Empowering Women in Leadership

In this webinar session, ELB Learning presented Rashim Mogha, founder of eWOW (​​empoweredWomen of the World). She is a thought leader, a best-selling author, and a popular speaker at global conferences in technology and business. Rashim has held leadership roles at companies like Skillsoft, VMware, Amazon Web Services, Oracle, and more.

Rashim started off by sharing some eye-opening facts about women in the workplace and in leadership. Here are a couple of those facts:

• Women leaders are 2x as likely as men leaders to be mistaken for someone more junior. 
• 43% of women leaders experience burnout, compared to only 31% of men at the same level.

In addition, the current economic slowdown is impacting women far more than it’s impacting men. For example:

• Women in tech are 65% more likely to be laid off than men.
• 45% of those who were laid off in the recent round of tech job cuts were women.

And despite the fact that women earn 83 cents for every $1 men earn, women pay 7% more for personal care products compared to similar male products.

So how can women advance their careers and achieve leadership positions where they’re appreciated, recognized, and compensated for their skills?

There are 3 key action items that Rashim calls out during the webinar:

1. Identify Your Superpower
2. Identify Your Sponsors
3. Expand Your Network

There are certainly going to be challenges along the way. Many leadership roles are not posted externally; you need to be in the know to even hear about them. Additionally, women are more likely to suffer from imposter syndrome and not go after leadership roles even when they know the roles are open. Many experience guilt over prioritizing a career versus their home life. 

However, as women, we often don’t realize the power that we have in our own hands to change the trajectory of our career, said Rashim. In the webinar, she goes through the 3 action items listed above and how to follow through with these steps and advance to a leadership position. 

Let’s talk about identifying your superpower.

Your superpower, your unique selling point (USP), is whatever sets you apart from others. This is what’s going to get you that next job, that next rung up the ladder.

Rashim shared that her superpower is Make It Happen. 

Women can find it hard to identify their superpower. If you’re lucky, a colleague or current manager can share insight with you on what they see as your superpower. Otherwise, start by considering what you truly love doing. This will often point you toward your superpower.

Or, after a project has wrapped up, and someone congratulates you on a job well done, ask them to identify what you did that was crucial to the success of the project. After a while, you may notice that you hear the same thing called out each time. That's your superpower.   

It’s not enough to just know your superpower, you need to be able to articulate why your superpower matters and what impact it can have on a business need or challenge.

Watch the webinar recording below to hear all of Rashim’s tips on how women can empower themselves and achieve leadership positions.