What’s holding back your executive journey?

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Advancing Your Executive Journey

Overcoming common barriers on your executive journey

Once you know where you’re headed, the next question is what’s holding you back? You may even find you're holding yourself back – struggling to find the courage to take a risk, or to give yourself permission to venture into something new.?On the Athena blog , we explore common barriers and biases that hold back women leaders and how to overcome them.

Quick tip on overcoming biases from Athena Coach Jocelyn King

In our Navigating a Career Transition Pathway, Athena Coach Jocelyn King?offers two approaches ?to combat prejudices and biases in your executive journey.?

1. "Show them how you're like them and how you can connect with them. So if you're a woman in a group predominantly of men, you want to quickly show ways you're thinking as a business person or that you have technical acumen."?
2. "Make sure you come across as relevant. For example, I'm a chief growth and marketing officer over [a certain age]. People might think that I don't understand TikTok. So I'd have to say, 'When we were launching the TikTok campaign, we did such and such.' Give people facts to help them understand their prejudices and biases."

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Athena in the News

5 qualities that make a good board chair

As board chair, you’re expected to champion collaboration and alignment – building deep relationships with the board, the CEO, key management, and stakeholders... and those relationships?must?be built on trust and understanding to thrive. Athena Founder & CEO Coco Brown was recently?interviewed by Fortune ?on the top qualities of effective board chairs.

Making the business world work for women

Athena isn’t about, “How can I rise? How can I be more ambitious?” It’s about, “How can WE?” Coco was recently?featured in The Suite Collective ?discussing how she found her footing as a woman in business and how women are supporting each other everyday within Athena.?

"Quiet quitters" may be a prime target for layoffs

As recession fears loom, “quiet quitters” may be a prime target for layoffs. In good times, leadership may look at disengaged employees and proactively try to engage them. But in bad times, those same people are often the first let go.?Read the full article ?with commentary by Coco in Business Insider.

Voices of Athena

Passion & Purpose with Theresa Szczurek

How far are you from your passion and purpose? What one thing would bring you closer to living the life of your dreams? Theresa Szczurek – freight train jumper, cybersecurity guru, and Athena member – is devoted to?helping you find out .

Join Us

In your job search, it's not just who you know – but how you know them

Join us on Wednesday, October 26 ?for a public Salon led by Athena Coach Cate Goethals where we'll deep-dive into the power of your loose connections to transform your career.

The competitive advantage of globally distributed workforces

As companies settle into hybrid working arrangements how can you continue to leverage your distributed workforce as a competitive advantage??Dive in on Thursday, November 3 .

Women in the Workplace

For women leaders, we’re in the midst of the “Great Breakup”

Women executives are leaving their posts at increasing rates. McKinsey and Lean In recently released their sixth annual?Women in the Workplace Report ?diving into their motivations.?

Key findings include:?

• Women still struggle to rise into the top ranks of leadership. Women make up only 36% of Sr. Managers (up 3% since 2017), 32% of VPs (up 3%), and 26% of the C-suite (up 6%).
• Women continue to experience more biases and microaggressions that hold them back in the workplace. Women were 40% more likely to have a coworker take credit for their idea, and 2x more likely to be mistaken for someone more junior.?
• Women were 35% less likely to report experiencing micro-aggressions while working mostly remote vs. mostly on-site. The gap was even greater for disabled women and and women of color.?
• Women of color are more ambitious while receiving less support. 59% say they aspire to be top executives vs. 49% of women leaders overall.?
• Women leaders are also overworked at home, as men tend to do less household labor as they advance – but women don’t have the same luxury. As men advance to senior leadership, they are 60% less likely to manage most of the family’s housework; as a woman advances, she’s only 10% less likely.

How Autodesk retains their top women leaders

Autodesk partners with Athena Alliance to support the development and retention of their top 50 women leaders. Their?custom program ?provides a cohort of women with hands-on coaching and one-on-one support, and the opportunity to meet hundreds of other women in similar positions.

Member News & Celebrations

Congratulations to our members on their recent achievements

• Deepika Rayala was appointed Chief Digital and Information Officer at Cornerstone OnDemand
• Theresia Gouw and Mallun Yen were recognized on Forbes' 50 Over 50
• Yvonne Wassenaar was appointed to the Board of Directors at JFrog

Welcome new members

We are thrilled to welcome this week’s new members to the Athena community. They include VPs, CFOs, and Senior Leaders in human resources, finance, and marketing. They come to us from leading organizations such as?Truist?and?Acosta.