The Broadsheet: October 20th

EVERYONE'S TALKING

•IBM's big miss. The tech giant run by CEO Ginni Rometty is reeling this morning after reporting earnings well below analyst expectations. The company also abandoned its previously-announced guidance for 2015, and said it will pay $1.5 billion so that another company will take on its unprofitable chip-manufacturing unit. The stock is down some 9%. "We are disappointed in our performance," Rometty said. CNBC

ALSO IN THE HEADLINES

•Marissa Mayer on the defensive. This week, the Yahoo CEO will fend off a challenge from activist investor Starboard Value LP, by detailing a fresh strategy to turn around the struggling Internet company. Her plan? Acquire at least one large tech startup with some of the $5.8 billion Yahoo made from Alibaba's IPO, according to the Wall Street Journal. It is unclear how that will be received by investors as Mayer has yet to prove that the company's $1.1 billion acquisition of Tumblr, as well as many other acquisitions, was worth it. WSJ

•Ginsburg speaks out on Texas voted ID law. In a six-page dissent, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg outlined why she is against the state's decision to keep its controversial voter ID law in place. "Racial discrimination in elections in Texas is no mere historical artifact. To the contrary, Texas has been found in violation of the Voting Rights Act in every redistricting cycle from and after 1970," she wrote. Policy Mic

•State Department Ebola chief: It may get much worse. Nancy Powell, the newly appointed chief of the U.S. State Department’s Ebola unit, said heavy rains have prevented people from traveling —now largely confining the epidemic to Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone. But once rainy season ends next month, Ebola could spread more rapidly within Africa. Fortune

•Anne-Marie Slaughter on Obama's failure. Hillary Clinton’s former policy director who now heads the New America Foundation told Fortune's Nina Easton that the White House has failed to acknowledge the magnitude of ISIS's extremism. The spread of ISIS, combined with civil war in Syria, is setting off the equivalent of the seventeenth-century Thirty Years War, “which decimated one-third of Europe’s population," she warned. Fortune

•Mary Barra's top lawyer is out. GM's embattled general counsel, Michael Millikin, is retiring as soon as the Detroit automaker can find his replacement. Millkin had been highly criticized for his role in GM's recall scandal that is now linked to more than 20 deaths. Throughout his tenure, GM CEO Mary Barra constantly defended Millikin and insisted that he was a key part of her leadership team. Fortune

MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Neiman Marcus CEO Karen Katz is now a member of Under Armour's board of directors.

BROADVIEW

Change.org boosts paid parental leave perks for all new parents

Change.org, a petition website dedicated to empowering people to create social and political change, is extending its paid-leave program for new parents.

The company now will offer 18 weeks of fully-paid parental leave to every employee who becomes a new parent -- biological or not. With 207 employees in 18 countries, Change.org’s team is 51% female and its leadership team is comprised of 40% women. The expanded program will become the most generous equal leave policy among all U.S. tech companies, says Change.org President and COO Jennifer Dulski.

“Our goal was to create a real parental leave program that supports all evolving families without creating financial hardship for them,” Dulski said in an interview with Fortune last night, while getting her 12-year-old daughter's dinner ready. “We did a robust financial analysis and having a strong family policy is also good for business.”

Change.org’s announcement comes in the wake of news that Facebook and Apple will now pay for female employees to freeze their eggs. The perk will cover up to $20,000 in costs to allow women to extend their fertility and have more family-planning options. Some critics argued that the move is just a ploy to get female tech employees to work more years before having children, but infertility treatment is, in fact, a somewhat common benefit among big companies.

“Companies are working toward providing a set of benefits that are as flexible and generous as possible,” said Dulski, adding that Change.org has yet to include family planning options like egg freezing into its benefits package. “What you don’t want to do is create a set of policies that generate a set of behaviors that perpeturate inequalities among different types of parents.”

Click over to Fortune.com to read my full story. 

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

•Japan loses power women. YukoObuchi, the daughter of a former Japanese premier, will step down as the country's first female trade and industry minister less than two months after she was appointed. Obuchi is leaving the post amid allegations that political funds were misused. Justice Minister Midori Matsushima -- appointed less than two months ago -- also stepped down over claims she breached election laws. The dismissals are a very public knock against Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's goal of having women in 30% of leadership positions in all fields by 2020. Bloomberg

• The Marines turn to female execs for help. As U.S. Marine Corps Commandant General James Amos looks for strategies to support the growing number of women among his ranks, he is leaning on Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Lockheed Martin CEO Marillyn Hewson and other high-powered biz women for advice. "They helped me see what I'm not seeing, simply because I'm a guy, and as my wife tells me, an old, white guy," said Amos.  Reuters

•The Williams brothers? Shamil Tarpischev, the president of the Russian Tennis Federation, has been suspended from any tour involvement for one year and fined $25,000 after calling Venus and Serena Williams the “Williams brothers.” “I thought they were very insensitive and extremely sexist as well as racist at the same time. I thought they were in a way bullying,” Serena said about his off-putting remark. Time

ON MY RADAR

Are women better decision makers? NYTimes

Doctor’s letter spells end of job for pregnant employee NYTimes

The odd life of the man who invented Wonder Woman The Atlantic

Janet Yellen's 4 ways to make it in AmericaFortune

What it's like to be an exec at Pantone WSJ

Gender equality? Not in business branding Fortune

QUOTE

I do not subscribe to the idea that young people should emphasize people skills. The world is not just a social network. If you’re in politics, that may need to be your primary specialty, but the No. 1 driver for somebody’s role, respect from others and for your ability to contribute, is what you can do that’s of value.

Michelle Munson, C.E.O. of Aspera, a unit of IBM that provides software for high-speed file transfer, told the New York Times.