A Call to Leadership - Transforming Your STEM Career Through Leadership and Innovation - page 7

exercise their leadership capabilities, not just for their own benefit, but to ensure
the ongoing growth and development of commerce and industry. In an excellent
treatise in her topic, The Difference 'Difference' Makes , Deborah Rhode says:
As management experts have increasingly recognized, the business case for diversity
is clear. A wide array of research indicates that the representation of women in
leadership positions has a positive correlation with economic performance, measured
in tangible terms such as organizational growth, increased market share, and return on
investment [11] .
Everyone recognizes the importance of integrating people from different
social, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds to enable business to function with a
broader and more effective focus. This is no doubt essential; but what about gen-
der diversity? Are we not overlooking the “complete” integration acceptance of
50% of the population? If the integration of minority segments of the population
can re-energize business management, what about the integration of the talented
female population, among whose ranks are highly capable future leaders?
The integration of women into leadership positions is not a new concept;
it is as old as the Bible. In her book, Jesus CEO [12] , Laurie Beth Jones says,
“Jesus said to both women and men 'The kingdom is within you.' He delegated
equal power and authority to anyone who asked. He said that in heaven there is
neither male nor female, and he came to see that things were done 'on earth, as
it is in heaven.' ” Fast forward two thousand years and “diversity” has become
a buzzword in business circles, people have come to accept it as a fact of life
and are willing to assimilate it into their lives - both corporate and at home. By
doing this studies have consistently shown that they bring in more varied talent
and thus increase opportunities for organizational success.
The story of Linda Alvarado is a story of one woman determined to succeed,
having made an unconventional choice early in her career. She was a woman
trying to establish herself in the American construction industry - tradition-
ally a male domain with women numbering less than 1% of the workforce. In
addition, she came from a minority community, hailing from a traditional His-
panic background, with great ambition but few examples of female leadership
in male-dominated professions.
Her initial days in the construction industry were marked by considerable
hostility from her male colleagues. She experienced this in the form of graffiti
on the walls and pictures of her in “various stages of undress.” Undeterred by
these conditions, Linda knew that she liked buildings and construction sites.
Construction was to her a sense of the creative process that ended up with this
structure of great permanence and beauty [13] . Linda worked her way to proj-
ect engineering, after initial roles in accounting and project management sup-
port. She gradually worked on building her skills by taking classes in survey,
estimation, and construction supervision.
Determined to show that women could succeed in the field, Linda started
her own construction management company. While seeking for funding for this