Madeleine Albright’s Leadership Institute for Women

Former Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright is paving the way for the future women leaders of the world and unlocking the door to the proverbial good old boys club. At Wellesley College, Ms. Albright’s alma mater, a new Institute for Global Affairs named after her will be offering students around the world access to non-partisan lectures, seminars and internships with topics ranging from political science and economics to religion. The goal is to address the issues at the core of international societies and empower women leaders with an opportunity to make a difference.

Albright believes that women see the human part of issues and pursue power in order to do something with it, not just to have power for the sake of having it. With only 600+ women holding cabinet positions worldwide, Albright is on a mission to groom the next generation of women leaders.

At a recent professional development conference, I participated in a workshop with law and MBA students who described their top competencies for leaders. These women are the leaders of tomorrow in the business and legal arena and here is what they believe is important for leadership success:

• Good leaders should foster the potential of others in an organization.
• Optimistic leaders are more effective.
• Effective leaders learn to be assertive and not aggressive.
• Strong leaders are comfortable in their own skin and lead by being authentic and true to themselves.
• Successful leaders understand human motivation.

These emerging legal and business professionals have some great insight about what makes a leader successful. I’ll be discussing leadership in greater detail in a forthcoming blog post and I will share the wisdom of leadership expert, Deborah C. Stephens, my mentor and colleague. Cheers to Madeleine Albright for her efforts in blazing the leadership trail for women and may her new institute at Wellesley be a valuable resource for the future generation of female leaders.