Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | February 19, 2018 | Worcester Business Journal 7 Public companies 16% 8% 13% Private corporations 18% 17% 18% Financial institutions 21% 33% 27% Healthcare organizations 26% 38% 31% Colleges 37% 46% 39% Social service nonprofits 46% 62% 50% Central Mass. total 32% 36% 33% Massachusetts public companies 19% 12% NA U.S. public companies 20% 14% NA Central Mass. Boardroom Gap For the first part of this series, WBJ studied the gender diversity in the business leadership of 75 Central Mass. organizations. Below is a summary of those findings, and a comparison to Massachusetts and U.S. public company figures. To see the entire company-by- company breakdown, see the Feb. 5 edition or visit WBJournal.com. % female % female % female Central Mass. sector board members executives leadership NA = Not available Sources: U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission and 990 form filings (Central Massachusetts institutions), Massachusetts Women's Leadership Index (Massachusetts institutions), Catalyst.org "Women in S&P 500 Companies (corporate CEOs and board seats), CNNMoney (national executive officers), Guidestar (nonprofit CEOs), Leading With Intent: A National Index of Nonprofit Board Practices (nonprofit board seats). Continued on next page board searches were dominated by male networks. "You do have to hold your ground," said Susan Adams, a Bentley University professor who's conducted research on gender gaps in business for the women advocacy group The Boston Club. Making their presence known Laurie Leshin, who in 2014 became the first female president of Worcester Polytechnic Institute, spent her early career as a space scientist at NASA, where she was a member of the Mars Curiosity rover team. "Especially at NASA, there were many, many meetings when I was the only woman in the room," Leshin said. "You didn't notice it at first, but after a while, you think, 'Really?'" Mailman said she's seen women talk- ed over by men in meetings and has found women need to become more proactive and better engaged. They can't, for example, continue casual post-meeting talks in the men's room with much of the rest of the members. "You have to speak up and then speak over the men sometimes," she said, "and women need to support each other in the boardroom." Sharry is the new chairwoman of the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce board of directors, the third woman to hold the position. She said she still occasionally senses a need to win over male clients who might not be used to working with a woman. "I sometimes feel like I need to prove myself each time [we meet]," she said, describing her feeling some people may never get used to working with female business leaders. In her industry, Sharry has often been the only woman in a boardroom, or nearly so. She's learned to rely on feed- back from other women, she said, and has made a point of asking a question in The Boardroom Gap series n Feb. 5 edition on WBJournal.com • Fewer seats at the table – A WBJ study found Central Mass. for-profit companies lag behind in gender diversity in leadership. • Pay gap – Male executives in Central Mass. make $1.3 million on average, while female executives make $572,709. n Feb. 19 edition of WBJ • Feeling marginalized – Central Mass. women who sit in seats of power say their voices aren't heard as loudly. • Gender diversity = Profits – Studies consistently show organizations with greater gender diversity perform better. n March 5 edition of WBJ • Creating progress – Steps are being taken to create equal gender representation in corporate leadership. • Leading organizations – Organizations like Worcester State University and Heywood Hospital say how they achieved more equal gender representation in their leadership. a meeting sometimes with the express purpose of making her presence known. She also expressed thanks to several men at local businesses who've supported her professionally. A gap between the genders in the boardroom still needs to be closed though, Sharry said. Corporate coach- es have told her to consider how she sits in a meeting and to give a "mascu- line energy," a tip she finds insulting. "I don't want to have to sit there and think of what type of gender energy I'm bringing out," Sharry said. "I want to be focused on the task at hand." A changing dynamic Leshin said outspoken woman leaders played an important role in her career and life development. Her mother took her to National Organization for Women meetings when she was 5 or 6. "They were trying to pave the way for people like me to be successful people," said Leshin, who called herself fortu- nate to have both male and female mentors in her career. Judith Nitsch, a WPI graduate who founded Boston-based Nitsch Engineering in 1989, said she's absolute- ly found women are more likely to be interrupted or ignored at a meeting, but she has grown used to male-dominated environments. The male-to-female stu- dent ratio at WPI her freshman year in 1971 was 25-to-1. Judith Nitsch "For every person who was maybe a problem, there were 99 who were advocates." Susan West Engelkemeyer "Some generations are just not used to seeing women in power positions ... I do think it's changing."

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