Fortune MPW Future Leaders

Thank you so much for coming to this session of Fortune MPW Future Leaders, presented in partnership with Hydrick and Struggles. Now, this room is filled with an incredibly inspiring group of women, and we could not be more honored to be here with all of you today. I'm going to kick things off with a few introductions before we get started. So first, this is going to be a mini version of what we call the Big Get to Know You. It is one of our favorite parts of the MPW Summit because it's a fast, fun way for us all to get to know one another. We are also going to be doing it in the main ballroom tomorrow with all of the summit participants, so you get a little sneak preview first. First of all, I would like to thank Jody Grinnier and the Foundation for Women Warriors for working so closely with us on the program. Huge round of applause. We're going to be hearing from Jody in just a moment. And we have 18 veterans here with us today. These, whoo, big, big cheer. These women recently completed serving our country and are now transitioning to non-military careers. Thank you all so much for your service, and we are so grateful to have all of you participating here in our Future Leaders program today. So here's how it's going to work for this session. Each of you will have three seconds to introduce yourselves as we quickly go around the room. There will be a handheld mic, and I know three seconds doesn't sound like a lot, but I believe in all of you so much. Once you've introduced yourself on the mic, just pass it over to the next person and so on. So we're going to start with the mentees first. So I would like you to tell us your name, your military branch, and length of service, as well as one word to describe who you are outside of uniform. So we're going to get started. Can we start down here? I'm sorry to put you on the spot. Stand up. Greetings. I'm T. White, U.S. Air Force Reservist, 31 years serving. One word about me. All in. Hello, my name is Rocío Villanueva, U.S. Army. I did eight years, and one word will be community. Hi, I'm Tiara Turner, United States Navy, seven years. My motto and my word would be resilience. Jackie Payer, U.S. Air Force, 21 years, goofy. Hello, Isis, four years in the Army, resourceful. Shanae, U.S. Air Force, seven years, and I would say empathetic. April Noble, U.S. Air Force for 20 years, encourager. Lisa Maxamy, U.S. Navy, 11 and a half years, communicator. Hi, Kristen Lee, U.S. Army for four years, and I'd say hard worker. Ashley Griffin, Army National Guard, 16 years, determined. Hi, Bridget Crawford, United States Navy, 10 years, and tenacious. Lisa Christensen, 20 years in the U.S. Air Force, and I would say determined. Doris Boyer, United States Marine Corps, four years, and resilient. Ryanne Benavides, I spent 26 and a half years in the United States Air Force, and I'm boring. Catherine Armandi, United States Air Force, 20 years, purpose-driven. Renee Aquino, eight years, U.S. Army, and I would like connector. Caprice Ali, United States Air Force, 13 years, and I would say gracious. Jessica Adams, U.S. Air Force, four years, compassionate. Any other mentees on this side? Okay, all right, we're good. So thank you so much. Great meeting you all. In addition to the mentees, we have with us an outstanding group of women from the MPW community who are here to coach and offer career development guidance to all of the future leaders. Now we're going to go to the MPW mentors. So ladies, your assignment is a bit different, but we're still sticking with the one word. So you're going to give us your name, title, company, and one word to describe who you are outside of the office. Okay. And we'll start here this time. Lisa Ramirez, SVP of Client Success and Operations at Indeed, the job search site. It's hard because it's just one word, so it gets confusing. And one word outside of the office, teen mom. So I have your sympathy. Sunny Ackerman, hydration struggles. What was the other question? Title? Name, title, company, and one word outside the office. Fashionista. Joe Riley, CEO and founder of Sensia. One word. Dope. Linda Livingstone, president of Baylor University, and I'm just going to hyphenate mom and wife. Hello, Floss Agri, chief influencer for Ronstad. One word would be giver. Hi, everyone. I'm Michelle Zatlin. I'm the co-founder of a company called CloudFlare. Joe is dope, and my one word is hostess. Hi, I'm Marisa Andrada. I'm also a co-founder and partner of a company called WoofWorld. And one was already taken, so I'm going to use Bravo. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Amanda Baldwin. I'm the former CEO of Olplex and Supergoop, so coming to a shelfie near you. and my one word right now feels humbled to be in this room. Jodi Grenier, CEO of Foundation for Women Warriors. My one word would be busy. Elizabeth Baker-Cuffer, I'm Executive Vice President and Chief Relationship Officer at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and my one word is social. I'm Alexandra or Allie Siegel and I'm the Chief Equality and Engagement Officer at Salesforce force and I would say manifester. I'm Catherine Ragg, the chief people officer at TriNet and my one word would be outside of teen mom, I guess enabler. Sarah Youngwood, CFO of Nasdaq and I'll go for grower. I grow my kids, my garden and try to grow myself. Hi, I'm Christina Shim, chief sustainability officer for IBM. My one word is adrenaline seeker. Hi, Shelly Solomon. I lead I'm Global Vice President of Amazon Business, and my one word is dog mom. I'm not going to stand up because I have a laptop in my lap. Amanda Garrett, Editor at Fortune, listening. Dr. Alyssa Abdullah, Deputy Chief Security Officer for MasterCard, busy body. Hi, I'm Katie Burke. I'm the Chief Operating Officer at Harvey, a legal AI company, and I would say mine right now is hype girl. Hi, I'm Melanie Rosenwasser, Chief People Officer at Dropbox, and I would say my word is curious. Hi, everyone. My name is Kelly Kaler. I'm a VP of product at Thrivent Financial. And outside of work, I'm a twin wrangler. Stacey Hostetler. I'm a partner at Hydrick and Struggles. And I am the managing partner for our global medtech practice. And my word is joy. Hi, everybody. Jennifer Wilson. I'm also a partner at Hydrick and co-lead our HR officer's practice. So hello to the CPOs. And mine is physically active outside. Is that it? Yeah, Tony, you have to go. Oh, I appreciate that. Tony Towns. Oh, Tony Towns Whitley. I'm former CEO of SAIC, board member for NASDAQ, and my word is blessed. Okay, those are great. Do we have any? Oh, we have one more over here. Sorry. Good afternoon, everyone. Carmen James Randolph. I'm with the Women's Foundation of the South, and my one word is magician. Oh, great one to end on. I think I want all of these words on a cap that I can just like switch out every day and wear. Thank you. I'm selling it at a bodega near you. so look for that. So mentees, thank you so much. We also appreciate your dedication and service and to our mentors. We are so grateful for your insights as we work to build the next generation of powerful and influential women. So thank you. We applaud all of you, MPW members and mentees. Thank you so, so much. Now I would like to invite Anne Rocky to say a few words. Anne is the regional leader for North America at Hydrick and Struggles. Anne. Twin mom, I hear you. All right. Well, I'm so happy to be here today. It's wonderful to be here again at the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit. And I think one of the greatest gifts of being here is truly the opportunity to meet extraordinary women. And this probably tops the extraordinary women that are here at this conference today. It's a privilege to be kicking off this mentoring session with you all. And when you think about it, each of you bring such exceptional skills from your time in your military careers. But we're so happy to be here today, as are all the mentees, because we're here to support you as you think about building new relationships, looking at new opportunities, and thinking about how do you translate all this amazing experience you have from your military careers and translate that into the private sector. I'm especially proud to be here today with a colleague, but more importantly, a friend, Dr. Karen West. Please stand. So Karen West not only runs our Global Head of Psychology and Research at Hydrick and Struggles, but importantly, is a veteran lieutenant commander in the U.S. Navy. Incredible colleague, incredible mentor, our incredible friends. Thank you, Karen, for being here and for your service and for just being you. So to all the future leaders in the room today, we, all the mentors here, we're excited to be just one small part of this next chapter. And we really hope to build our relationships with you that will extend beyond today. So again, thank you all for your service. We're thrilled to be here and we can't wait to see what happens next. So congrats. Thank you so much, Anne. So now I would like to invite the CEO of the Foundation for Women Warriors, Jodi Grenier, to speak. No cards. Can everyone hear me okay? So good afternoon. I'm Jodi Grenier, the CEO of Foundation for Women Warriors. I've been privileged to lead the organization for the past 10 years. I'm also a Marine Corps veteran myself. Women have served our country since its inception. And despite, you know, they've actually volunteered in every country that our country has faced to serve. And despite their incredible leadership demonstrated in the most austere of environments, their service is seldom recognized, as is their achievements. When they leave the military, even though the number of women serving in the military are growing, they still don't necessarily fall into a sisterhood, a community of support. And so that's why we're here. They possess exceptional skills. They've demonstrated leadership. And because of this lack of recognition, there's disparities, disparities in access to professional networks, financial disparities, and then also being able to translate their skills. So for over a century, our organization has supported the advancement of women veterans through personal and economic well-being. We provide things like this today, professional development alongside financial education and financial assistance for child care and critical resources. The veterans in this room today, the most important part, they are part of our 2026 Women Veterans Lead Cohort, a four-month hybrid program that is focused on professional development, personal development, and leadership. It creates opportunities for support and women to continue applying their leadership, not only in the workplace, but within their communities. Collectively, this year's cohort has 237 years of service. Most notable, one of the veterans in the room today has 31 years of service. T. White has served 31 years in the Air Force, and that's Thank you for your commitment to our country and our national security. These women bring experience and talent and grit, but what they haven't always had is access to professional networks like this, peer support and opportunities that open doors. This program is where they can succeed. They can cultivate meaningful relationships and pursue their own personal and professional ambitions. Every day we see results, nearly 70% of our alumni earn promotions or transition into new roles after the program, 96% report greater financial stability, and 95% have built stronger lasting networks. These outcomes demonstrate what is possible and why we're so grateful for Fortune's partnership as well as Heidrick & Struggles. Thank you all for being here, for participating, and for recognizing women's military leadership. you for recognizing women's leadership, and with that, thank you. Thank you so much, Jodi. So next, we're going to have a conversation on charting a successful career path and lessons in leadership. Colonel Edna Cummings has a motto, which I personally love, the odds ain't good, but good stuff happens, and she's lived it. She went from army brat to army colonel, and when she set out to win national recognition for forgotten unit of black women who served in World War II, she kept pushing until Congress said yes. Today, she's here to share what she's learned about leading when the odds aren't in your favor. And a small tip from us, you may want to pay close attention to the back and forth between Colonel Cummings and myself. We'll kind of be demonstrating the types of questions that you might ask during your one-on-ones with the NPWs in just a few minutes. So please join me in welcoming Colonel Cummings. Colonel Cummings, thank you so much for being here. So I want to start with one of my favorite facts about you, which is you became the first black woman commissioned through Appalachian State's ROTC, a fact that you yourself didn't even find out about until 2008, years after the fact. How did you find out and what was going through your head at that time? Well, I can tell you what was going through my head at the time I was in college. I just wanted to get through college. Relatable. And the thing about it was interesting I'm great and honored and proud to have birthdays but in 1974 when I was a freshman I didn't know that was a year women could legally have credit cards in the u.s. so it's this generation my generation where I've seen a change I didn't know it at the time it was probably great and I didn't know I was the first but I didn't care I wasn't attempting to make history I just wanted to finish college and become a second lieutenant. Well, I think it's very poetic because now you've spent so many years making sure that other women who came before you have gotten their public recognition. So for those here that don't know about your 6888 campaign, can you walk us through what that is and how you built it? Are you all familiar with the 6888, first of all? It's a great, great, great name. And I remember, I didn't know about the 6888, this incredible unit of black women who served overseas during World War II. First of all, there were more than 6,000 black women on active duty during World War II, and I didn't know that. I knew about the nurses, but I didn't know about the non-nurses. And maybe 2015, 2016, I was scrolling the Internet, and I saw this story about a black woman whose name was Charity Edna. I'm like, oh, my God, another black colonel who spoke her mind and suffered the consequences sometimes. Her name was Charity Edna Adams, and that story resonated with me. Charity Adams led the 6888 overseas to clear the military's mail backlog. Other units had tried and failed. And for those veterans, and I'm sure you know some veterans, was the vital connector then. But the thing about it, when you deploy overseas, the Army takes care of everyone's mail. Civilians, military, all branches of service. she's known for saying over my dead body to this general which tried to replace her, so majors in the military don't talk to generals that way, never disrespectful but I was just so impressed because some of the challenges she had in World War I were some of the same ones I experienced, so I just said if I had the opportunity to share that story I would so we started in 2018 and build a monument, documentary, engage Congress to get legislation through, three pieces of legislation, bipartisan through Congress, using the skills I learned in the military. no easy task, so congratulations to you for that. I'm not a lobbyist, I'm an advocate. And now, in addition to the monument, to the legislation, you have a Netflix film coming, a Broadway-bound musical coming. How do you walk into an industry where you haven't had any background and get taken seriously? And any advice do you have for doing that? Listen, understand your audience. And I always say with the military, we have a set of superpowers, and we don't know we have them. And I get these looks down because we're taught to leap tall buildings with a single bound, two bounds, it's repelling. I did that in college. We would rappel off the tallest building on campus. And we deploy, we outrun artillery, bullets, bombs, and we navigate, especially Navy people, you navigate water and you can walk on water through it. I mean, the incredible things and skills and talents, and I make light of it, but it's really tapping into your superpowers. You have a toolkit and you don't know what you don't know and you don't know what you do know until it's time to use it. And I think it was the coach from Duke, Kara Lawson, just said that we have the tools to do hard. And you've done hard, especially if you served any time in the military. And I'll tell you why that's important. Because only 25% of young people now are even eligible to serve because of academics, health, and just a lot of reasons. So you need the top 25% of the nation to begin with if you've served. How did you know that it was time to leave the military? And how quickly after realizing it, did you actually act on it? That's a good question. I was in Colorado Springs where NORAD tracks Santa Claus, Cheyenne Mountain Post 9/11. And I was being considered for my next assignment, promotion to general officer. And I had taken a photo to go before the promotion board. And I was on Cheyenne Mountain, driving down the mountain after I pulled the beach blanket off my windshield because it was so cold. And I got to the office, and I always had night shift. You know what? I don't want to do this anymore. I'm tired. My daughter said, no one will come to see me in Colorado when I graduate from high school. And then someone said, you know, you can wake up and get 50% of your paycheck. I'm like, wait a second. Yeah, you can retire. I said, wait a minute. So I'm working for half pay? And it was hard. And so I said, you know what? I think I can do something else, but I had no idea what that something else was. But someone told me, when it's time to transition, quietly let people know that you're transitioning. It's not, you know, I'm out, don't call me again, but just let people know, I'm thinking about a career shift. So the next question, which is why we're here, what can you do? And could you answer that for us? Well, and that's the challenge, how to synthesize 30 years, 20 years, and we've done so, so much. No one wants to see a 10-page resume of all of your assignments. No one wants to see that when you were 18 years old, you were a sergeant doing blah, blah, blah. What they're looking for are your skills. So that skills isolation is really, really hard. And sometimes, you know, I still struggle with people say, what do you do? I'm like, what do you want me to do? Not being flipped. But it becomes hard. And I think sessions like this will help you with the skill isolation. But more importantly, what do you want to do? Who was the first person outside of the military that opened a door for you? And how did you find them? Outside of the military? I'm so ingrained in the military. Most of my contacts have been primarily military. But I think I remember when I was on active duty, I was thinking about leaving service. And so someone told me to speak with a professional who's a civilian civil service worker, still in the federal government. And she said, if you don't tell your story, no one else will, which is sort of antithetical to what military people have been taught. You don't talk about yourself. You don't brag about yourself. And then she said, all of these evaluation reports you have, go back and read about how great you are. because everyone has an evaluation report at least once a year where they tell you how good you are, something you've done. So that helps to isolate your skills and your contributions and then all the awards you receive. You are the only one who did whatever. We forget about those. I have mine in a big notebook and I never looked at them until I had to do them. Because what I believe, and I'm sure the mentees and mentors will let you know, the mentors here will say, What is it that you're most proud of? What have you done? What contributions have you made? I didn't know, again, 30 years later, that I was the first one to graduate from Appalachian. And that wasn't an accomplishment. That was just something that I did. And I found out because Appalachian beat Michigan and I went to homecoming. No way. And that revolutionized, you know, college football, but that's another story. Other session. Yeah, another session. But still, just someone reminds you, hey, when you did whatever, you were the first, you were the only one. And this is why this is important. So sometimes it takes people telling you. And so afterwards, once I retired, I had other people who had gone before me in industry to just identify my skills and just to help me to isolate some of those skills that I had taken for granted, skills I didn't know that I had. One quick question for you on those skills, and then I'm going to turn to the room to see if anyone else has any questions as well. but was there a military skill that you thought was incredibly useful for you in your civilian life that maybe you didn't expect yes the ability to talk to anyone about anything yes and that's something that we veterans can do because we meet people from throughout the world and we have to make that connection because unfortunately our role in the military is sometimes to get people to do those things that we don't want them to do as a leader and sometimes it doesn't turn out so well without going too deep into what the military does, but how do you get people to follow you when it's hard? That's a skill, first of all. How do you make a connection with someone you've never seen, never talked to, a different culture, different language, where you've been brought overseas, and host nation support becomes important. How do you establish those relationships? So the military and people sometimes I don't believe understand this is about relationship building especially within the organization and then outside the organization because we have a lot of stakeholders and partners and the longer you stay in the more that skills are refined and developed so that's a skill that i think i've developed that helped me in congress to build those bridges when people told me that it will be impossible for you to get the president to sign legislation. Any questions? And you can raise your hand and while the mic is brought over to you. One over here. If you're driving your car and you're looking ahead and you look in that rear view mirror and you look at your past, would you join the military again and why? Absolutely. Even though I got out and came back in, I, in retrospect, the view, I mean, it's better than I thought it was because, again, as I said before, you don't know what you've done and your accomplishments until, number one, someone tells you that it's history, until you see people whose lives you've impacted. I've been various places. When I was in Colorado, I met a young captain. He says, ma'am, you taught me. I used to teach Army ROTC at Georgetown. He said, you taught me at Georgetown. And he was on the president's bomb squad. And he was so proud that, you know, he brought all these troops around him. So just those moments, it only takes one, kind of like those in education, I heard someone from Baylor, it only takes one student to say, you made a difference. So that one soldier, that one airman, that, you know, Marine, forget about the Navy, that sailor that says, you know, you made a difference in my life, you know, that makes it worth it. So absolutely. And for one more. Very good question. I think it was taking advantage of the educational opportunities because the military encouraged used to be a lifelong learner, and soon as I joined the military, I, well, after college, of course, I got my master's degree, so I was a second lieutenant with a master's degree because I was bored at Fort Rucker around a lot of Army aviators, so I figured there was a good way to pass time, but seriously, just get as much education as possible, and also skills, so those things, and then once I got out of the military, there's some skills I knew I didn't have. I went to community college and took some courses in Excel because I didn't have clerks. I didn't know how to do a lot of that stuff because I always had people, but once you retire, you don't have people anymore. You don't have a driver. You don't have somebody tell you to go to a meeting. You got to think for yourself. Well, thank you so much, Colonel Cummings. Thank you for the great questions.