Hospitality Design - July 2010 - 70

have a style of management that is more open and inclusive, are more likely to encourage participation in meetings, more nurturing of subordinates, and prefer consensus to confrontation and empathy over ego.” Successful women in our industry also tend to share qualities such as:

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Stronger relationships with customers. Creative intelligence. Women tend to be more right-brained but are adept at using both sides of their brain, combining analytical and creative skills. Inspiration, or presenting a compelling vision for the future. Women have the ability to ﬁgure out where to go and to enlist the people and groups necessary to get there. Passion. The ability to make things happen instead of waiting for others to chart the course. Ability to see opportunity in setback. Problem solving. The good news for women, as reported by McKinsey & Co, in an article, Why Women Matter,

is that research suggests that companies with a higher number of women at senior levels are also companies with better organizational and ﬁnancial performances. Some leadership behaviors which are more frequently applied by women than men in management teams prove to enhance company performance and will be a key factor in meeting tomorrow’s business challenges.

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Today more than ever, woman are having an impact on hospitality design

Moreover, having more women in the workforce is a prerequisite for breaking the glass ceiling.

But based on the McKinsey report, this alone will not be sufﬁcient. Women quickly come up against barriers inherent in the traditional business model, such as need for ﬂexibility. This is not necessarily a interrupt their careers to handle work and family trade-offs. woman-only issue, but women are still challenged by family demands and are still largely the ones who As a result, women tend to struggle more than men with a desire to advance their careers and balance life and family demands. Companies who have adopted work ﬂexibility—remote working, parttime or ﬂexible hours—are more apt to retain women managers. Probably more than any other group, Gen X and Y want and will demand more balance between work and their personal life. Within our industry, perhaps as a result of challenges in the workforce and favorable barriers

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of entry, more and more women are starting their own businesses—and have achieved a great deal of success in terms of return on investment and personal gain. While this is not for everyone due to the risks associated with a business launch, it is a path many women have chosen, particularly those featured in this issue. The workplace of the future is likely to be more ﬂuid, more virtual, and less ofﬁce-bound and this will require a different set of management skills. As reported by Chartered Management Institute in their article, Management Futures: The World in 2018, recruiters are looking for emotional intelligence, and the ability to appreciate people’s values as much as they’re looking for other competencies. According to Brenda Barnes, CEO of Sara Lee, “Today’s business world, where work can be done anywhere, at any time, calls for a ﬂexible environment that provides opportunity for work-life balance. This doesn’t mean employees work less; instead it means empowering employees to do their work on a schedule that works for them.” Diversity of leadership will be a key driver in meeting the future challenges of the global hospitality design industry. The future bodes well for the advancement of women, particularly in hospitality, where women have been increasingly successful in overcoming barriers such as discrimination, ﬂexibility in the workplace, and resistance to women’s leadership. And women are using non-traditional management styles, drawing on their skills and attributes and demonstrating how to achieve results in a different way. “To love what you do and feel that it matters—how could anything be more fun?”—Katherine Graham, of the Washington Post Company, the ﬁrst female CEO of a Fortune 500 Company.

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Hospitality Design - July 2010