Katrina Dudley
“I have a very good coterie of very successful women who are all just sick and tired of being told what to do. We are sick of, ‘Lean in,’ ‘Lean out,’ ‘You can have it all,’ ‘You can’t have it all,’ ‘You don’t negotiate,’ ‘You need to negotiate more.’ And we don’t see that happening with the men. Also, I fundamentally believe women don’t take care of themselves. If people ask me how I got ahead, I say, ‘I always made sure I took care of me, first.’ But I don’t tell them to go off and do it. And there’s a difference.”
How to do better: “Firms need to be more aggressive. The business case has been made: We know that having a diverse team leads to better decision making; it gives you a broader perspective. Diversity in terms of socioeconomics, background, experience, gender, race—it’s those diverse teams that make the better decisions. We need to have more successful women at the top of front management so that people will come in at the bottom and see that there is a career path to the top.”
—Katrina Dudley is co-portfolio manager of the Franklin Mutual Series European mutual funds at Franklin Templeton Investments. She is cofounder of the Iron Skirts, an organization founded by five female industrial investors to help women in finance get ahead. franklintempleton.com; theironskirts.com
