Let's talk about Black women and leadership

Good morning,

Leadership is a topic that I not only have the great opportunity to write about but one I continually reflect upon, personally. What will the road to leadership look like for me?

Black women can perform the pivotal roles of leaders and visionaries but are often left out of the leadership equation, Tynesha McHarris, co-founder of the Black Feminist Fund (BFF), said. At the Fortune Connect Summit virtual event on radical collaboration, I moderated a panel discussion titled, How (and why) to center Black Women. Thought leaders shared their perspective on why women of color around the world are disproportionately excluded from power.

“Black women have consistently modeled what it means to be in collective leadership,” McHarris said. BFF, an organization with a global perspective, officially launched this past March with a $15 million seed investment from the Ford Foundation. “When you think about Black movements around the world, in Sudan, Nigeria, and in the U.S.,” they are led by a collective of Black women and Black non-binary people, she said.

“I’m on the side of actually handing out the philanthropic capital to women and girls of color,” said Ada Williams Prince, senior adviser for program strategy and investment at Pivotal Ventures, founded by Melinda French Gates. “What we found in the investment strategy that was built is: women and girls of color need to be visible. We need to get capital to support and invest in their leadership.”

When it comes to advancing Black women in leadership roles, there’s more work to be done, McHarris said. “We have a history of kind of believing in Black women’s labor but never believing their leadership requires investment and pouring into their development,” she said. “How are we investing in Black women’s strategic thinking and brilliance?”

When looking at corporate America, women of color are underrepresented in leadership roles, including in the financial sector, as reflected in studies over the years, such as a 2018 McKinsey report. In 2021, two Black women are running Fortune 500 businesses. Roz Brewer is the CEO at Walgreens Boots Alliance, and Thasunda Brown Duckett, the CEO at TIAA. Duckett is known for being an advocate for diversity within the financial services industry.

For some, the lack of leadership diversity in the field can be isolating. Cecilia Owens, CFO and chief operating officer at Grandview, a privately held entertainment management and production firm, spoke with me in May about not encountering many Black women in CFO roles. “I cannot tell you how hard or how challenging it is to want to see someone who looks like me in a CFO role and not being able to find that,” Owens said.

So, how can organizations advance Black women into leadership roles? Within the executive coaching and mentoring space, “there should be a plethora of different types of coaches,” Williams Prince said. “It is very important that people have a way to be represented,” she said.

“There shouldn’t be just one leadership role in which Black women get moved into,” McHarris said. “There should be multiple pipelines of leadership.” A support system should be in place as well, she said. “Too often, Black women are isolated and expect to go alone. We need to start to think about cohorts and pairs in which Black woman can support each other and support their leadership because when we’re alone, it’s incredibly isolating,” McHarris said.

“Collaboration is really the key to transformation,” Williams Prince said.

See you tomorrow.

Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com

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Leaderboard

Ajay Kataria was named EVP and CFO at Utz Brands, Inc., a U.S. snack food company, effective October 4, 2021. Kataria is currently the company’s EVP of finance and accounting. Kataria joined Utz in 2017 and worked on the company’s FP&A, commercial finance, and supply chain finance teams, in addition to overseeing the IT function. He joined Utz from Armstrong Flooring, Inc. where he served as VP of global finance and strategy.

Mark Hansen was named CFO at Entrata, a technology platform. Most recently, Hansen served as the head of finance and accounting as well as the interim co-CFO at Pluralsight.His appointment follows the recent announcement of $507M in funding towards Entrata's growth.