Saadia Zahidi (2) Ongoing Barriers for Women

McDonald's in Pakistan deliberately set a policy to bring in educated women from lower income families.  The notion of their working is perhaps at best a foreign concept and at worst a target of resistance.  But because these young women have a safe workplace, get transportation between work and home, and (not to mention) earn an income, their families are evidently coming to accept their new normal.

Hooray to McDonald's for overcoming a barrier for women!

All of this underlines the conscious, often deeply personal and brave decision of millions of ordinary Muslim women and men to break family tradition and sometimes shun cultural pressures. As a result, a new segment of the labor market has emerged—and unprecedented consumer power.

Saadia Zahidi is... head of the Gender Parity Programme and head of Employment, Skills and Human Capital. In November 2014, the proposal for her book, Womenomics in the Muslim World, won the inaugural FT/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for business writers under age 35.

Reference: Women in the Muslim world taking the fast track to change.
 

Saadia Zahidi (1) Unfolding Story of Women

Saadia Zahidi is smart, articulate and visible, and as a Senior Director at the World Economic Forum, she paints a compelling picture for 40 million Muslim women having entered the workforce over the last decade:

An untold and still unfolding story exists in their lives, hidden in their classrooms, careers, and handbags. Changes that took half a century in the United States are being compressed into a decade in today’s Muslim world, and they are only likely to accelerate. It’s as if the United States had compressed into a few short years the half-century evolution from Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique to Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In. That is the magnitude of this sweeping change.

Saadia Zahidi is... head of the Gender Parity Programme and head of Employment, Skills and Human Capital. In November 2014, the proposal for her book, Womenomics in the Muslim World, won the inaugural FT/McKinsey Bracken Bower Prize for business writers under age 35.

Reference: Women in the Muslim world taking the fast track to change.
 

2015 Billionaire Newcomers Set New Record

The fact that Forbes had a record number of billionaire newcomers last year at 268, then this year shattered that with a new record of 290, is testament to rising wealth in the world and, I imagine, further skewing of wealth distribution.  Welcome to the Club indeed.

The Usual Suspects among Tech Titans

No one among these Tech Titans is a surprise, and they've occupied this rarefied air for years.  The companies they ran, including Steve Jobs via his wife Laurene, are storied companies in American business history. 

1826 Billionaires $7 Trillion Combined Net Worth

1826 billionaires boast a staggering average net worth of $3.9 billion and combined net worth of $7 trillion.  Discuss.  So to say that wealth distribution around the world is skewed (negatively) toward a minute fraction of the population is to speak an understatement. 

Catherine Courage (3) Sustaining Design Thinking

Needless to say, executive support is de rigueur for any initiative, new or existing, to be successful.  Top leaders in the company lend vision and guidance as well as emphasize execution and accountability.  There are other factors, of course, such as right capability and satisfactory resources, but the CEO and his or her direct team must put spirit and muscle behind sustaining initiatives. 
 

Catherine Courage (2) Embedding Design Thinking

Design thinking may start off as a one-off, maybe experimental effort.  But to Catherine Courage's point, for it to have optimal impact, companies must embed it in their processes and foundation and their culture and mindset.  That's easier said than done, of course.  But a CEO who has foresight, strategy and discipline can do so systematically and progressively over time.