Sylvia Ann Hewlett

Transcription

KAREN SOMBERG: I'm Karen Somberg. I'm the diversity lead for tech. And I probably wouldn't normally be the person introducing this session, but I used to work for Sylvia at the Center for Talent Innovation, and I joined Google last year. So it was very exciting to welcome her back here today to talk about executive presence, which was a piece of research that started happening when I was still at the center. And was really transformative for me and for others as we talked to companies. About thinking about, what is leadership? What is are the leadership archetypes, and how do you become an effective communicator? And you know, what does it mean to have gravitas? And all these big pieces that we don't often think about, but that are crucially important in addition to doing our work. Also, how we come across and how we relay our messages. So I'm excited to welcome Sylvia here today. One thing that I learned about executive-- well, I learned a lot of things about executive presence from Sylvia. But one was that you should always have one fun piece of-- you know, maybe in your appearance-- some fun piece of clothing. That was always something that I noticed that she did, and used very effectively actually. And so, in honor of her today, I wore leopard shoes, because she always had leopard. And I think she has a bag that's leopard, so I'm right on target today. But I wore like Google-safe leopard, you know, not too much. But I'm very excited about to welcome Sylvia here to talk about her new book on executive presence, which was voted the best book of the month by Amazon this month. So pretty awesome. And so, without further ado, Sylvia, welcome. [APPLAUSE] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: So it is fabulous to connect with Karen. She has much more important things to do this morning, but we already did a little catch up over breakfast. So that was fabulous. I want to begin with a story, because this topic goes to the core of some of my failure, and some of the challenges I had early in my life. I grew up in the coal mining area of South Wales. This is a very depressed piece of the UK. The unemployment rate in my valley when I was growing up was 38% because the coal industry was closing down. And I did come from a hardscrabble family. And partly because of the women's movement, partly because they were trying to get folks from the wrong side of the tracks to major universities, I did end up at Cambridge when I was 18. And I was bright. I did pass a lot of exams. But I spoke English with this thick working-class Welsh accent, which was the kiss of death in polite English society, which is very class-conscious. I also I did not use grammar kind of correctly. I grew up with a lot of bad habits, because this was not a reading household. And I remember knowing when I was 18 that no matter how great I was at my work, every time I opened my mouth, I let myself down. It was also true that Cambridge was only 7% female at the time. So there was enough going on, in terms of the gender barriers, to make me feel that at least I had to fix the way I talk if I was going to get anywhere. So I spent two years listening to the BBC World Service, practicing those modulated tones, and also fixing my grammar. And it did make me much more accessible, much more successful, much more able to actually communicate my thoughts. Now, looking back on it, there was a lot of bias going on in that story, right? What's wrong with regional accents? What's wrong with working-class accents? Now, I did need to fix my grammar. That was a good idea, right? You do want to use the language that is your main vehicle well. But back then, because class was such an issue, I also really had to change the way I spoke. So I mean, this business of how you communicate, there is this tension between authenticity and conformity. And I think all of our corporate cultures present us with some of these challenges. What works? What gets you over the next hurdle? But what is true to yourself? So let's look at this data. We've got some amazing data on what is going on in corporate America right now. We looked at 14 sectors, including the tech sector. And I will talk some about the specificities of the Silicon Valley challenge. So first off, I founded the Task Force on Talent Innovation some 10 years ago. Google has been a leader or this group for the last six years. So I have been very much involved in your talent journey here. In terms of this study, we have collected incredible data around what allows you to be seen as having potential, as being leadership material, as being ready for the next big thing, right? And one thing I want to emphasize here is executive presence is really not about performance. It's not about whether you really do deliver the goods, hit the numbers, really know your craft, and have the skills. It's about what you signal about your preparedness for the next big chance. We find, right across sectors, that there are three main pillars of executive presence which leaders look for. And in this data, we went out to hundreds of representative leaders across the private sector. We also did a ton of focus groups and interviews, so this really reflects a lot about data collection in terms of what is important in the eyes of your boss. So these are the three dimensions. Now think gravitas. That is a biggie. When we think of that word, what comes to mind? I mean, what do you associate with the word gravitas? Force? Competence? Heft, in terms of being seen as an intellectual heavyweight? I mean, how do signal that, right? Credibility. Eloquence. Remember, we're talking about communication a little separately here, but you think that that is part of the gravitas piece. Impact-- very good word. So we had a bunch of words, right, that seem to describe it. But we probably don't know what is most important, right? So let's take a look at what the data is telling us, realizing that there is some intermingling of these things. For instance, you can have the most amazing heft, but if you can't be compelling in how you talk about it, it remains locked up, it becomes a well-kept secret, right? So obviously these things are interlinked. So what we find in the data is that gravitas-- really right across the spectrum here-- is seen as the most important piece. Signalling to the world that you know your stuff cold, that you're five questions deep on your domain of expertise, that it's at your fingertips. Right? There is a very interesting picture emerging here across ethnicity. And basically what senior leaders are telling us in this survey is what they're looking for in terms of their team-- their mid-level managers, their high-potential younger folks, et cetera. As we can see, whether you're Caucasian or Asian or female or male, there's tremendous uniformity in terms of the rough proportions. You know, gravitas is the biggie, communication skills is the second piece that is important, and then the appearance piece seems to be quite small. They are all interesting differences here. For instance, for African American leaders, they are particularly looking for gravitas. And they say, we know that we struggle with this ourselves. There is the specter of Affirmative Action. They're saying, it's as though we've got to re-audition for our jobs all the time, because perhaps way back we got an unfair chance. And in our interviews, we found that gravitas seemed to be a particularly big hurdle for African American want-to-be leaders. For Asian individuals, communication is often somewhat more difficult. If you come from a respect-filled deferential culture, right, and you value consensus, how do you get to be forceful enough in an American-centric corporation? And again, bias, very infused in this data. But the main message here is that there's tremendous agreement in terms of what matters. So moving on, let's look at the top picks. We presented our leaders with about 50 traits, these are the top six. And again, amazing agreement. Female and male leaders really picking a very similar list. Top of the list there is this-- confidence, poise, credibility, grace under fire. Someone who can keep their cool and credibility under pressure-- tremendously admired. Now would you say that translated in the tech sector, is that something that is important? I see some nods. Many people told us in fast-paced industries, or industries where business models are changing, this is particularly valued. Interestingly, charisma is number six, right? A little down the list. People are suspect of big personalities these days. They prefer the calm confidence. Number two-- decisiveness showing teeth. Now, when we look at our mid-level employees, we find that women have a problem with this. That being tough, being really forceful can be hard for a female, because she's seen often times as a little unlikable. The b-word gets rolled out quite a bit. So this tough, showing teeth thing is actually easier for men than for women. And again, it reflects the dominant culture, the mainstream leaders, you know, there's bias here. This is how it's been done by the dominant group, right? So any reaction here? Is it harder did you feel, for a woman to be super, strong minded and remain someone who is admired? You know, two weeks ago, Jill Abramson was shot down as the executive editor of the New York Times. Why? Well, we probably read the press. She was seen as pushy. She was seen as abrasive. She was seen as lacking charm. She did not sufficiently make nice to her, particularly, senior male colleagues. She was a fabulous leader. No one was criticizing her track record or what she'd done in China. So it is tough, particularly in somewhat traditional fields, perhaps. But if you look at number four, it's fascinating. Emotional intelligence-- this is where we find women really do amazingly well. There is more of an empathy factor that women are able to get out there at work. And these days-- why is emotional intelligence newly-prized, newly on this list? A lot of leaders said, look, it's shooting up the charts. Didn't used to be on the list, but now it is. So why is emotional intelligence important if you want to be a leader? Right, and your team is probably diverse, right? So sitting in someone else's shoes-- pretty important. And valuing difference-- pretty important. The other thing we find is that customers and clients can be very diverse, they can be very global these days. Don't we all work in global teams? So a little empathy builds trust. And you can't just be the top-down command and control guy anymore, and have it work. So in a way, this is nicely mixed up. Some of these prized attributes are more natural or perhaps more instinctual for men, others for women. We don't know whether that's socialization or really how we are born. But it's nevertheless true. And the thing that we find in the final pick here-- vision, yes, is prized, but a measured vision. One that you can put data around, one that you have a lot of evidence around. The charisma bit-- which is just turning people on about your path forward-- does not work so well anymore. So moving on, we asked leaders, who is their icon? Who brought up gravitas better than anyone else? Top choice was Mandela. We explored why he was so admired. He was thought to be the complete package, the extraordinary integrity, force, and vision of his journey, the ways in which he had earned leadership. But also, his amazing ability to understand the power of symbolism, and to connect on a very human level. This particular episode you probably-- well, maybe you'll all too young to remember this-- but he was newly president of South Africa. The rugby team, The Springboks, had just won the world championship. The Springboks team were recalcitrant [? Afrikaans. ?] 100% of the team were white South Africans-- from the [? Afrikaans ?] group, which was the group that had actually designed and fought for apartheid. So this was the group that Nelson Mandela had spent 23 years in jail for, but they won. South Africa was the champion. So Mandela leaps out of the stand, dons a Springbok jersey, and hugs the captain. It's splashed around the world, this image, because what it showed was this new president was really about reconciliation and healing. And this said it, right? This man had the most amazing emotional intelligence, as well as heft, as well as integrity. Jamie Dimon's on this list, Steve Jobs is kind of on this list, although he was thought to be a little suspect because of just the eccentricity of his personality. But it's an interesting list, you know, what leaders choose as their icons. The other thing we find out from gravitas is how does it go badly wrong? How do you cut yourself off at the knees so that, no matter how good, you're out of here? So you know, sexual impropriety seems to be a way in which men hit the skids. Think of Petraeus or Spitzer or Weiner or-- you know, Clinton was impeached after all. There is a way in which senior man really do know that this is a way of getting written out. But other behaviors that get you in trouble is lying, covering up. The bully piece does not get you anywhere these days. It tends to, again, get you crossed off the list. An off-color or racially insensitive set of remarks will do the same. Mitt Romney, famously, was seen as someone who had a tin ear-- was clueless about how most people lived. He was in this bubble. He was such a privileged man, he really didn't know how the world worked. So he could talk about having binders full of women or he could tell the world that 47% of the population were losers because they were on benefits. And he included veterans and the disabled, in terms of the losers on his list. In other words, the reason he lost that election was that he was so profoundly insensitive as to how other people lived or what their challenges were. And of course, Christie's in the middle of a scandal right now. He's seen as a bully. He's seen as someone who's trying to cover up. And again, you can see the blunders as being elements which will probably ensure that he does not run for president next time around. So here are some tactics. How do you deal with some of these issues that are problematic for you? For instance, if you're a woman, how do you make your force, your very strong opinions, your track record really sing? We did lots of interviews for this research. And maybe you sugar coat your strength with some humor. Or when you have a massively important new campaign that you totally believe in, you also go on some kind of charm offensive to make sure that people find it palatable. Maybe you do none of the above because you know your non-negotiables, and there's no way in which you want to bend your demeanor or your approach to just please the culture you're in. So I think we all face tension here. Maybe we are willing to bend at the margins. If one is a man who's lived in a pretty straight-arrow environment, the way you bend at the edges are really listening for bias in your environment, and forcing yourself to understand the other, right? So again, we find that the tension between authenticity and conformity, between standing in and standing out, really permeates these things. But by and large, women do need to understand that making their strengths somehow work for them is a challenge in a lot of organizational cultures. And for men, figuring out how to show empathy is again a commonplace challenge in their team work. The other thing I want to say is, if your reputation and the word at the water cooler precedes you, how do you signal your reputation-- your stature-- in ways that aren't annoying? You're in a company, I guess, which doesn't have a whole lot of titles, right? So sometimes it's a little hard to show your experience, show your leaderly credentials. So any ideas here in terms of how to, again, just signal that gravitas, somehow establish from the get-go in a meeting that you know what you're talking about, that you have the chops? Is that an issue at Google? It is in a lot of young, highly-geared companies. If you are hired in, there's this wonderful assumption that, of course, you're exceptional. You're still faced with how do you stand out at Google? How do you progress? How do you end up by being tapped on the shoulder for some major opportunity, because we know that they're given out not to everyone, but to those who are seen as ready. So I think this is true of all organizations, but I thought that was very well expressed. Thank you. So let's move on and take a look at communication. Because in some ways, this is the way in. We find this is oftentimes the ice breaker. So the top pick, and it's very contemporary-- the ability to have kind of this mini-TED talk, the concise, compelling value-add. Huge. And what we find is that leaders particularly prize this if you can do it seemingly extemporaneously. It's the kiss of death to rely on notes or too many slides. You've got to wing it-- which goes to your point-- this is very hard to bring off. Not only is it valued in very fast-moving, incredibly talented cultures like Google, but this is true in media and on Wall Street, you know, at Walmart. I mean, this is a demand of the modern workplace. Attention spans are short. To find your voice, to make it be heard, the concise, compelling thing is a must. And it's not easy. And again, my own story-- I had some pretty terrible habits 12 years ago. I had just spent a bunch of years in academia being a professor-- a very boring professor I think-- but I was doing intermediate macro theory as my main thing, right? So hard to make that too lively. But here was the admired style in my department. You delivered information in 50 minute chunks. You snowed people with evidence, right? And very complex proofs. Try that out on a book tour. [LAUGHTER] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: I was a disaster. I couldn't do anything without my notes. So I made myself watch a particularly bad interview I did on Charlie Rose, which was particularly galling, because it was a big chance to get my message out. And I was terrible. I was just yawn-inducing. And I really was there with my three-by-five cards. You know, I could not let go of the notes. And I forced myself to learn what was going on. And did I practice, practice like crazy. And before I went to any meeting or made any speech, I banged it into my brain. So I knew the arc of what I was going to say. And I knew three different versions, just in case the conversation went in a different direction or someone said what I was about to say. And I learned to tell stories, not long stories. So it can be learned. All that stuff can be learned. But that is how you get your confidence. This is why communication is often the way to build the gravitas piece that we were talking about earlier. Because it establishes your credibility. And it ensures that you're heard. OK, so how do you move that into the ability to command a space, a room-- whether it's a team room or an audience-- and that is the linked one which is at the top of the list here. This requires a bunch of other things which are actually the surround sound is posture-- how do you sit at a table? How do you stand in a space? Some of it is just, you know, straightening that backbone and looking competent, paying attention. The other piece of it is to let go all that which is between you and your audience-- podiums, spectacles, and again, notes-- get rid of them-- and devices-- eye contact, eye contact, eye contact. So we find that we're rolling out a whole bunch of high-touch workshops, stuff like this, around EP. This is where one can be transformative, really rather easily. Any comments in terms of this culture, what works here? Or what is problematic here? AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: But if you have in your mind a playbook of exactly what you can say-- several versions of it-- which you know will grab, it's easier to do that. AUDIENCE: So manipulation of that general conversation gets-- SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: So isn't this a brilliant example of having your emotional intelligence connect with your communication skills? Because you know that the leaders need to take ownership of this idea. You've got to prod them along. You've got to become indispensable. And you've certainly got to be value add, right? But this can be transformative of one's-- how you see, right? And of your own confidence. OK, so moving on, what was the top pick here? Interestingly, a woman. Sheryl, of course, we all now. Not only is she seen as someone of enormous credibility, but her communication skills, right? She did do that TED talk, right? One of the most-- I think it was the most watched TED talk that particular year. Because she has this ability of delivering a clear message and then revealing some of her own vulnerability, so you can relate to her. She would be obnoxious if she did not do that. Because this is a person who's had a golden path. How do we relate to someone like that? But she tells us, you know, that she put on 60 pounds with that first child and some of her struggles. I mean, you can reveal any part of you. It doesn't have to, obviously, be family. You probably shouldn't over-share. But this is part of empathy-- sharing our roots, sharing a little piece of failure. And it makes her someone that people want to hear. And this other thing about the blunders-- because again, we did look at the blunders-- we see, again, bias all over these blunders. The interesting thing about bias is that executive presence is, oftentimes, the place where you see bias revealed. Because you're talking about a leadership archetype, right, that crying-- take crying-- turns out, men can cry, women cannot in the workplace. Think of Obama's speech around Trayvon Martin. He let a few tears leak out of his eyes. We liked him for that. It showed that this really distant man had heart and connected to the tragedy of this young person's life. But when women cry in public, they're seen as just way too emotional-- who can deal with them kind of thing. It takes us down in our stature. So if we look at this list, we know that we want a world where there isn't so much bias, such a gendered, for instance, take on what leadership needs to look like. But this is what's happening this week, next week, last week. This is how people are judged. Because this is data in terms of what leaders right now find does not work. One thing which I find particularly interesting-- the number one blunder is constant device checking. Leaders find that profoundly discourteous and profoundly undermining of a more junior person's gravitas, that they are not able to pay full attention. So what is the deal at Google, because I think-- [LAUGHTER] --some of the valued devices must be so omnipresent. But is there a kind of unwritten etiquette here, in terms of what happens in key meetings? AUDIENCE: Most of the meetings are no wifi-- SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: What about iPhones? I'm looking at someone who's holding theirs. Well maybe it's not an iPhone, maybe it's an Android. So tell me what the dominant behavior is. But if it gets in the way of you making eye contact with your boss and weighing in with your power sort, and doing the clever stuff of linking your emotional sense of who is really needing to buy-in, in this meeting, to my idea, and how do I demonstrate my indispensability to this project going forward, it truly does get in the way. No, no, no, no, I'm not saying you personally, don't feel it as an attack. You see, what leaders say-- no matter what the technology, no matter what the value-add of being able to complete your sense of some link or whatever-- the most important activity-- the main goal-- of a meeting is to leave it having impressed, having pushed the ball forward, and having a newly central role in whatever was decided. So I mean, I do feel-- I mean, I have five kids, so I am in touch with-- I mean, I don't tend to use devices that much, because of my age. Right? You know, it's not a habit I ever developed. But I do feel that there is a way in which we can undermine ourselves. And one thing that is valued above all other things by senior leaders is eye contact and having the full attention of a younger person they value. OK. So some more or less humorous examples of what people feel has gone wrong in terms of public displays of this-- Tim Geithner, famously, cannot make eye contact. He's always accused of looking like a frightened teenager, because he deflects eye contact. He almost cannot do it. Tremendously undermined his credibility. And the forcefulness, assertiveness, of statements coming from women of color really on display, I think, with Indra Nooyi. She gave a very famous speech not long ago at the Columbia Business School, where she took on American arrogance in the world. She was coming from a very secure place. She was born and brought up in India. She's been a very successful, global executive. And she is CEO of Pepsi. But because she is a woman of color, she got trashed by the press, particularly by white-guy reporters who saw her as out of line for criticizing a country that she had done so well in. So again, the degree of forcefulness, the degree of edginess, you can show as a woman of color really constrained by bias, by these stereotypes, and the archetypes of the leadership. OK, so we all know this, that 80% meet you first time online. And you'd better make sure that you're very happy with your LinkedIn manifestations, and that you're showing up online in ways that you're proud of. This is where colleagues and bosses-- where folks who are perhaps interviewing you for an opportunity-- will really first meet you. And I'm sure you all know that very profoundly here. So a few tactics-- first, lose the props. Get rid of the security blankets. We find that women use about one-third more PowerPoint slides than men. Because women often times feel that they have to show that they're super well-prepared, that they really did do all their homework. Often times, they feel that there are very few of them around a table, particularly at more senior levels, so they have to show how much work they put it into this presentation. But what it does, it undermines them, because you do, above all, need to show that you can wing it, that you know your stuff cold. Eye contact. Lower your voice-- this is interesting. Voices go up under pressure, under stress. Keeping obvious control-- not speeding up, not lifting your voice-- very important in terms of being heard. We've been using some opera coaches in the workshops we are doing around EP, and it's fascinating how much you can manipulate your voice so as you're heard. And again, it's got nothing to do with accent. Most opera singers don't speak any of languages very well that they sing in. It's all about tone and projection. And the last one-- use silence as a weapon. It's probably a little hard to do at Google, because you're describing a very crowded meeting culture, where people are fighting for space, right? But in some cultures-- and on Wall Street is a very good example-- I did an amazing interview with Sally Krawcheck, who was head of Merrill Lynch for many years. She said that, as a Southern woman, she was brought up to fill all space with words-- chitter-chat-- because a nice girl was supposed to make everyone else feel comfortable. And science was awkward. So she made it her business to fill up all space. She was totally discounted on Wall Street, because chitter-chatter in Southern women don't make much impact. So what she learned to do was become much more economical in what she said. And she was audacious. I mean this was a woman who did not take prisoners, in terms of her viewpoints. But she learned to surround her very important thoughts with silence, to deliberately make people feel awkward, so that they actually listened. So there's all kinds of tools. But it's a performance. This is something that we can all manipulate. And in a way, this isn't bias. This is how you've get your voice to count. Which is why I see the communication thing as the way in. Too many of the demands are growing competence and credibility. OK, turning to appearance-- this is the least important, it's about 7% of what leaders say as important. Very good news here, grooming and polish and being appropriate. So much more important than the sheer size of your body, or the texture of your hair, or you know, exactly what's happening to the clothing style that you choose to wear. So what is grooming and polish? We find, again, in the data that seemingly casual cultures can be actually harder to figure out than formal cultures. And there are weird tripwires. For instance, remember the IPO of Facebook-- all the hoodie, schlumpy, nerdy people? And then they were Sheryl Sandberg, looking quite formal. Because it's hard to do the hoodie thing and look leaderly if you're a woman. It's pretty easy to look like a graduate student or someone's assistant. In other words, it is surprisingly tough to negotiate casual cultures and somehow crack it, because there are admired styles, even though there would seem to be few rules. One thing that I experienced last summer is, I was invited to the advertising celebration in Cannes. where they give the awards in the industry. It's called the Cannes Lions Awards. And it's a little like 1963 in that only 3% of the creative directors in the top 50 advertising companies are female. This is largely a male crowd. It's the rock stars, you know, giving each other awards. And it's profoundly male. So you walk in, and you try and figure out what the look is. And it hits you between the eyes. There was almost a uniform-- four-day-old stubble was in. I mean, they did not have a whole lot of hair on their heads, so they were trying to look virile, I think. And then there were the bespoke shorts, the incredibly expensive watches, and flip flops. That was it. The few women in the room did not know what to do. I mean, they couldn't quite do the stubble thing-- that wouldn't have done them much good, right? And you know, the short thing is hard, because most-- these were people in their 50's, they were at the pinnacle of their careers. Most women don't look that great in shorts when they're 50. Well, the men didn't either, but you know. [LAUGHTER] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: So I guess what I'm trying to say is that there was a code in this room, but it was a tough one, a really tough one. So again, what we say is find yourself some role models. Find what works in your micro-climate, because I imagine that tech and sales and HR have different demands even at Google. Because you've got to get rid of this. I mean, it's not very important, but it's good not to have this get in your way. Because the thing about appearance-- it's the first filter, right? If you get it profoundly wrong, and turn up looking like Hillary Clinton in your pantsuit at Cannes, it would not do you much good. So it's not that in the end it's important, but it is surprisingly tricky. So again, admired folks in terms of the well-put-together piece-- Christine Lagarde's thought to be the very elegant executive woman. It's great that she's allowed to have white hair. And then of course Ken Chenault is hugely admired for his style. And we find that the other thing that was a big tip from this work is that looking as though you're toned and fit is very important. It's actually much more important than say being physically attractive in some chocolate box way. You've got to look as though you have some resilience these days. Jobs are demanding. To show you that you actually work out, and you can deal with the travel, and deal with the long work weeks, you are signaling vigor and resilience. Yes? AUDIENCE: Isn't that just a code for not being [INAUDIBLE]? SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: No, no, it's interesting, it's not. We tested that. And it was particularly important for African American talent that we test that. We are very forgiving, I mean within some limit. Being obese is not a good idea. But if you are clearly looking after yourself and fit, there's a big range, which is actually very good news. And then finally, the weird way in which women really are scrutinized more than man. 700 people were invited to look at these pictures for 250 milliseconds. And 86% of them decided so very quickly which one of these-- one, two, three, or four-- was the most competent, the most leaderly. Which number? AUDIENCE: Two. AUDIENCE: Three. [INTERPOSING VOICES] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: Four. She was seen as being in control, having it together. Number one got no marks. But when asked, which one is the most trustworthy? AUDIENCE: Two. SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: Two won out. So it's treacherous, right? Wouldn't you want to be a competent, trustworthy leader? And then just remind ourselves, you know, men don't have to deal with this it's all. Unless you're a TV anchor, you're not in the business of make-up. So women do gets scrutinized more. So that's that data, and I'm just going to end with In this last slide. Women and also people of color-- multicultural folks-- have little latitude-- less latitude-- than the mainstream leader type. Now, again, the power of bias, the power of the existing models of leadership. So it's very easy to be seen as too provocative, too dowdy, too pushy, too self-depreciating. The one I love is too young, too old. As a woman, very easy to be seen as too inexperienced and not ready. But also easy to be seen as over-the-hill, right? There are three years in there when we're just right. Men as a whole get 17 years. So there is. There's gendered thing going on. And clearly this does feed so much into the amazing work that Google is doing on bias. Because there is a need to widen and make more inclusive how we see leadership, in terms of how we act, how we speak, and how we look. But if we're interested in dealing with figuring out how to succeed this week, this data is pretty important. So thank you. [APPLAUSE] AUDIENCE: My question is around the make-up piece. Since there is conflicting evidence, what would you do, if you were a woman, in terms of what amount of make-up that you would wear? SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: I think it's the kind of well-put-together thing, you know, a kind of good version of you. You certainly don't want to come over as someone quite different-- faking some persona is not a good idea. But it does seem to get marks for effort. It's good to show that you have put some energy into looking good. It shows respect for yourself, respect for the team, and perhaps respect for the stakeholders. Dishevelment, both men and women, you get-- and I think it was given as part of the example. You've got to look as though you didn't just fall out of bed, that you put some effort into showing up ready. AUDIENCE: So is making sound, informed decisions something that leaders just don't consider? SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: That is performance. This is not performance. This is how you signal, what you telegraph, in terms of how you act, speak, and look. Judgment calls-- incredibly important. There's another ton of books on that, right? This is about your image. But it's about 30% of everything. Because it does allow you to be tapped on the shoulder for some big opportunity. You then might screw up, right? You don't deliver the right stuff in terms of performance, in terms of the great judgment calls. But how would you stand apart from the crowd, how would you get singled out in the first place, and given the shot at a big opportunity. No, I'm not trying to say that there aren't some fundamental performance elements that, in the end, will fuel your journey, but this is really about the telegraphing of confidence, the ability to be compelling about what you have to say, and the ability to look the part enough so that you don't get knocked off the list because of the fact you've got soup on your tie, or I don't know what. You know, there's a lot of things that you could-- no ties, soup on your t-shirt-- who knows. There are very culturally specific things. And if I were to choose my category of what really is magical, in turbo charging progression, it is the communication piece. AUDIENCE: [INAUDIBLE] SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: Yes, no. Totally, totally. And it needs to be evolved, always, because the demands of the era change. AUDIENCE: You gave the example of Sheryl Sandberg, and how she shares personal anecdotes just to relate to people better. Do you feel that if women share their personal stories about their families, they will come across as more emotional. SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: You know, that's a great story. You can over-share and it's not a good idea to wear your family on your sleeve. That tends to undermine your edge, because there's a lot of bias around working moms. But I'll tell you the story. I interviewed someone who is head of the global card division of American Express last week. He's African American. He was wresting with the challenge of connecting to his global team. His team is spread around 52 countries. And obviously much of his contact is virtual. He is seen as an enormously effective leader. He is much beloved. I wanted to know how he did it. He understands the importance of being known to his key people around the world. So he goes to every market once a quarter and does a town hall. He also does monthly phone calls, so that it's not just email and really abstract kind of connection. So I said, well, what do you do at these town halls, or what do you do on those calls, that make you so beloved? I'll bet he's a great performer, and he does all the other stuff too, but he's seen as someone you want to go work for. He tells stories for the first three minutes. Not a whole bunch of time, there's a lot of business that needs to get done, right, in these very precious one-hour phone calls. He said, for instance, he did a call out of London. And the BAFTA Awards were just going on. He loves movies. So he told why he was totally rooting for this movie and invited folks to get back to him on this movie. And give him some sense of what they loved, too. And he said, look, it's so simple, but the fact that they knew that I kind of totally screwed up the weekend because I had to see all these movies, it made him human in a way that was very, very important in building trust. Sometimes it's a little deeper than that. For instance, he grew up in the projects of Oakland, and the first legs of his career were full of struggle. He'll share a little piece of that. Not much, because you don't want to kiss all-- kiss-and-tell all kind of thing-- that's not going to work. You need to stay in the business strategic world. So oftentimes, it's not family. It can be roots, it can be passions, but to reveal another dimension of yourself is this empathy thing. And allows-- he said, then people read his emails with a different mindset. They think they know him. So there are things that are quite simple that create an aura of your ability to lead. AUDIENCE: Just a bit of a comment on what you were saying. I think that the sharing thing really shows you as a leader, but when you're lowish in the organization and you're looking up, sharing is not generally very valuable. SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: That's a very good-- that's a very wise point. AUDIENCE: It actually goes against your gravitas. SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: But you see, I think that it's not two worlds. Many people in this room both lead small teams and are junior in other contexts. And it's the rare person who doesn't have a sphere of influence. But you're right. It is particularly magical coming from someone who is senior. AUDIENCE: I think at Google I feel a lot more comfortable being myself in sharing more than I have elsewhere, because there's just generally more respect and people treat each other really well. But I just still have a question about, as a woman, being able to share things. Because I've seen these things done very badly. So is there a bad way to share information about-- so that you're bringing your whole person to work, as opposed to having completely different personas of work and your personal life? SYLVIA ANN HEWLETT: One type of sharing which is incredibly effective is how you get feedback. Again in the data, we find that very few high-potential, younger people get unvarnished feedback. Senior folks can't be bothered, they avoid it, it can be embarrassing to give honest feedback sometimes, particularly across lines of gender or race. So it doesn't happen. It happens between mini-mes. Again, straight, Caucasian guys from the right schools do a lot of sharing on the feedback front. But oftentimes, at a very diverse workplace, very little feedback happens. And we've got a lot of data on this. So how do you get feedback, and how do you give it? And revealing some of your aspiration-- some of your sense of where you see your journey going-- is magical in this regard. If a younger person says to a supervisor, or a mentor, or a sponsor, or a manager, "I'm giving this presentation next week. I'm really white hot. I think I can nail this. But there are two areas where I feel I could do some fine tuning. Can you listen, and pay attention, and give me feedback?" I mean, there's ways of presenting this that do not make you vulnerable. I mean you're saying look, I got it. I'm excited. I'm going to do it well. But please pay attention to this, that, or the other thing. It opens the door to the most amazing useful feedback. And similarly, you can do that about the way you present yourself in other ways. And the older person, or the more senior person, feels permission to be real. And of course that's how you grow. Thank you so much. Amazing conversation. Enjoyed the questions. [APPLAUSE]