Joelle K. Jay

Athena JBS

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Congratulations! You’ve Arrived!

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As a leader, an executive, and an aspiring board director, you are on an exciting journey – one filled with challenges and victories. In the last 12 months, throughout this series, you have learned about the road that might be ahead for you and how to be successful on your Journey to a Board Seat. 

To review, you learned about the three “lanes” on the path: 

  1. You
  2. Your Network
  3. Your Learning. 

You. You discovered the six steps on the journey to a board seat as described by the experts on this path, The Athena Alliance, whose membership opportunities offer you a guide. Those six steps once again are:

1 – The Journey Planning Strategy
2 – Your Executive Board Package
3 – Voice and Presence
4 – Thought Leadership and Presentation
5 – Personal Positioning and PR Strategy
6 – Network Leverage and Enhancement.

Your Network. You also learned the three important ways you can maximize your network: 

  • Mentoring
  • Connections
  • Exposure. 

Your Learning. Finally, you were introduced to Athena’s Virtual Salons – ongoing learning opportunities to help you be successful as you grow into the leader, executive, or board director you aspire to be. 

Hopefully this overview of the Journey to a Board Seat has been helpful to you, in that it has given you a way to prepare yourself for this exciting phase of your career. Whether you decide to walk this path slowly or speed your way through, The Athena Alliance is there to help. They can be found at www.TheAthenaAlliance.org. 

Whether you are interested in their Aspiring Director Accelerator Program because you’re currently on a Journey to a Board Seat – or if you’d benefit from their Rising Executive Accelerator Program for leaders stepping up in their leadership roles – either way, you will be well supported by the extensive learning and community filled with women like you. 

Next Steps: 

If you’ve enjoyed this series, The Journey to a Board Seat, be sure to connect with me for future newsletters, article series, and learning opportunities. 

To join me, go to www.JoelleKJay.com and register for my Updates & Insights.

Or let’s connect on social media: 

And, if I can help you in any way, as an Executive Coach I’m here to support you, so reach out anytime. You may email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. 

Thank you for joining me on the journey, GOOD LUCK, and let’s stay connected!

Joelle K. Jay, Ph. D. is a Director with the Leadership Research Institute (LRI) who specializes in leadership development for senior executives in Fortune 500 companies. She is an executive coach, keynote speaker, and author. She strategizes with business leaders to enhance their performance and maximize business results. Joelle is especially known for her success in the advancement of executive women in companies like Microsoft, Accenture, and Adobe. Her books, The Inner Edge: The 10 Practices of Personal Leadership and The New Advantage: How Women in Leadership Can Create Win-Wins for Their Companies and Themselves, have been endorsed by such luminaries as Marshall Goldsmith, Jim Kouzes, and Stephen Covey. The Leadership Circles Program™, a leadership development program based on her work, has been credited for helping companies become Best Places for Women to Work. She holds a Masters Coach Certification and was named one of the Top 29 Coaches by Leadership Excellence magazine. Joelle and her husband live in Nevada with their sons, Jackson and Morgan.

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Your Learning – the Virtual Salons

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As you’ve been following along the Journey to a Board Seat, you may remember we talked about the three “lanes” on this path: 

  • You
  • Your Network
  • Your Learning. 

We’ve spent the last several months focusing on you and your network. Today, we’re going to tackle the additional learning you can be doing along the way – the third “lane.” This is where you’ll find Athena’s Virtual Salons. 

The Virtual Salons

Envision for a moment Paris at the turn of the century. At that time, popular among the elites were what they called the salons – small gatherings in lovely rooms of intellectuals, poets and artists, where they could share ideas, get to know interesting others, and expand their horizons. 

The Athena Alliance introduces the Virtual Salon – a gathering place for those of you on a journey to a board seat where, just like in the Parisian salons, you too can expand your learning in a rich environment with a guest list and topics cultivated just for you. 

Virtual salons are group-setting video conferences, each on a topic, with an expert and a panel who talk about things relevant to women at a senior point in their career. Whether they seek a board seat or know they need to become more broadly a business steward, they can learn their way to success by joining the Virtual Salons.

Topics for Discussion

One of the benefits of the Virtual Salons offered by the Athena Alliance is that they present you with the topics you need to know if you’re aspiring to a board seat. Not only are you learning, you are learning what you need to learn. 

A sampling of topics presented by the Virtual Salons include:

  • Finance for the non-CFO; 
  • Cybersecurity topics
  • Boardroom trends
  • The traits it takes that make a good director
  • Leadership topics – like how to negotiate

and

  • The value of your brand.

Notice that while these topics are important to aspiring board directors, they are also topics important to executive women in general. They therefore help you grow in your career currently while becoming educated about the topics you’ll need on the road ahead. Virtual Salons are hosted by experts, coaches, and experienced members of the Athena community, and they give participants the opportunity to not only learn but participate in an engaging discussion with other like-minded leaders. 

An Engaging Experience 

Alana Schmidt, a Member Success Manager with the Athena Alliance, has seen members benefit greatly from the Virtual Salons as they have grown and expanded over the years. In her words, 

“Our Virtual Salons can be a great source of value and information for members, as well as an excellent opportunity to get exposure to the community, exchange thoughts, and ask questions to other senior leaders in our network.” 

The Athena Alliance offers several tracks of content including Boardroom Insights, Modern Leadership, Finance for the Non-CFO, Investing, Current Events, and Life Transitions.  Virtual Salons are recorded and available to members at Athena’s extensive Resource Library.  Here is a sampling of specific titles:

As you consider the breadth and depth of topics, tracks and offerings represented in the Athena’ Alliance’s Virtual Salons, can you start to make a list of some of the things you need to learn in the months and years ahead? 

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Accessing the Full Power of Your Network – Mentoring, Connections, and Exposure

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In the last issue of this Journey to a Board Seat series, we talked about the importance of your network. But how do you get connected with the people you need to know?

This is where the Athena Alliance comes in. Members of the Athena Alliance have access to a vast network of

  • Mentors

  • Board Members

  • CEOs

  • Investors

  • Coaches

  • Advisors

and

  • Aspiring Board Members just like you.

The Athena Alliance can help you get connected. In fact, dedicated Member Service Managers are committed specifically to helping members of the network find each other. If you haven’t yet joined the Athena Alliance, of course you can reach out and get connected yourself. It may take a little more effort and courage, but so many leaders on this journey are ready and willing to help that you are bound to find the support you need.

However, there is a catch. Networking at this level takes on a new meaning, especially if you are actively pursuing a board seat, and even mores o if you’re doing so for the first time.

Joanna Furlong, Media and Communications Manager at Athena describes three different ways aspiring board members connect with individuals in their network:

  1. Mentoring

  2. Connections

And

  1. Exposure.

Read on and ask yourself, which if these would be most helpful to you now?

Mentoring

In the mentoring tradition, up-and-comers learn the skills and strategies from people who have achieved what they want to achieve. Here, those are likely to be accomplished board members.

One third of Athena’s members are Pioneers – experience board directors join Athena because they need it but because they want to – as Furlong puts it – “send the elevator back down.” She describes them this way:

“Pioneers are highly advanced in their careers and have achieved either private board seats, public board seats, and sometimes multiple board seats – and now boards are knocking on their doors. They join to give advice, mentoring and support to aspiring leaders.”

For instance, if members are interviewing for a board seat and wants to learn about the industry, or they’re nervous about the interview, or if they want to learn more about the process of being on a board, mentors can help by meeting with them and sharing insights to help them succeed.

A Question for You: If you had a mentor now, what kind of qualifications would that mentor have, and how could she help?

Connections

Sometimes what you need as an aspiring director is not necessarily mentoring, but just connection. Connecting to peers who are walking the journey with you is an equally important way to leverage your network.

At Athena, many members join Athena to access each other. Athena’s motivated and accomplished community of women in leadership offers endless opportunity to learn from each other and discover new opportunities. Members connect over business deals. They connect within and across industries. They lean on each other for business connections. Again, Athena’s Member Success Managers help facilitate connections by understanding what each member needs and making introductions – which not only speeds but also strengthens the process – but you can certainly expand your network simply by looking around for peers and being willing to take the first step.

A Question for You: What are some of the pressing questions you have about your career path right now? Where would it be helpful to meet someone struggling with the same challenges as you?

Exposure

The third way aspiring board members can make the most of their networks is through exposure to the right people and opportunities. In short, you need visibility.

Coco Brown, CEO of the Athena Alliance, compares their approach to facilitating visibility to being like a Hollywood agent. Athena surveys the landscape for opportunities that members can take to get that exposure, whether it’s aligning them to a speaking engagement; putting them forward for a conference presentation; and suggesting or even securing invitations to dinners and events – all to make sure aspiring members are being seen in the right places and meeting the right people.

A Question for You: If you could meet anyone you might want to meet, or be seen presenting, contributing to, or just attending a particular event, what would you choose? What would that kind of exposure do for you, and is there a step you can take to make it happen?

The Impact of a High-Powered Network

A network is only as powerful as the quality of the relationships, but having the right relationships is also critically important. Listen as one Athena Alliance member describes the impact her conversation had when she met with a connection through the community.

“Thank you for taking the time to speak with me, and for so generously sharing your thoughts and ideas, which are so thoroughly informed by your real-world experience as a board member and CEO. I’m excited about the possibilities you identified — so many of which seem possible! Thank you, too, for the role-playing and constructive feedback — I found it helpful and realistic. I look forward to following up with the many resources you suggested — and I hope very much to meet you in person at an event soon.” – Sara Ponzio, Deputy County Counsel @ City of Santa Clara

You can sense the energy and enthusiasm that came from this connection. Imagine how much momentum can come from your connections, and you’ll power up your journey, too!

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Three “Lanes” on the Road to a Board Seat

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If you’ve been on this journey from the beginning, you know that the road to a board seat has at least six stops:

1 – The Journey Planning Strategy

2 – Your Executive Board Package

3 – Voice and Presence

4 – Thought Leadership and Presentation

5 – Personal Positioning and PR Strategy

6 – Network Leverage and Enhancement.

We’ve talked about all of those steps, and you may be working on them as you move down this path. It really is a journey; it takes time, and you don’t have to do it alone. Remember the Athena Alliance is there to guide you. Their processes are uniquely designed to help you be successful. You can explore membership opportunities here: www.AthenaAlliance.org

Now, though, as you move along the journey, we need to explore your experience from a couple of new angles.

Coco Brown, CEO of the Athena Alliance, believes there are three big themes on this journey to a board seat. You might think of them as “lanes” on the path – three areas you can move into while simultaneously moving forward. Those three themes are:

  1. You
  2. Your Network
  3. Your Learning

To date, we’ve been focused on YOU – specifically by stopping at the six points you’ve learned so far and doing the “inner work” needed to be ready for a board position. Walking this path has meant truly and deeply connecting with who you are – the stories you tell, the way you think about yourself, and the way you want to present yourself. Perhaps until now, you’ve thought of yourself as climbing a career ladder, but now it’s time to think about yourself as an overarching steward of business. You need that perspective to be successful in board service, so you can operate across an entire company. You have to think about yourself differently now and how you bring yourself to that space. You have to understand yourself differently. That is all a journey of its own.

But there are two other “lanes.”

What we need to do next is look at your network, and then we’ll look at your ongoing learning and what else will shore up your readiness for a board seat.

Ready? Let’s switch lanes.

Traveling Companions – Your Network

On your board journey as in life, the road may sometimes feel long, but you don’t have to go it alone. You have traveling companions.

This is your network.

Of course, you have a professional network. You’ve cultivated it for years. You have relationships with peers within your company, function, industry and areas of expertise. But even if your network is rich, deep, and varied, it may not be the network you need on your journey to a board seat.

When you are looking for board positions, you are connecting to a different world.

Here are some of the people you may now need to add to your network.

  • Mentors. Many executives discover that as they grow up in their careers, they move from being mentored to becoming a mentor. But if the journey to a board seat is new to you, it’s time to be the one getting mentoring once again. This is one area where the Athena Alliance excels – it is filled with a network of experienced board members and other leaders who are walking the journey to a board seat with you. Talking with them can give you the insider knowledge you need to find the shortcuts on the journey – or to navigate the challenges, sustain yourself as you go the distance, or keep up the pace.
  • Board Members. In your network, you’ll want to get connected with more board members in general – not just for mentoring, but for connections.
  • CEOs. Many leaders seeking a board seat are also seeing the need to expand their careers by taking bigger positions. Executive committee positions. C-level positions. Having CEOs in your network can help you see new opportunities and grow yourself in new ways, as well as connect you to the executives who know what’s needed on a board and can advise you on your journey.
  • Investors. Especially if you are seeking a board seat in start-up companies, you will want to become versed in the world of venture capital. Adding investors to your network will help you do that.

Remember: in order to get into a board room you have to network with a different ecosystem. Give yourself the chance to get connected – stop thinking you have to take the journey to a board seat alone, and build your network along the way instead.

Taking the Next Step

Whether you are simply exploring the journey to a board seat or racing down the path, a good exercise at this point is to stop and take stock of your network.

How many people do you know who fall into the categories above?

How might you start expanding your network?

Start a collection of names and ideas. Think about different roles, companies, industries and levels of people you might want to know – and whom you want to know you. In our next edition in this series, you will learn about three specific kinds of relationships to build with your new and expanding network.

If you’d like to see our next article in this series, “Journey to a Board Seat,” click here.

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Network Leverage & Enhancement

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As an accomplished business leader, you have spent a career developing relationships. So it might come as a surprise to learn that when it comes time to pursue a board seat, you may not have the network you need.

That’s because the kinds of people who will support you in getting that board position are not necessarily the ones who supported you in your career. To date, your network may be filled with executives, clients, and colleagues – but now, you’ll need to round out your network with board members, investors, governance influencers, and CEOs. And, some of your current network may include these targets, but you may need to stretch to get connected if this is a new arena for you.

Fortunately, you’re ready.

From Preparation to Outreach

Along the journey to a board seat, we have seen a progression through a number of steps.

  • First, you learned the Steps on the Journey.

  • Next, you built your Executive Brand Package.

  • Then, you polished your Executive Presence.

  • After that, you clarified the key messages in your Thought Leadership.

  • Last, you considered your Personal Positioning.

Having done those things, it’s almost like you’ve completed the packaging, and now you’ve created the product that is you.

And so now it’s time to go to market.

In other words, you’ve prepared yourself to introduce yourself as a board candidate, and now you’re going to put all that good preparation to work.

What will that outreach look like? That depends on what you want. In this sixth of six steps on the journey, you need to think specifically about what kind of a board seat you want – the one that is uniquely suited to you.

Nancy Sheppard, Executive Coach and Chief Journey Advisor for Athena Member Aspiring Directors, suggests asking yourself these questions in order to build a bit of a strategic plan.

  • What kind of a board do you want to be on?

  • What kind of industries interest you?

  • What are five companies on whose mission and boards you’d love to serve?

  • What do you need to do in order to connect into those kinds of companies?

  • What research might you have to do?

  • Who can help you, and how can you reach out to those people?

This kind of thinking helps you orient to what you really want. You might also take some time to consider what you might be missing.

  • Do you have the experience needed for the board seats you want?

  • Do you have any conflicts of interest?

  • Do you have the time and your management support necessary to serve?

  • If you were really honest about the board you’d secretly love to be on…whether or not you’re sure it’s possible…what would it be?

With the answers to these questions, you may find yourself adding or subtracting some names from your list. And now it’s time to start some outreach.

  • Who do you know?

  • Who do you need to know?

  • How can you connect with the boards and companies that are your targets?

These questions, she notes, are an ongoing process.  You’ll keep building out your “allies” as you progress in identifying new targets.  She encourages member to “get started” and  to go out and share your interest so that you can be on the top of minds of those who can consider you for, or refer to you, opportunities.

This is where all the good work you’ve done to this point pays off.

You’ll use the “Value Proposition” developed for your new Bio and Resume from your Executive Brand Package to introduce yourself to board members you’ve not yet met.

You’ll use your refined skills in Executive Presence so you’re making a strong impression.

You might look for opportunities to deliver presentations or submit publications to share your thought leadership. Think TED Talks, LinkedIn Groups, and networking events.

You might tailor your personal positioning to each new connection so it’s relevant to the person before you, whether they are someone who can help you get on a board, make an introduction for you, or simply give you some guidance.

In all of these ways, you will be building allies for your board search.

From Outreach to Opportunity

As you know from the other newsletters in this series, the Athena Alliance has specifically designed a process for getting to the board seat you seek, and they know that you will be even more successful if you don’t have to do this alone. If this step seems intimidating at all, it’s definitely worth bringing in a coach who can ask the right questions and even advise you or share their knowledge from working with other leaders. Not only will you feel more confident that you’re doing the right things, but you will also save time and be sure the time you do invest will be time well-spent.

For instance, Nancy Sheppard coaches leaders in thinking about the deeper questions and helping them articulate what they really want with a specific opportunity such as:

  • What kind of due diligence do you have to do?

  • Why do you want to be on this board?

  • What’s important to you about being on a board?

  • How can you help this company, and how can you be of value to them?

  • Are you a good fit for the board culturally? Is it a good fit for your personality? How should you look at companies or their board to be sure they’re the right fit for you?

  • And what kind of research do you need to do to find out?

She also prepares them for the interview process and answers questions like,

  • What are the most important things to remember in any board interview?

  • What scenarios might I encounter in the interview process?

  • How is a board different than the process for an executive position?

  • What tips will help ensure the interview goes well?

She even role plays mock interviews with board candidates so they go into the interview feeling calm, competent and confident – and so they get the board seat they want.

Success Story

To understand the impact of Nancy’s coaching, listen to how Nancy Vitale, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Partners for Wellbeing, and former CHRO for Genentech, describes her experience.

“Nancy helped me re-frame my approach to networking for both my business as well as for board opportunities. Nancy helped me to be more targeted in how I leverage my network thoughtfully for these two distinct needs. I am now approaching my reach outs to potential clients with a different mindset of providing valuable support and solutions to problems they have vs. “selling” my services.  I am also more confident in leveraging the executives in my network for potential board opportunities as I continue to grow my visibility through speaking engagements and other external contributions.”

How about you? Is it time you leveraged your network and expanded your opportunities?

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Personal Positioning and PR Strategy

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Today it’s time for a self-assessment.

  • Do you believe others perceive you as the leader you want to be?
  • Do they see you leading at the level you want to lead?
  • For that matter, do they see you…at all?

When you are focused on advancing yourself as a leader, including when you’re interested in elevating yourself to a board position, it’s not just who you are that matters. It’s how others see you. We want to be sure those two things are aligned.

It’s time to become visible as a leader.

Personal Positioning

This part of the journey is to help you get more visible as a potential board member. What is it you want to do? Who are you trying to reach?

In the prior steps on this journey, you got clarity on the messaging – your pitch and your stories – that will help represent you. In this step, we take those messages on the road.

Mara Brazer is a communications coach and media strategist with the Athena Alliance who has been advising CEOs, executives and business leaders for 30 years. As a corporate and advisory board member herself, she has the inside view as to how women need to position themselves to gain their objectives.

At this stage, it’s worth revisiting that question for yourself.

  • What are your objectives right now in your professional life?
  • Are trying to get on a corporate board, advance in your career, or both?

Whatever your professional objectives at this moment, you will want to position yourself to achieve them and put together the strategy for being seen.

Choosing the Path

If preparing yourself to be ready for a board seat is a journey, today you are choosing the path you will take to get there.

Unlike prior steps on the journey where you were collecting ideas and packing your toolkit with pitches and stories to introduce yourself, today you’ll be thinking about how to hit the road and finding the people with whom you want to share your message.

To find your path, Mara suggests some more questions to guide the way.

  • Who will help you meet your objectives? In other words, who is your target audience?
  • What messages do they want to hear? This is a different angle than what messages you want to deliver – it’s knowing how to answer your target audience’s unspoken question, “What’s it in for me?”
  • What do you want from them? This is where you clarify your ask, so you can put it out there. Do you want a board seat? An executive position? Some other opportunity?

Envisioning First Steps

This part of the journey becomes quite personal, as the way you approach personal positioning depends on what you’re trying to achieve.

Imagine that you are indeed looking for a board seat now. You’ve identified that as a future step in your career, and you’re doing everything you can to be ready for the opportunity. That’s your objective.

So, you think about who might be able to help you get on a board. CEOs, investors, colleagues, former colleagues already on corporate boards – these are now your target audiences. They are the ones who need to hear your messages and understand why they should care about having you on their team. They should understand what you can bring to their company, and how your expertise aligns to their own vision and objectives.

Then, you would think about what you want. If a board position is what you want, this means clarifying how you want to serve, who you want to serve, and the impact you want to make.

  • A CFO I once coached decided after a career in finance, what she really wanted to do was promote a healthier world; she joined boards related to sustainable living.
  • A Silicon Valley executive with highly technical expertise decided to pursue a board seat in an industry she loved but knew little about: fashion.
  • Other women have chosen boards that gave them opportunities to travel to Paris, Tokyo and Sydney; or they chose board positions specifically in their home city so they could stop traveling for work and enjoy making an impact closer to home.

The reasons you love what you love and want to do what you want to do are all about you and your personal choices. They come up here, because once you know what you want, now you can position yourself to get it.

Stops Along the Path

Once you have thought through your personal positioning, now it’s time to take your ideas and share them. If pursuing a board seat is a campaign, and you are a candidate, these are the stops on your tour.

Where will you share your messages?

Think about social media. What’s your platform? LinkedIn? Twitter? YouTube? Where will you share your messages? For most board candidates, LinkedIn is usually the most relevant choice; how can you leverage LinkedIn to advance your goals?

Consider speaking engagements. Where might you appear as a guest speaker, panelist, or expert?

TED Talks? Meetings and Conferences? Ideas Festivals?

Identify your media strategy. Can you establish yourself as an expert source with reporters who reach your target audiences? Can you submit articles with your byline espousing your special viewpoints, to business publications?

On Your Way

So much of your journey to a board seat involves the internal processes you need to be ready. Designing your strategy; building an executive brand package, strengthening your voice and presence, and collecting ideas for your thought leadership have been the focus so far. But now, it’s time to share all of that with the people who need to know you.

Here’s how it may sound when you do.

“I really appreciated the help [I received from Athena]. The turnaround was quick, and I had several “ah-has” from our conversation about how to position myself better. And, I loved [my coach’s] approach to getting to my value. Plus, her personal way of “being” is just all-around enjoyable. This help alone is worth my membership in Athena.” — Michelle Lewis, Principal @ CapStreet Group

Position yourself in the right way, make choices about what’s in your PR strategy, and you’ll be moving down the path that leads you to the opportunity you want.

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Thought Leadership – Clarifying Your Messages

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Welcome back to the journey! As you know, this year we are exploring what it takes to be on the Journey to a Board Seat – a goal held by many leaders that is especially gaining momentum for women, as they accelerate their careers and take leadership of their companies for the future.

Being on this journey takes persistence. To review, in this twelve-part series about the journey, you know the first three steps are:

  • Step 1 – Planning Your Journey Strategy

  • Step 2 – Creating Your Executive Brand Package

  • Step 3 – Developing Voice and Presence.

Today you are about to learn the fourth step:

  • Step 4 – Identifying Thought Leadership and Presentation

Almost by definition, putting yourself out there as a board candidate means standing out. The very word “candidate” evokes images of being the one who emerges from a crowd to be the leader – who is seen as worthy and compelling – and who attracts attention for their ideas. The best candidates know what to do with that attention when they get it. They use it to deliver those ideas and make an impact on others.

What will you say when their attention falls on you?

As an aspiring board candidate, you need to know what to say when others give you their attention. What are your big ideas? What do you want to be known for?

Or, as Athena Alliance coach, communications expert founder of Lange International, Jenna Lange asks, what do you want others to be saying about you when they introduce you to their network?

Clarifying Your Ideas 

The step of identifying thought leadership means being able to clarify the ideas you want to be known for.  Imagine someone saying, “I want to introduce you to X because she has great ideas on Y”.  Y are those ideas.  Perhaps even more importantly, it means being crisp enough in your articulation of those ideas that others can talk about them even when you’re not there.

After all, gaining a board seat – or any leadership opportunity – is not a process in which you take the stage and expound on your ideas with a stump speech. In an election year, we see political candidates jumping on stages and platforms, grabbing the mic and talking, talking, talking about their ideas hoping to attract the attention of whoever’s interested. They hope their listeners will walk away with a strong and positive association of their name with their ideas.

You may not have political aspirations, and you don’t need to jump on a stump, but as a board candidate you are participating in that same process (albeit in a much subtler way). When you’ve clarified your ideas, you will be talking about them wherever you go:

  • Sharing what’s important to you

  • Telling stories to help others understand the point

  • Looking for audiences who care and want to support your ideas.

Everyone who gets to know you will then develop that strong and positive association of your name with your ideas.

Then when the opportunities you’re looking for become available, it will be clear that you are the best fit.

Your Thought Leadership Toolbox 

Unlike the Personal Brand package you developed earlier in your Board Journey, your thought leadership package is less concrete. It’s not a resume or LinkedIn profile; it’s a collection of ideas. Think of it as a toolbox full of ideas and stories you can pull out in a variety of settings and tailor to the audience.

That way, you’ll be able to be consistent in your messaging whether you are:

  • Introducing yourself to executives and board members one-on-one;

  • Speaking in small groups and networking settings to new acquaintances;

  • Sharing your ideas and explaining what you care about to others who can connect you, sponsor you, or promote you;

Or

  • Taking the mic to share your ideas from the stage.

A Place to Start

The Athena Alliance advises those who wish to be board candidates to gain clarity about their thought leadership. You can do this on your own by starting with a couple of different tasks.

First, fill in the blanks of this sentence: I want to be known for ______________________.

Second, gather a few stories that illustrate your ability to do that thing well.

Or, consider these questions:

  • What impact do you have as a leader that you want others to see and appreciate?

  • What stories can you share that show you having that impact? And how can you make those stories come alive with detail so they make an impression?

  • Who do you want to know your impact, and if you were talking to them right now, what words would you choose to convey your ideas?

  • If someone else wanted to introduce you to the person who could open the door to your next big opportunity, what words would you want them to say to represent you?

These questions can make a big difference in the way others view you, and the way you view yourself. As one Athena member commented,

“I had thought I had a good handle on it. But I learned how to have a more executive presence. To speak more deliberately. I’ve been the only woman in the room for 30 years, so I thought I could do this. But the experience with Athena was very helpful and empowering.”

—Barbara Adey, VP, Head of US Sales and Marketing Practice @ BTS Consulting

Getting Out There

Having packed your Thought Leadership Toolbox with your “starter set” of ideas and stories, now you can take that toolbox out and start sharing the word. Whether you do that through conversations, presentations, publications or the media, you will now be able to say and show yourself to be the leader you know you are – and want others to see.

When you do, you will stop being overlooked or misunderstood, which is what can happen when you haven’t clarified your ideas. Instead, you will be standing out and stepping up. You will be creating a positive impression in eyes of those whose attention you want to attract and showing up as the best version of yourself.

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Developing Voice and Presence

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What does your voice say about you?

Many of us put time, effort, energy, and expense into every aspect of our presence:

  • Our dress
  • Our stance
  • Our messaging.

But all of that can be sabotaged in an instant when you say your first word, if your first word isn’t delivered with the strength of a confident voice.

Just Listen

Here’s an exercise. For the rest of the day, every time someone speaks, close your eyes briefly and ask yourself: what does this person’s voice say about them?

A thin, high voice can be perceived as weak and ineffectual.
A low, slow voice can be perceived as thoughtful.
A booming voice can be perceived as either commanding or overbearing.

What does your voice say about you?

In our last Journey to a Board Seat article, we discussed Personal Brand – the packaging of “you” to share with the world using the four pieces of your Executive Board Package. But many people actually won’t get to know you through those documents.

They’ll get to know you when they meet you and hear you present yourself.

Meet Your Voice Coach

At the Athena Alliance, the journey to a board seat includes a stop with Voice and Presence Coach, Hillary Wicht. Working with Hillary can make you feel like a movie star or a celebrity politician ~ she refines the Elevator Pitches of leaders and helps them speak with authority. Once you’ve mastered the art of delivering your Elevator Pitch with confidence and clarity, including with a strong voice and presence, you will engender confidence in others every time they meet you.

And Your Voice Coach May Be You

As with all of the coaches on the Athena Alliance journey, Hillary has endless resources for leaders wanting to improve their voice and presence.

Just listen to the impact this experience had on Athena Member and CFO of SurveyMonkey, Debbie Clifford:

“I give 95% of the credit for securing a board seat to Athena. Athena is an organization that has changed my life for the better. Athena helped me find my voice. I started speaking softly and without conviction. Through the aid of Athena, I learned how to be more confident in telling my story. I found a louder, more compelling voice.” – Debbie Clifford, CFO of SurveyMonkey

But what if on your path you’re just exploring? You don’t have to be an Athena member to find your voice.

  • If you’re not yet ready for a voice coach, you can easily work on your voice on your own.
  • Try recording your voice on your smartphone and listening to yourself speak. Are you pleased with what you hear?
  • Try practicing your Elevator Pitch or self-introduction on video or with a friend, mentor, coach or colleague. What impression do they get?
  • Try searching Voice and Presence online. What programs, books, audios or resources can help you develop a compelling voice with which to present yourself as a leader?

Your Voice: A Secret Weapon

The fact that, of the six steps on the Journey to a Board Seat, one of them is Voice and Presence should tell you how very important it is to attend to this aspect of your image. From what I know of executive leaders, especially women, it may also be the most neglected. People think their voice “is what it is” – but nothing could be further from the truth. You can strengthen your voice and strengthen your reputation if you think about not just what you say, but how you say it.

Next Steps for You

Before you go back to your day, set a next step for yourself related to your voice. What assignment would you like to give yourself to develop this essential element of your executive presence?

Coming Soon

Join me next time when we continue pursuing the way you present yourself to others we move to the next step on the journey: Identifying Thought Leadership and Presentation.

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Your Executive Brand Package: The Four Must-Haves of Your Personal Brand

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There are millions of leaders looking for board seats. Fortunately, you’re one in a million.

In our Journey to a Board Seat Series, so far you’ve learned:

  1. What the Athena Alliance is and how they can help you develop into an attractive board candidate;
  2. How to plan a strategy for your journey to a board seat.

Today, you’re going to learn about Step 2 of the journey: Creating Your Executive Brand Package: The Four Must-Haves of Your Personal Brand.

Why do you need an Executive Brand Package?

As a successful business leader, chances are you are well-known in your organization. You have experience, a reputation, and perhaps even a collection of interviews, press releases and articles showing people who you are and what you offer. Even if you don’t, you probably have a website, or at least a photo and a bio.

In other words, you have a brand.

However, your brand – built over many years of your career – is likely more a historical picture of where you’ve been.

What you need now is a branded package of who you are and what you want. This is the essence of an Executive Brand Package.

What is in an Executive Brand Package?

There are four pieces of your Executive Brand Package:

  1. A Resume or CV
  2. An Executive Bio
  3. An Elevator Pitch
  4. A Linked-In Profile.

You may have variations of these already, or you may be starting from scratch, but either way, the intentional step in this part of the journey is to craft versions of these messages that specifically paint a picture of you as the qualified board member you are and want to be.

How do you create your Executive Brand Package?

There are two distinct phases to developing a winning Executive Brand Package.

First, you must know yourself.

Second, you must capture your compelling qualities in writing.

Neither of those things are easy, and they both benefit from working with a coach.

Fortunately, The Athena Alliance offers coaching and produces an Executive Brand Package for its members, taking out much of the stress and time needed to “brand yourself.” I was fortunate to work with Executive Writer, Adriana Azuri, who masterfully pulled together my Executive Brand Package and led me through this step.

  • We started by gathering my existing materials.
  • We then discussed everything I’d learned from planning my Journey Strategy.
  • She drafted each of the four elements of my Executive Brand Package.
  • Together, we wordsmithed and refined the final copy.
  • And in the end, I had four complete, written documents that I could feel confidently presented me in the best light for the board seat I wanted.

As Adriana says,

“Through this process of learning about a member’s career, I can tell you who they are and what value they deliver or have delivered. I then outline a member’s overall career achievements to bring out the best of the best. It’s crystal clear to me who they are and what their strengths are.”

Adriana Azuri
Athena Alliance
Journey Advisor & Executive Writer

Whether you’re pursuing a board seat now or think you may wish to sometime in the future, it’s never too late to pull these materials together for yourself.

How can I create my own Executive Brand Package?

If you know you need to spruce up your public image and put together an Executive Brand Package that presents the best version of you to the world, the place to start is defining your Personal Brand.

Admittedly, working through the details of creating a Personal Brand can be painful and difficult to do on one’s own. It requires self-knowledge, reflection, self-awareness, vulnerability, and confidence. This is definitely a process that is served by working with a competent communications expert, a personal branding consultant, or a coach.

I work with many of my executive coaching clients on building their Personal Brand, and I’d be happy to share that process with you – just email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com.

Once you know your Personal Brand, the rest is easy. All four of the elements of the Executive Brand Package –

  • Your Resume or CV
  • Your Bio
  • Your Elevator Pitch
  • Your Linked-in Profile

– are all really just different formats for presenting that Personal Brand to the world.

Next Steps for You

Having been fortunate enough to work with an Athena Alliance Executive Writer, I know the value of having someone create my Executive Brand Package for me – and having tried to create the four documents involved on my own in other phases of my career, I also know how excruciatingly difficult it can be to do this alone. There’s something about writing about oneself that is just simply hard.

Give yourself the benefit of support.

If you’re walking yourself through the journey to a board seat on your own, do gather drafts of the Executive Brand Package and see if it presents you the way you want to be presented.

But if you have any reticence at all, feel uncertain of your Personal Brand, are intimidated by the writing or the process, or don’t have a clear sense of what a successful Executive Brand Package might look like, stop struggling. We can do this piece together. Again, shoot me a note at Info@JoelleKJay.com, and we’ll work through this phase of the journey.

Coming Soon

In the next article in our Journey to a Board Seat Series, I will share with you how to deliver the Personal Brand in living color as we move to the next step on the journey: Developing Voice and Presence.

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.

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Planning Your Journey

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They say a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, but if you’re planning a long and successful journey, you should also have a strategy.

That’s definitely true if you are on the journey to a board seat.

As you know from our introductory articles, women who are pursuing a seat on a corporate board are often at a disadvantage.

Board seats tend to go to men and to those on the “inner circle” – a situation that tends to leave women out. That’s why The Athena Alliance was created. CEO Coco Brown and her team present women with a path to a board seat, and it is a journey that begins not just with a single step, but a strategy.

They call it the Journey Planning Strategy. In today’s issue of the Journey to a Board Seat Series, I want to share with you my personal experience with the Journey Planning Strategy – a benefit offered by The Athena Alliance that instantly gives women on the journey a great start.

Orientation

Starting the journey to a board seat can be daunting.

  • You’ve never done it before.

  • You don’t know what’s involved.

  • You have no idea whether you’re qualified.

  • You don’t know what gaps you need to fill to be qualified.

  • You wonder if you can be successful either way.

How much easier it is to start a journey if you have a guide.

At the Athena Alliance, your guide is your Member Success Manager. Member Success Managers serve as a “Personal Chief of Staff.” Athena Alliance Members are encouraged leverage these partners to access the full value that Athena can offer, from coaching and events to meaningful connections to other members, and it all starts at the beginning of the journey.

When I was first introduced to my Member Success Manager, she did two things for me.

First, she gave me an overview of the stages of the journey I’d be taking. To review these from our last article, the six steps on the journey are these:

  • Step 1 – Planning Your Journey Strategy

  • Step 2 – Creating Your Executive Brand Package

  • Step 3 – Developing Voice and Presence

  • Step 4 – Identifying Thought Leadership and Presentation

  • Step 5 – Personal Positioning and PR Strategy

  • Step 6 – Network Leverage and Enhancement

She introduced me to The Athena Alliance website, www.AthenaAlliance.org, and shared with me their considerable resources, including a library of relevant articles and dozens of other women on the journey, many of whom were open to conversations with me and some of whom were seasoned board members willing to help me on my way.

Having given me the map and assuring me I could get in touch anytime, my Member Success Manger launched me on Step One – Planning My Journey Strategy.

The Strategy Sessions

Planning my Journey Strategy again sounded worrisome. How could I plan a strategy for a journey I’d never taken? Where would I even begin?

Again, The Athena Alliance is designed specifically to guide women down the path with experienced experts virtually leading the way. My Member Success Manager handed me directly into the care of my first coach: Chief Journey Advisor Nancy Sheppard.

A seasoned board member herself, as well as an Athena veteran and executive coach, Nancy had the skills and the system for helping me discover what it would take for me to get a board seat.

In our first meeting, Nancy got to know me and asked a series of questions.

  • Why do you want to be on a board?

  • What kind of a board interests you?

  • What qualifications do you have, and what do you need?

She read my bio, explored my social media profiles, and asked about my references and connections.

In our second meeting, Nancy presented me with a Plan for my Journey Strategy. By the time our conversation was over, I had her honest assessment about what assets I had that would make me successful in obtaining a board seat and where I needed to fill in some blanks.

In other words, she answered all of those questions I had at the start of my journey. I knew now that even though I’d never been on this journey, I was in good hands. I understood what was involved; I knew where I was and wasn’t qualified; and I had confidence that by taking the Athena Alliance Journey to a Board Seat, I could be successful.

You can hear how other members experienced this thorough launch of their journey by listening to them describe their experience in this phase:

“I had a wonderfully motivating journey planning call. I am grateful to have been paired with someone in an active leadership position in [my specific] sector. She tailored the journey overview to focus on helpful tips for me to get the most out of my journey. I wasn’t sure what to expect out of the first call, but our time certainly surpassed anything I envisioned. She injected such well-crafted role-playing exercises to more deeply explain the goals and purpose of my network and visibility session. I left feeling energized and ready to take full advantage of what the Athena program has to offer.” – Erin DeCesare, CTO of ezCater

Next Steps for You

If you haven’t already visited the Athena Alliance website, take a moment to explore: www.AthenaAlliance.org. There you’ll get a sense of the resources they offer, from research to services and events. Even if joining a board is a distant dream of yours or a new interest, you will begin to discover what’s ahead on this journey – and what’s ahead may be an exciting adventure in your career.

And an expert tip: you may not yet have a Chief Journey Advisor like Nancy to build your plan, but by comparing Member Profiles and reading through The Athena Alliance website, you can ask yourself the same kinds of questions Nancy asked me and start sketching a plan for your journey to a board seat. You already have a lot of the pieces – just take some time to put them together, and you’ll be able to lead yourself down this path.

Coming Soon

Watch for our next article in the Journey to a Board Seat Series, in which I will share with you how to package yourself as a potential board member with your Executive Board Package: The Four Must-Haves of Your Personal Brand.

P.S. Here again is the website for The Athena Alliance: www.AthenaAlliance.org

As always, I send my best to you. If I can help you in any way, or if you’d like to explore Executive Coaching to support your success, please email me directly at Info@JoelleKJay.com. I’d be delighted to hear from you.