Shattering the Glass Ceiling: Suggestions for Success
Ann Collins Chadwick
University of Wyoming
November 12, 2009
I am a native of Mississippi. I was born during the Great Depression of the
1930s, grew up on a small dairy farm, and attended a small public school.
Economically, my family was below the poverty line.
A good student, I enjoyed school, and thought vaguely about attending
college, but there was no support for my doing so, nor were there any
expectations that most students in my class would attain education beyond
high school.
In fact, the norm for young women was to marry, have children and center
their lives on family and home. So, that is what I did.
My husband was making the U.S. Navy his career. We moved 20 times in
20 years. The frequent relocations were difficult for our two daughters and
much of my time was devoted to providing stability in their lives.
I was not a likely candidate to shatter glass ceilings!
I began my college education 15 years after high school graduation and
chose what was then Home Economics (HE) and is now Family and
Consumer Sciences (FCS) as my major. I planned to teach. Teaching would
enable me to be home with my children when they were not in school.
The focus of the Family and Consumer Sciences (FCS) profession is to help
individuals, families and communities to achieve an optimum quality of life
---no matter what emphasis is chosen within the profession. So this
profession was a natural transition from my role as caretaker of family and
home. The FCS profession also provides a foundation for a large number of
careers, including but not limited to the areas of: nutrition and food science;
apparel and textile design and merchandizing; human development and
family relationships; consumer economics; and interior design. Practice
settings may be in educational institutions, businesses, non-profit
organizations that work to meet human needs, and government service.
2
I attended five different universities and colleges to earn my BS degree
because of military relocations (University of Connecticut, University of
Hawaii, Green River Community College near Seattle, Mississippi State
University, and Mississippi University for Women). It was a challenge to
ensure that all of my courses would transfer to every new university and
fulfill graduation requirements.
When I completed my BS degree, there were no teaching positions available
where we lived and I did not want to move my teenagers to still another
school. So, I earned a Master’s degree in Nutrition and Food Science.
Again, no teaching jobs were available in a college town brimming with
highly educated competitors.
My major professor urged me to interview for a new position at Bryan
Foods, a large meat processor just 20 miles away. They were looking for
their first home economist. I protested, but she told me to do it even if I did
not want the job because interviewing was good experience.
I think I was hired because I was recommended by professors the company
trusted, and because I may have been the only applicant who did not flinch
at the sight of the blood that is a part of meat processing.
The company knew only that they wanted a home economist that would help
them be more competitive and give them “the woman’s point of view.”
I was able to define the position because they did not really know exactly
what they wanted me to do. We settled on objective sensory evaluation as a
major key to improving their products, i.e., blind taste panels and some
market testing.
Until then, what they called sensory evaluation had really been a product
review where the marketing, sales, production and quality control personnel
would stand around a table tasting a new product slated for market, making
comments such as, “This is just too good,” and “This is a winner,” and “My
wife would buy this.” Then the company president would come in, they
would all become quiet and watch him, and he would taste it and say, “It’s
too salty.” They would all nod in agreement, “Oh yeah, it’s too salty.”
3
As the first woman in management in the company’s 40 year history, I was a
novelty, a curiosity. The men just couldn’t see what use I was going to be.
They did become interested in the taste panels. Many of our products were
meats often eaten for breakfast, so they thought it was hilarious to say, “I
like my eggs over easy.” I like biscuits with my sausage.” “When are we
having steak?”
I learned to be amiable and respond, “I thought you were bringing the eggs,”
or “You’ll wait a long time for steak.”
One day I was part of a discussion about a proposed new smoked sausage
product consisting of links very small in diameter. The marketing director
asked us all what we thought and remarked, “We aren’t going to spend any
money promoting it; we’re just going to put it out there and see what
happens.” I had already prepared the product in the test kitchen so I was
thinking, “The product is tough and dry when heated because the links are
too small in diameter for the coarsely ground meat, the links look like pale
little cigars, and the packaging does not compliment the product.” But I did
not have enough confidence in my own judgment to say so. The product
failed; we did not know why. But I decided right then that never again was I
going to just sit there when I had concerns.
The quality control staff began asking me to help them with problems they
identified that the production staff thought were insignificant. One morning
before a product review, a quality control man brought me a pound of bacon
that contained some slices with some very unappetizing-looking glands that
had slipped through the production line on its way to be packaged. I cooked
it along with other products and set it aside for later discussion.
The production manager came bustling in, reached for those two slices of
bacon and said,” May I?” Without even thinking, I slammed my hand down
on top of his to stop him and said, “No!” He looked aghast, but he did not
eat the bacon, so I had it to show everybody and proved my point.
4
Later that morning, I was participating in a meeting with the production
manager and others. The personnel director asked if anyone wanted to go to
a free seminar on assertiveness training. I raised my hand and said, “I do!”
The production manager raised his hand limply and said, “Oh, please don’t
go…The doctor said my hand will be all right in a couple of months.”
Obviously, he had not taken offense at my earlier action in the test kitchen,
which demonstrates the value of establishing a relationship of trust between
colleagues.
My supervisor, vice president for research and development, and I had a
very strong disagreement about one of the company’s flagship products one
day, which resulted in our literally stalking away from each other. I thought
I would receive my “pink slip” within the hour. A few minutes later, he
called me into his office and told me that he appreciated how conscientious I
was. He apologized and said that he had been wrong and that I should
continue to point out problems that needed to be resolved. We remained fast
friends.
Shortly after that, I received an award for Outstanding Management
Performance.
By 1980, I had participated in organizations that enabled me to learn what
our competitors were doing to meet consumers’ needs. I thought these
practices would benefit our company, so I wrote a proposal that would
essentially upgrade my position to Consumer Affairs Director and presented
it to the president. He was interested, but said, “That sounds good, Ann, but
I don’t want you to ever get out of the kitchen.” I replied, “George, I cannot
take the pulse of consumers with one hand and keep the other hand in the
kitchen sink here.”
By that time, my personal circumstances enabled me to move to take another
position. One of my mentors told me that the Hormel Company in
Minnesota was looking for their first Director of Consumer Affairs. The job
description was almost exactly the proposal I had written that had just been
rejected. I was one of 25 applicants for the position and I was hired.
5
My colleagues at Bryan Foods gave me a warm goodbye. The president told
me he wanted to remain friends. He said, “At the rate you’re going, you’ll
go all the way to USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture) some day and
you’ll be my boss.”
Hormel provided many more opportunities for professional growth and to
learn how large corporations achieved success. Hormel had been in business
for 90 years and was four times larger than Bryan Foods. As Director of
Consumer Affairs, I had an influential role in helping to establish the
company’s policies and was responsible for handling all contacts from
consumers---about 10,000 a year. I was expected to be visible and active in
organizations with which the company shared mutual interests.
This was a first for Hormel; again, I was a woman in a man’s world, the first
woman to hold a significant management position. Most men were
respectful, but with the exception of some visionary officers, they had low
expectations of what I could contribute and did not understand why anyone
was needed in this role.
A man in the accounting department had been handling all of the consumer
complaints and he trained me to respond according to the company’s
policies on such things. He had been with Hormel for 41 years and he saw
my employment as his being replaced by a woman who knew nothing about
the company or its products. He was more than a little annoyed and
instructed me in great detail as though he was unsure whether I could
understand.
I enjoyed my work with Hormel and learned when I resigned in 1982 that I
had been slated to become the company’s first woman vice president.
However, my personal life had taken a turn for the better and I moved to
Alexandria, Virginia near Washington, DC to remarry. My husband was
active in professional, governmental, and political circles and he became the
newest of my mentors.
6
As his guest at a reception, I talked with a woman I had met at a national
meeting during my years at Hormel. We exchanged business cards. A
month later, she called to ask if I was interested in working again. The
position she referred to was Consumer Advisor to the U.S. Secretary of
Agriculture. This was a political appointment. I had not been politically
active, so I had doubts about obtaining the position.
With little hope for obtaining the USDA position, I took advantage of every
consulting opportunity I was offered. The offers came from people whom I
had known and worked with during my years with the meat industry.
Ten months after I submitted my resume, the USDA Office of Personnel
called me for an interview. It had taken that long for the FBI to complete the
security clearance for me because of the more than 30 places I had lived in
my life. Further, this was a political appointment and I had not been active
in politics. They told me that I had impressive references and my credentials
were just what they were looking for, but if they could find someone who
had a political track record and the same background in academics and
business that I did, they would hire the other person.
Two months later, I was asked to accept the position. Officials in the Office
of Personnel said they had found that it was very difficult to find a
nutritionist who had been active in politics.
Challenges at USDA were numerous and varied. During my nine and a half
years as Consumer Advisor and Acting Assistant Secretary for Food and
Consumer Services, I served at the pleasure of four secretaries (Block, Lyng,
Yeutter and Madigan) and represented USDA on consumer issues including
food security, nutrition, food safety, biotechnology, rural health, and food
labeling. I also served on several White House task forces on issues related
to agriculture and consumers.
The position of Acting Assistant Secretary for USDA was the highest level
of responsibility I reached during my career in business, government and
professional association management.
7
An Assistant Secretary serves at the pleasure of the Secretary (the highest
ranking official of a federal agency) and is appointed by the President and
the Secretary and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. The Secretary reports
directly to the President and his or her staff. So the responsibilities and
decisions that must be made can be daunting.
An Acting Assistant Secretary is appointed when the Senate-confirmed
Assistant Secretary has vacated the role. The person appointed serves until
the next Assistant Secretary is confirmed by the Senate. The person in the
“Acting” position has the same responsibilities as if he or she had been
confirmed by the Senate.
My scientific perspectives were in agreement with the policies of USDA
during the Administrations in which I served. I was never asked to
compromise my principles; in fact, my colleagues and supervisors often
asked for my unbiased opinion. It is essential to be loyal to any organization
for which you work. It is especially sensitive when you are in a role that can
impact large numbers of people on health matters and economic issues.
While I served as Acting Assistant Secretary, I had responsibility for 60 per
cent of USDA’s budget because this area, Food and Consumer Services,
oversees the nation’s 13 major food assistance programs, including: the
Food Stamp; National School Lunch; Women’s, Infants, and Children’s
(WIC) Supplemental Food programs; and distribution of commodities. This
amounted to $34 billion at the time I served in this position.
This role was the culmination of years of hard work: trying to do better than
my best; being completely honest with my supervisors and colleagues even
when it put me at risk; cultivating relationships with everyone with whom I
interacted, even though we did not always agree; and earning their respect
and trust. The career public servants at USDA are highly committed to their
agency and the work they do and they enabled me to do far more than I
could have done without their support.
I learned to respect those who had not reached the same level of education I
had for what they did and knew. Every person I met filled a valuable role in
the respective organizations in which we worked, and met an essential need
for the ultimate success of that organization.
8
For example, it was USDA career staff working directly with clients “in the
field” who patiently explained to me that what I thought was a great idea
would not work in reality. This was a humbling and important lesson for
me.
The most visible role I had while I worked at USDA was overseeing the
research that led to the release of the Food Guide Pyramid in 1992. Through
a series of unforeseen incidents and misunderstandings, the Pyramid became
the center of public controversy, which resulted in the Department’s
conducting additional research costing over $700,000 before the Pyramid
was released. I was asked to fill this role for the very same reason that I had
almost not been hired.
But by this time, primarily because my credentials were more academic and
less political, I had gained the trust of both the political appointees at the
Department and the career professionals.
It was the most challenging role that I had experienced and it required very
thoughtful attention to assure every stakeholder that the process was fair and
based on sound research and unassailable data.
A month after resigning from USDA in 1993, which occurred when
President Clinton was inaugurated and is the protocol for political
appointees, I became the Public Policy Advisor for the American
Association of Family and Consumer Sciences (AAFCS). I soon became the
Director of Public Policy and Professional Development, and, in 1996, was
promoted to the position of Executive Director.
Like many umbrella associations, i.e., professional associations that have
members with different specialties such as the American Medical
Association and the American Bar Association, the subject matter and
practice areas of AAFCS that developed and grew stronger formed their own
specialty associations, e.g., the American Dietetic Association. Many
professionals feel they can afford only one association in terms of dues and
time, so many turn to the specialty associations for their professional
development, strengthening their identity in the specialty area, while failing
to maintain their association with AAFCS. However, I attribute much of my
success to my 37 years of AAFCS membership.
9
The result was declining membership and financial resources which
hindered AAFCS’s ability to maintain its effectiveness. This was and is a
significant challenge for AAFCS leaders and staff and it weighs heavily on
the executive director.
Another major challenge for family and consumer sciences professionals is
increasing public awareness that FCS professionals conduct research and
teach at many levels in many settings to help individuals and families lead
healthier, more productive lives.
This brief litany of work experiences demonstrates several approaches that
have helped me to reach objectives that were important to me. I don’t know
that I really shattered any glass ceilings, but my working life has been richly
rewarding because of things I learned and applied on my journey.
Some Specific Suggestions for Success
1. Study and work hard; there is no substitute for it. A college education
is a wonderful opportunity to enrich your life. Make the most of it.
2. A good scholastic record is the basis for standing above the crowd and
demonstrating that you are conscientious in what you do. It is often
what makes the difference in whether you obtain the job you seek.
3. Cultivate mentors; listen to them. They are gifts to you as a
professional.
4. Learn from leaders.
5. Treat others with respect, but never compromise your principles or
integrity.
6. Obtain all the data you can and analyze it before you make lifechanging decisions.
7. Dare to take calculated risks based on valid data.
8. Keep an open mind.
9. You are much more likely to be successful or even shatter glass
ceilings when you collaborate with others as much as possible and
rarely make unilateral decisions.
10. Do things you are afraid to do; I have never taken a new job that I
was absolutely sure I could do.
11. Glass ceilings are probably shattered much more often through
consistent, long-term efforts than with a single big splash.