Donna Venable: A Leader Committed to Helping Others Rise and Shine

Donna Venable, Executive Vice President, Human Resources for Ricoh North America and Deputy General Manager, Shared Services, is a long-time supporter of International Women’s Day. It is a day on which she celebrates how dedicated Ricoh is to growing women leaders and how far the organization has come on its journey to empower women to be successful both inside and outside the company. Donna says that Ricoh has always had a focus on developing women, and “I’ve had a seat at the table from the start.”

Making a global impact

Six years ago, Donna’s colleague Lorna Hernandez who leads Human Resources for Ricoh Latin America participated as a panelist at another organization’s International Women’s Day program. She returned from the event so inspired by the experience that she recommended Ricoh create something similar. Ricoh acted on Lorna's suggestion, and since then their celebration has grown in impact and coverage each year.

Since 2017, in commemoration of International Women’s Day, Ricoh has held events in 45 countries around the world. “The International Women’s Day event adds so much value,” Donna noted, “that we are taking our lessons learned and using them across the spectrum of diverse communities to extend ?the positive impact.”

Continuing the journey

Both Ricoh and Donna are continuing the journey to level the playing field for women and other under-represented leaders. When asked how her experience has been as a woman leader, Donna says it has been “less difficult for me than for some others.” Even though she had to make sacrifices, she found, what she calls her “happy medium.”

Looking back on her career, Donna sees that she has had to make specific choices to find her happy medium and that even now, she and other women face more trade-off decisions than their male counterparts. Still, Donna appreciates the support she has had at Ricoh to make the choices that are right for her.

Lifting the team

Donna considers herself to be very driven. When she sees a need, she pulls people together to fill it. Donna learned this trait from her father. “My father inspired me with his ability to bring people together and do whatever it takes to get things done.”

Donna balances her drive for success with her deep care for others. She says, as leaders we should pause often to reflect, “Am I doing the right things to lift my team members?”

She also encourages leaders to seek feedback from multiple sources. As a young leader, Donna tended to be a perfectionist. Her focus on being perfect drained her energy and her time. Fortunately, she received coaching from a caring leader who encouraged her to let go of perfectionism so she could focus on elevating others and broadening her impact. Taking this advice has served Donna well.

Today, Donna’s favorite thing about being a leader is being able to watch people “rise and shine” as they achieve goals and deliver results. And on International Women’s Day, Donna gets to celebrate all the women who are shining.

Interested in learning more from Donna? Join NIIT Principal Consultant Pooja Singh Mehta, Donna, and the panel of other women leaders for “From Glass Slippers to Glass Ceilings | Celebrating Women Leaders in Learning” on March 30, 2022, at 10 AM Eastern time. Click here to register.