Description: The ideas she's spawned have flown the coop and landed in big companies and presidential campaigns.

Question: What impact does your work have on the world?

Transcript: I would love to feel that my work has an impact in the world; but I also need to approach this question with a certain degree of humility. I mean we at Harvard sometimes think that we’re part of the greatest university in the world. But there are lots of other places now that are also doing great things. My work, if I have influenced some people – some people in leadership positions – to do things differently, that’s the important thing. I do have many, many people who read my books. They quote me. I am sometimes recognized in airports. But I also sit at meetings with world leaders where I am convinced of my utter irrelevance. So I think that I have had an impact in terms of the term “empowerment”, and the importance of empowering people. I think my work on change has guided many, many organizations not only through my books, but through a change toolkit on the World Wide Web that is being used by many companies and governments around the world. I think that the ideas have entered into the vocabulary of leadership so much so that people sometimes forget that I thought of it first. And I guess that’s what’s important because I’m gonna go on to the next idea.

Question: What is your proudest achievement?

Transcript: Oh my proudest achievement is so hard to say. My proudest achievement is generally the most recent because . . . because I had just put in so much effort and so much struggle to do it. I really work hard. None of it comes easy. So I think of my books as proud achievements. But I’m always proudest of the most recent because I think that I’ve gone further in whatever that is.

I’m certainly proud of my son – of being able to have a life sufficiently balanced – that I can have a good family life and set forth my son upon the world. I’m certainly proud of the companies I’ve changed and the ideas I’ve spawned. And I can point to particular ones of the presidential campaigns that I’ve influenced; of the world leaders with whom I’ve shared the stage at numerous events who had already been using my ideas, but then go back and have learned something that often shapes their agenda. I’m asked questions like, “Well what should be the most important priority for Columbia?” And I answer those questions. So it’s thought leadership. It’s working with the power of ideas. And it’s wonderful that in this world of giant enterprises . . . IBM has 350,000 people and enormously advanced technology, and yet one person whispering in the ear of a world leader or an IBM executive can often change the course of that company, and sometimes the course of history.

Question: What needs to change for women in business today?

Transcript: Women in business, as well as women in leadership positions in any sector, have been something that I’ve been concerned about my entire professional life. I have to say we’re selfish because I got my PhD at a time when there were very few people like me. I was often the first of my kind sitting in a room with people of another kind. That’s sometimes true, by the way, when I go as an American to the Middle East now where I’m very different in many respects. So I was very concerned about getting more women. I thought it was in my self-interest to have my women colleagues. First of all then the whole image of women would have been elevated. But also I wouldn’t have had to sit there and answer silly questions about, “What’s the women’s point of view?” I wanted more at the table. I also do care about opportunity, and I care about not breaking . . . not being confined. I care about . . . I care about opportunity, and I care about not being trapped behind stereotypes. So now we’ve had the breakthroughs. There are certainly more women in leadership positions and lots and lots of women in the pipeline. What I’m concerned about now is that we haven’t changed institutions enough to make it possible for women who want to devote themselves to their children during formative years to do that, or for men for that matter who say, “No, I’d like to devote my time to my children” to do that without feeling they sacrifice their careers. I think we still don’t have enough women in leadership to make it totally normal, or we wouldn’t ask today’s silly woman question, which is, “Was Carly Fiorina fired because she was a woman?” And the answer is, “No, she wasn’t.” But all the attention she got afterwards was because we had so few women CEOs we didn’t take it for granted. But I think we have to get more women in leadership. In order to do that, we need to help those talented women in the pipeline feel that they can continue to advance without sacrificing important things to them in life. They don’t have to sacrifice their career, nor do they have to sacrifice their family. I think that more men ought to take on some of those family responsibilities. That was important to me. I always felt there was a reason for two parents. And my husband did a great deal. And so we could lead more balanced lives. I think that, to me, is the frontier. It’s what we do about work and family . . . work-life balance. And if we craft that, we will see all those talented women taking on responsibilities. And it will look completely normal to have women do important leadership tasks.

Recorded on: 6/13/07