Lynn Elsenhans: Women must take risks
Being the first female CEO in a predominately male-dominated industry is no easy task, but Sunoco CEO Lynn Elsenhans told an audience Wednesday morning that in the business world, gender stereotypes aren’t nearly as limiting as the folly of self-doubt.
Well over 100 students and professionals filled the eighth floor of the business school Wednesday for free breakfast and insight from Elsenhans’ 31 years in the petroleum industry.
After receiving her MBA from Harvard University in 1980, Elsenhans took on a job as one of the only female process engineers at a Shell Oil Co. refinery in Houston. She eventually became process manager and chairman for Shell, a position she held for 28 years before taking on the position of Sunoco Inc. CEO in 2008. A year later, she was named No. 10 on Forbes’ Top 100 Most Powerful Women list after securing the purchase of a 100-million-gallon-per-year facility in New York to supply 25 percent of Sunoco’s ethanol production.
Her lecture, part of the Wells Fargo Series, outlined the major internal, external and organizational obstacles that she said prevent personal and organizational success. The most severe and common, she said, is avoidance of risk out of fear of failure.
“I see this especially in women. They won’t volunteer for an assignment unless they’re 100 percent certain they will succeed, but my most impactful endeavors were the ones that put me outside of my comfort zone,” Elsenhans said. “Fear leads to being frozen in action, and it is far better to seek forgiveness after than to wait for permission.”
One of her most rewarding assignments was her transcontinental work with the Shell Co. in Singapore, where her superiors were originally hesitant to send a female American executive to deal with their Asian and Middle Eastern counterparts.
“Stereotyping is not confined to women,” Elsenhans said. “The best response is to exceed expectations.”
Despite her many achievements, Elsenhans emphasized balancing decisions with family life. One of the main reasons for her switch to Sunoco was the position’s stability and closer proximity to her recently widowed mother.
“I find that the people who deal the best are people who recognize that they need to rearrange their priorities around their family,” Elsenhans said.