they went into the workforce in large numbers.”

But it isn’t increasing home responsibilities that are causing the most work-life conflict for men. It’s that they are working longer and longer hours. Men’s work-life conflict, by and large, stems from wanting a robust family life, while also feeling the need to be the primary breadwinner.

In a recent piece in the Huffington Post, Galinsky explained:

“In the national study, men who were working more hours then they wished (54% of men) were asked why they did so. Overall, 47% say that they need the money, 16% say they couldn’t keep their jobs if they tried to reduce their hours, and 14% say that they need to work hours to keep up with the demands of their jobs. In an economy where men’s wages have remained flat or declined slightly and where jobs are increasingly insecure, men want and need to be good breadwinners as well as involved fathers.

Today, men are experiencing what women experienced when they first entered the workforce in record numbers — the pressure to ‘do it all in order to have it all.’ This is the essence of the ‘new male mystique.’”

Why should women be interested in the report? Galinsky said, “When anyone shares the care of a home or child, there is going to be some tension. It’s automatic – it’s a normal part of becoming a couple.”

“That said, it’s an incredibly wonderful thing that men want to be involved with children. That to me is a really good change. The challenge is to learn to when and how to agree and to disagree.”

She added, “As part of a 2003 study, ‘Leaders in a Global Economy,’ we found that dual-centric women and men (those who prioritize both their work and their family lives) were the least stressed, where those who were work-centric (always putting work first) were the most stressed. Having multiple roles is good for you and your health.”

The Importance of Work-Life Boundaries

Galinsky said one way to alleviate work-life tension is to create transitions. She said, “There aren’t clear boundaries anymore—we are often thinking of home when we are at work and thinking of work when we are at work.”

“Identify a place in the road where you say you’re switching off – and really try to be where you are.”

She continued, “In my ‘Ask the Children’ study and book, I found that kids didn’t think their parents liked their jobs – but parents said they did. Often, we come home with the bad things, and we forget that kids are learning about work from their parents.”

“Remember to say the good things as much as the bad things,” she recommended.

She also advised that small changes can make a big difference. “It can be waking up fifteen minutes earlier or picking out your outfit before you go to bed. It’s just doing those little things that alleviate tension, that could mean not coming home in a bad mood.”

She advised professional women to find people ton mentor or help and to be sure to give back when possible. “Be the kind of role model that you would want to have – ask what your legacy will be,” she said. “People who think about their legacy seem to be happier, based on our research.”

And, she added, “Take time to celebrate successes.”

In Her Personal Time

In her personal time, Galinsky enjoys photography, having shown her work across the New York area. Her husband is also an artist. “I also enjoy spending time with my grown kids, and thankfully they seem to enjoy spending time with us,” she said with a chuckle.

“Both of my children have found work they care about, and that’s a wonderful place for them to be,” she added.

“I wanted to be a banker my whole life,” said Maria Coyne, Executive Vice President, Business Banking Segment Group at Key Bank. Coyne graduated with a degree in finance from Notre Dame in 1982, and besides a three year foray into the non profit sector, has spent her 25 year career in banking. While she has worked in just about every part of the bank, she said, she’s always come back to small business.

“It’s where my heart was,” she said. “Particularly the women’s business sector.”

Among her proudest achievements, Coyne includes the work she’s done with the Key4Women program – Key’s program for female business owners, providing financial solutions, networking opportunities, and education. She explained that, going back to the late ’90s, Key Bank was studying the needs of women business owners. “We saw that they just weren’t applying for loans.”

“We identified it as a need and wanted to make it real.” She said the program has gone a long way in helping understand the economic value in women-owned businesses. “This is not just a “feel good” project,” she said. “These women have sophisticated business needs.”

She continued, “The most thrilling thing for me has been to see these companies grow and expand through the program.”

In 2005, Key Bank has committed to lending $1 billion over the next three years, and accomplished that goal early in 2007. “So we said, ‘Let’s double it.’” That goal, she said, was achieved in 2009. The bank is on track to achieve its next goal of 3 billion by 2012.

On the horizon, Coyne said, is a program for non profit entities similar to Key4Women. “We want to help non profits find financial solutions. We’re very excited about it.” Additionally, Coyne said, so many of the bank’s employees sit on non profit boards that the program is energizing the entire leadership team. “We’re well suited to serve non profits,” she added.

Coyne is particularly excited about the financial education portion of the two programs.

She said, “I think financial education is so important in virtually every aspect of our industry. On the consumer side, particularly in the “unbanked,” there is heightened awareness around people better managing their finances. One of the good things that came out of this bad cycle is that we are building the tools to help people manage their finances better.”

Advice for Professional Women

“One of the things I had to learn was that I had to modulate my passion,” Coyne recalled. “That means being very measured in how you go about expressing opportunities and setting expectations relative to who you want to work with.”

She continued, “Women are often perceived as overemotional in the workplace because we bring all this passion – balance your passion by bringing the facts to back it up.”

Coyne said that she has seen the industry improve for women throughout her career. “There are a lot of women in leadership positions, and there are more role models than when I started 25 years ago.”

But she said, women in the industry could always use more role models, and she tries to serve as one herself. She continued, “I do tell young women all the time that you have to ask for what you want in terms of career development.”

“I think a lot of us make that mistake early on,” she continued. “You have to be clear about the aspirations you have. Don’t be afraid to take control of your career.”

And she added, don’t be afraid to roll up your sleeves. “Early on I made a name for myself as a person who could solve problems and fix things – I didn’t mind being thrown into a mess and I think that opened doors for me.”

As women advance to more senior levels in their careers, Coyne continued, “Stay encouraged.”

She continued, “And for women who have achieved senior roles, please look for someone who needs your help and be a mentor.”

“At Key we say, find a mentor, be a mentor. I have a half dozen people I rely on for advice – I would encourage other senior women to make yourselves available. I’m happy to meet younger women for lunch or coffee when they ask.”

She added, “You learn as much from them as they do from you.”

Women at Key

Coyne is a part of Key Bank’s Executive Women’s Network. “It was formed about the same time as Key4Women. I’m not the founder, but I was actively involved in the formation,” she said. Coyne has also served as an executive sponsor for the network.

The Bank also has a number of programs aimed at mid-career women. “We’re trying to get people over that hump,” she explained.

Finally, Coyne credited Key Bank’s new Chairman and CEO Beth E. Mooney as an important step for women at bank. She explained, “She is the first female CEO of a top twenty bank. It’s important to have a champion in your chairman. When she was promoted, she got hundreds of emails from women in the company – and she replied to all of them.”

She added, “It shows that Key Bank is not just talking the talk, but really walking it.”

In Her Personal Time

In her personal time, Coyne enjoys traveling with her husband and two children. “We do love to explore and discover new places and try new things.”

She is also involved in her community. “For the last twelve years, I served on the board of directors for the high school that both my daughter and I attended and graduated from, and for the last four years I’ve served as chairman.”

She added, “And of course, I still have family balance issues. But being involved in the community helps keep you grounded and reminds you what’s important.”

Jacqueline Allen, SVP of Finance, Equities Reporting, North America at Citi, said the achievement she is most proud of is going back to school for her MBA. She explained, “I finally took the leap after having breakfast with the CEO of Equities at Citi. It was three years ago, when Citi was entering the most tumultuous time of the downturn. The message I took away was that I needed to be the best I could be to propel my career. So I took inventory of myself and realized that to compete in the changing environment, I needed more education.”

Now that Allen has completed her MBA, she is looking for the next opportunity on the horizon.

Career Path in Finance and Equities

Allen completed her undergraduate degree at Rutgers University and started her career in the finance department at the Bank of New York (BNY) fifteen years ago. She then left the bank for IBM, but after a year and a half, she returned to New York and was recruited to Citi by a former BNY manager. She transferred to the equities division, where it was her responsibility to liaise between the finance division and the traders on the desk.

A year ago, Allen earned her MBA, while working full-time at Babson College F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business, in Wellesley, Massachusetts.

She explained, “Now, after supporting the equities division for five years, I am excited about Citi and the ongoing opportunities ahead that will allow me to leverage the skills and knowledge I’ve gained from the MBA program. It’s exciting.”

LGBT at Citi

Allen, who is the co-chair of Citi’s North America Markets Pride Committee said, “When I entered Citi, it was important for me to be out. When I joined Citi in 2001, Citi was operating at full speed in implementing its diversity strategy. I got involved because I was an out employee and it allowed me to take on assignments without fearing anything will hold me back.”

Participating in the network has enabled her to advance her career as well. She explained, “It’s allowed me to sit in front of senior management on matters for the community.”

In her capacity as co-chair of the North America Markets Pride Committee, Allen said she is very involved with LGBT activities at Citi. “We’re working on creating an industry-leading policy model for diversity training, including revising the language in our training videos to better inform employees.

Allen also noted a recent panel Citi hosted featuring Dr. Eliza Byard, Executive Director of GLSEN (Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network) and an expert on LGBT issues in education, including bullying. “Dr. Byard spoke to employees about the impact of bullying on the workforce. The statistics show that many young people don’t make it to the workforce because of bullying.”

Women in Banking

The biggest challenge for women in the industry is a lack of confidence, meaning they accept what is given and don’t push for more,” said Allen.

She advised young women beginning their careers to ask lots of questions. Additionally, they should focus on building relationships. “Network with your peers and senior women. Be visible and be relevant. Volunteer for work no one wants.”

Women who are advancing in their careers should be vocal about what they want. “Ask for more and bring someone with you,” she said.

Allen recently participated in a 6-month leadership development program for high potential VP/Directors. “It taught us leadership skills, how to enhance our executive presence, strengthen strategic thinking, refine communication skills and how to create your own development program through ownership of your career.”

She continued, “The most important part of the program was access to senior leaders and personal coaching.”

In Her Personal Time

In her personal time, Allen enjoys entertaining friends and going to the beach. “We love Fire Island – it’s very peaceful there, and there are lots of LGBT families and allies,” she explained.

“It’s been the driving mission of ION since our founding in 2006 to increase the number of women on public company boards and in the executive suite. One of the criteria for member organizations to join is that this must be part of their mission,” said Charlotte Laurent-Ottomane, President of the InterOrganization Network (ION).

ION is a consortium of 14 regional organizations in the United States, dedicated to the advancement of women to positions of power in the business world.

Laurent-Ottomane explained, “There has been a growing body of research showing the high correlation between gender diversity in the boardroom and the financial performance of the company.” She continued, “Women make up a huge portion of the workforce and the consumer market means it’s only natural that you have women on the board representing that audience.”

“And simply put, it just has to be that way. It’s the natural balance,” she added. “In this country, we’ve gone through many variations of equality. Now its women’s time to be equal, and that means equality in the economy and in the board room. That’s where the power lies.”

Equal Chance to Be Elected

Responding to criticism that a push for getting more women on boards is tantamount to tokenism, Laurent-Ottomane said, “A lot of women don’t want to be token. But if you’re not a qualified woman, we don’t want you there either.”

Advocating for women in the boardroom does not mean putting men at a disadvantage, she explained. It just means ensuring the best people for the job have the opportunity to be considered for it. “Of course we do want the best people for the job,” Laurent-Ottomane said. “But women can be the best people for the job too.”

She continued, “We need to look at a balanced spectrum of candidates, is what we’re pushing for.”

Money and Power

ION recently announced a new initiative to engage state treasurers and institutional investors in promoting gender diversity on boards. Laurent-Ottomane explained, “A gender diverse board is a more effective board.”

She continued, “We advocate that either the companies have a representation of women on the board or they have a gender diverse slate for new directors. The issue is not black or white or about a specific number or quota. Rather we encourage companies who are making the effort to change the status quo. Ideally, we would like to see a company strive for a ‘critical mass’ that is at least a 30 percent representation of women on the board or on the slate of directors for a shareholder vote.”

She continued, “This is all about money and power. The initiative is to say, ‘I will give you my money as an investor if you meet this criteria.’ It’s a simple as that.”

“It’s an excellent addition the movement. Until a few years ago it didn’t have the power behind it. The influence of the mutual funds and treasurers gives the CEO and sitting boards cause for reflection.” Laurent-Ottomane also mentioned the SEC’s new diversity regulation, which requires companies to disclose what they are doing to increase boardroom diversity.

Influencing Decision Makers

One of the IONs goals is to help women connect and network, and encourage them that board service is something they can do. “We’re sometimes our own worst enemy, because it’s never even occurred to some women to serve on a board.”

Each of ION’s member organization provides training and education for women on board responsibilities and self advocacy at least once a quarter, Laurent-Ottomane said. “I as president have been very adamant about getting out there on this issue. And as an organization, we have grown to the point where we do have a voice.”

Laurent-Ottomane said that getting more women on boards has long been a personal mission. She recalled, “I spent a large part of my career in Paris with Alcatel-Lucent. And I was fortunate. I was in charge of financial communication spanning Europe and the US. It put me in a position to understand the importance of good governance.”

She continued, “I returned to the US in 2000, and eventually decided to leave Alcatel and start my own firm in Florida. And in 2007, I formed my own firm providing counsel to public companies on communications with institutional investors and shareholders.”

“When I moved to Florida, I wanted to connect with women like myself and joined a group called Women’s Executive Leadership, and eventually was asked to join the board. Then I was asked to be our representative to the ION board. Then one year ago, I became president of ION,” she explained.

In her time as office, Laurent-Ottomane said, she has tried to drive ION as a business. And she’s also used her own business to advocate for putting women on boards – and she’s been successful, having recently convinced a client place a woman on its board. “It’s all about synergy,” she said. “Increasing board diversity is all about good governance. My business is about financial communication and that includes governance. If I can help make a board better, I seize that opportunity!”