The most powerful words of wisdom from women leaders in 2023

This is my second full year at the helm of the Broadsheet (and almost my sixth working on it!), and it’s an honor to bring you the most important news that impacts women every day.

In 2023, women ran all major U.S. news networks and started to take over telecoms. Women in higher education and venture capital navigated the fallout of new attacks on diversity and inclusion programs. We heard from the youngest female Fortune 500 CEO and the longest-tenured. The ongoing assault on abortion rights continued. We kept track of the progress female execs are making in leadership roles throughout the Fortune 500, the Global 500, and the Fortune 500 Europe. Fortune‘s annual list of the Most Powerful Women in business was bigger and more global than ever and featured everyone from Kim Kardashian to OpenAI CTO Mira Murati.

To celebrate the close of another year, below are some of the best pearls of wisdom from the women featured in the Broadsheet all year long.

“If they can’t track it, they can’t do it. It gave people a tangible goal to work towards.”
—Aurora James on the success of the Fifteen Percent Pledge

“What’s really exciting is how rapidly technology is advancing.”
—Canva cofounder and CEO Melanie Perkins

“We are telling them from a young age, ‘Your activities are just as important.’”
—Sheryl Sandberg on the importance of professional women’s soccer for girls

“The sidelines are not the middle ground anymore.”
—Jen Stark, co-director of the Center for Business and Social Justice, on why employers need to speak up about abortion rights

“Parties are not this frivolous waste of time. They’re how we build community. There’s something electrifying about being in a room with people.”
—Partiful cofounder and CEO Shreya Murthy

“How do you be a disruptor, because you’re already a disruptor by being different than the rest?”
–Accenture CEO Julie Sweet on the unique preparation diverse leaders have for the rapid change of the AI era

“It’s hard to measure it, but you just have to do it because it’s the right thing to do.”
–Birdies cofounder and CEO Bianca Gates on the risk and reward of sponsoring a women’s sports team as a startup

“Ninety-five percent of leadership is putting the right person in the right job.”
—BlackRock chief investment officer Samara Cohen on the parallels between business leadership and casting in theater

“I only know how to be a Black woman. I don’t know how to be anything else. And so I don’t know how to lead any other way.”
—Sen. Laphonza Butler (D-Calif.)

“I want to make sure that I’m not the last—and that I leave the door open.”
—U.S. Deputy Secretary of Veterans’ Affairs Tanya Bradsher on being the first woman of color in her role

Have a restful holiday break. The Broadsheet will be back in your inboxes on Jan. 2. See you in 2024!

Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
@_emmahinchliffe

The Broadsheet is Fortune’s newsletter for and about the world’s most powerful women. Today’s edition was curated by Joseph Abrams. Subscribe here.

ALSO IN THE HEADLINES

- Serving millions. A championship win and a slew of new endorsements made tennis phenomenon Iga Świątek the highest earning female athlete this year, according to Forbes, followed by skier Eileen Gu and tennis player Coco Gauff. Nine of the top 10 highest earners came from tennis, which is consistently one of the most lucrative sports for women. Forbes

- Massive discount. Arielle Charnas’s clothing brand Something Navy is being sold for $1—with new investors also taking on the brand's debt—as the fashion influencer tries to save the struggling business. Charnas launched the line in 2020 to moderate success, but over-expansion and quality concerns led to store closures and the freeze of its website in March. Wall Street Journal

- Correcting the record. Harvard University President Claudine Gay will be required to correct her past scholarly work again after the university announced it discovered a second instance of inadequate citations, this time in her 1997 doctoral dissertation. Gay was again cleared of any research misconduct by the school’s board, but she's been the subject of criticism for weeks for her comments on campus antisemitism and previous instances of plagiarism. Wall Street Journal

- Hack attack. Brazil's First Lady Rosangela da Silva is furious with X owner Elon Musk for failing to respond to a recent hack of da Silva’s X account that posted lewd attacks about her husband. Da Silva even threatened to sue the platform for inaction. Musk responded with an X post stating that “it is not clear how someone guessing her email password is our responsibility.” Fortune

- Care crisis. A surge in post-pandemic childcare costs is forcing high-earning and low-earning parents alike to cover the costs with extra work. One mom interviewed by Bloomberg described taking a second job at a daycare to receive a discount on care for her three children, while others described taking care of their children while they work full-time from home. Bloomberg

MOVERS AND SHAKERS: Lulu Cheng Meservey is stepping down as chief communications officer at Activision Blizzard next month as Microsoft takes control of the gaming business.

ON MY RADAR

Sports Illustrated's forgotten pioneer Long Lead

She blew up her life to reform the fashion industry The Cut

The year of Ozempic bodies and Barbie Botox Vox

PARTING WORDS

"Every time I do something and break another glass ceiling, when it’s time to renegotiate I’m at the bottom again like I never did what I just did, and I’m tired."

—Actress Taraji P. Henson on being consistently underpaid in the entertainment industry