Fortune Magazine – To My Daughter - Top Leaders Share Inspirational Advice

Fortune Magazine – To My Daughter - Top Leaders Share Inspirational Advice

As part of its Leaders & Daughters initiative Egon Zehnder recently launched its “To my daughter” campaign encouraging top leaders to share their wisdom with the next generation of professional women. The response was overwhelming, reports Fortune magazine. Angela Ahrendts, senior vice president for retail at Apple and former Burberry CEO, urges her two daughters to be present. "Being present is the greatest gift you can give another person, and the greatest way to more closely connect with them […]. This is a gift that often comes more naturally to women," writes Ahrendts. Mellody Hobson, president of Ariel Investments, urges her 3 year-old daughter to be honest, frank, and fearless: “While you may not be able to stop your fears, you can overcome them.” The campaign is not limited to female leaders. Eric Sprunk, chief operating officer of Nike, tells his daughter to pursue a full life, professionally and personally: “I want you to know you can be an incredible business leader, mother, sister, daughter, aunt, godparent, friend and wife all at the same time. In fact, the better you are at those things outside the workplace the better you will be in the workplace, and I want you to work for people and companies that recognize and enable that balance.”

Full story: Claire Zillman, Read the Sweet Letters These Apple, Nike, and Hyatt Execs Wrote to Their Daughters in Fortune magazine (7 March 2017).

To My Daughter

Read the full collection of letters from leaders and parents to their daughters submitted as part of Egon Zehnder’s Global Leaders & Daughters Series