For the past twenty years, the shared services community has set targets, and goals for DE&I focused on integrating more women into leadership roles. Despite these efforts, female representation in shared services leadership positions is still severely lacking.

In order to discuss solutions that will progress the careers of shared services women, SSOW kicked off its 27th year by hosting an “SSO Women’s Conference”. The event welcomed hundreds of women representing a variety of global organizations and focused on not only elevating women leaders but pushing DE&I to become a larger part of shared services mission.

The following is a summary of the event and some of the knowledge shared.

HR Shared Services: The Engine to Reinforce Culture, Deliver Innovation, and Lift Employee Experience in GBS 

During the session “HR Shared Services: The Engine to Reinforce Culture, Deliver Innovation, and Lift Employee Experience in GBS” Janet Ramey, Principal, Sourcing Change, led a conversation between two professionals with decades of HR experience.  

The discussion focused on improving the employee experience using digital strategies such as mobile platforms. Tom Nesteruk, SVP, Chief People Officer for Advent Health, shared his experience creating a mobile platform at Advent Health that improved the employee experience at every step of the hire-to-retire process. This mobile platform focuses on technologies such as chatbots and personalized assistants that can develop a strong company culture, foster innovation and improve employee wellness. 

Another area of discourse during the session turned towards developing HR shared services leaders of the future. Vidya Kishore, Head of HR for Johnson & Johnson Global Services, advice was to focus on finding leaders that have an array of experiences and backgrounds. This means leadership development, working alongside DE&I goals, and engaging across functions to identify potential leaders. Ultimately a diversity of leaders ensures new ideas are being shared that will improve the employee experience across GBS. 
 

Understanding your impact: Identifying & Utilizing Strengths of Women in Shared Services

Jamelia Lehn is the CFO at Roots Management Group, and during her session at SSON shared her thoughts on how women in shared services can boost their presence and influence. Jamelia’s presentation focused on three key areas she wanted all attendees to walk away remembering.

1. Realize we all have an impact on others through our actions
2. Be intentional about the impact you want to create
3. Learn your strengths and leverage them in the workplace

Talent Acquisition: Ensuring that You are Attracting a Diverse Workforce for your SSC/GBS

The think tanks during women’s day provide an opportunity to hear the thoughts of GBS women beyond the scheduled speakers. During “Talent Acquisition: Ensuring that You are Attracting a Diverse Workforce for your SSC/GBS” Kim Jackson, Associate Director, Project Management, for Boston Scientific GBS led a conversation about tactics organizations are deploying to create a more diverse workforce.  

That conversation brought up several key points focused on bringing in a more diverse workforce, including:

• Opening the sphere of job searches to become more global
• Demonstrating the need for diversity via job descriptions
• Leveraging social media to attract a more diverse talent pool (going beyond LinkedIn)
• Creating internships and rotational programs that give young talent the opportunity to see what roles suit them.

Cultivating the Next Generation of Women Leaders

One of the key sessions of SSOW’s Women's Day focused on professional development strategies that will promote more women across shared services.  

At the moment, women are leaving their jobs at higher rates than men, one-third of which are in middle management and have already been trained in leadership roles. The main reason for these transitions is because of the lack of advancement opportunities and flexibility in their current organizations.

In order to uplift more women to become shared services leaders Heidi Wilson, Director of HR Shared Services for Extreme Networks, believed there needs to be a greater focus on mentorship and sponsorship. Today 63% of women don’t believe they have a mentor giving them career development advice. This fact puts women at a disadvantage for advancement opportunities. Heidi urges organizations to create mentorship programs for women that makes mentoring accessible to women of all demographics.

Once a mentoring program has been established, it is important to go a step further and begin sponsoring or advocating for women to earn leadership positions. Sponsorships ensure female representation in leadership isn’t just a concept but an actuality.

To conclude her session, Heidi shared a multi-pronged approach to bringing more women into leadership roles. That approach included the following:

• Stretch projects
• Leadership development
• Hands-on-learning
• Cross-functional networking
• Leadership conferences

Keynote Speaker – Meghan Twohey

The final speaker of SSOW Womens Day was Meghan Twohey, who was able to tie her experiences investigating and reporting on the Harvey Weinstein case into the need for more diversity in business leadership.

During Meghan’s research, she was startled to find that the board of The Weinstein Company did not include a single female, and throughout the organization, there were instances of neglect by leadership from both the board and the HR department. Meghan reflected on how different things might have been had the organization adopted DE&I into its framework.

Another interesting aspect of Meghan’s presentation focused on the self-doubt she and her team had on the days leading up to the publication of their findings. Meghan and colleagues found themselves wondering if the world would even care about their reporting, a feeling that is all too familiar to minorities who feel they might not even belong in leadership meetings.

However, Meghan and her team's story had a massive impact on society and became the catalyst for the #MeToo movement that impacted every industry across the world, going to show that self-doubt can be the enemy of development.

Quotes to think about

“It’s too much work not to be authentic, genuine, and to have a dream.” - Aarthi Gopal

“As a matter of self-preservation, we all choose to believe we got where we are because of hard work and effort, not privilege.” - Dina Baker

“The more you step out of your comfort zone, the more people will want to follow you and do the same.” - Jamelia Lehn