To help businesses better support women in leadership, Chief — a membership network for women executives — has launched a new enterprise offering that enables employers to give their female senior leaders expanded
Chief launched in 2019 as a private, application-based network for women at the VP level of business and higher, aiming to create cross-industry opportunities to share ideas and build professional support systems. Today, the organization has 20,000 members nationwide, and the newly launched Chief Enterprise counts organizations including UnitedHealth Group,
"We know that businesses really want to invest in women in leadership, and we know it's important for retention," says Lindsay Kaplan, co-founder and chief brand officer of Chief. "Yet companies don't have a great way — outside of very expensive one-on-one coaching — to really support their executive women."
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Chief works to tailor each member's experience to suit their specific needs and interests. Upon joining, each woman executive fills out a survey about their goals, who they are as a leader and areas they're hoping to grow in. Based on those responses, Chief will place that executive in a targeted peer group, with other women leaders across industries, that can support those goals.
Fees typically cost anywhere from $5,800 to $7,900 a year for private members, many of whom previously asked their employers to subsidize the cost — which, compared to
"Women have something I call the third shift — you've got work, then your caregiving responsibilities, and then you also are expected to be a model executive woman for everybody in your company," Kaplan says. "It's why women are feeling burned out and dropping out of executive-level positions. So we're working to build a scaffolding of support around her as she climbs that ladder, so she doesn't fall. We're building the scaffolding that men have enjoyed in business for most of our lifetime."
Christa Newton was looking for that exact brand of support last year. The COO of One GI, a Tennessee-based
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"One of my own goals was just to expand my network, and have the opportunity to speak to other women leaders in different industries than my own," Newton says of what initially attracted her to Chief. "A lot of time we can get stuck in a one-track way of thinking in healthcare, and exposure and cross-networking outside the industry can drive innovative ideas and diversity of thought."
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"Belt-tightening means that businesses are trying to do more with less, so their leaders need more support, stronger networks, and they need to be more motivated and effective," Kaplan says. "Investing in these areas — especially when your competitors aren't — is one of the most strategic things you can do for long-term success."
At One GI, Allen says he views Chief Enterprise as a human capital investment, and can already see the long-term impact on his bottom starting to crystallize.
"Every one of the leaders in this program have been asked to grow measurably over the next three years to keep pace with the company itself," he says. "So the most straightforward measure of Chief's impact is that these female leaders are actually starting to accelerate past the company itself, which for us, allows them to drive growth in the company."
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The more women leaders feel supported, the more likely their impact and influence will trickle down throughout an organization, Kaplan says. The intention, for Chief and for its employer partners, is to build organizations that will continue to attract and retain top women talent. That starts by modeling an environment where women are set up to succeed and thrive.
"Candidly, we're just trying to recreate what's existed for me [as a man], for them," Allen says. "As a CEO and as a father of six girls, thinking about the world and existence I want to create for them, there's a lot of table tilting that needs to happen, and it requires that people who look like me participate in that."
