Recently, a new study found that the “quickest path to becoming CEO was a winding one.” A mix of career skills and experiences was found to be the fastest way to get to the top job at a company rather than holding a job in one functional area for a longer period of time. Based on an analysis of over 450 management consultants’ career paths as reported on LinkedIn, the evidence provided by this study showed that a multiplicity of skills may be more important than deep and singular expertise if you're interested in becoming CEO as quickly as possible.
There's reason to believe that women have an advantage in getting cross-functional jobs. First, there is data showing that women are more likely than men to job-hop, and second, research suggests that women tend to be better at certain things that matter a lot in the workplace such as communication, collaboration, and flexibility. These traits also happen to be very useful when it comes to learning the new skills needed to adapt to jobs and careers in new functional areas.
So how does a woman aspiring to quickly become CEO get a variety of functional work experience in different company departments? In my own career and the careers of successful women I've observed, there are four important tactics among those who have gotten jobs across different functional areas:
1. Understand which departments and roles play to your existing strengths.
You may be an accounting whiz but realize that analytical rigor also lends itself to formulating data-driven business strategies. Or perhaps you are great at communications and see that sales is a logical place to grow your career experience after a few years working in PR. There are some functional areas that share more in common with other than you think. Understanding the major skill set needed in each department is an important first step, and you can learn a lot by observing successful colleagues or simply asking questions of them.
2. Consider which departments may be the best for women.
Just as there are more women in certain C-suite roles, there are some where women report experiencing higher job satisfaction. For example, Fairygodboss has just ranked the best departments for women based on where women in our community report enjoying higher levels of job satisfaction across multiple companies and industries. The best departments for women as rated by women themselves include consulting, editorial, tax and engineering.
Best Departments for Women (based on Job Satisfaction)
The idea here is not to dissuade anyone from pursuing work in a department that isn't highly ranked but to help women transition into a new department with their eyes open. A career spans decades, and you may not want to spend years working in an environment where you're more likely have to fight a continuous uphill battle.
3. Get some actual experience in a new functional area before diving in fully.
The lowest friction way of doing this may be to volunteer for extracurricular activities either within your own company or even outside of work, for a non-profit, school or charity. You can also consider a side hustle where you try your hand at something new. It may be harder to get a new functional role as your primary job at a completely new company without a track record in that area. That said, don't discount the possibility of learning quite a lot about an adjacent department or functional area while you're in your current role. For example, I previously ran a large product team and by extension, got a lot of technology management experience through the process.
4. Network horizontally.
In some ways, this may be welcome relief. Since networking can often feel so transactional, networking across departments and job roles can feel more natural and sometimes be more interesting. You now have a good strategic reason to get to know that colleague in PR you've been watching from a distance or to meet with that woman running IT architecture. You may have very well wanted to get to know these people anyway, but now you have another reason to talk to someone other than your boss’ manager at the company holiday party.
While there are still relatively few female CEOs (7% of large companies were women), getting new experience in a functional department may help you overcome the odds.
