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Lemonada.

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This is the Inspiring Women Leadership Lab, and I'm your host, Lori McGraff. For 30 years, I've been a leader at the intersection of healthcare, technology, and innovation. For all of those years, I've wanted more women leaders at the table. Because when women lead, we build better business businesses and a more just and equitable society. Sure, things are changing, but they're not changing fast enough for me. Even today, did you know that less than 2% of all of the billions of dollars of investment funding that's out there goes to businesses with female CEOs? Did you know that only 10% of investment partners are women? So there are real headwinds. So what? Now what? This is our time. It is beyond time. And that's where the Inspiring Women Leadership Lab comes in. This is a master class for women CEOs, entrepreneurs, and business leaders. Every week, I'll be talking to a visionary guest to get practical advice, inspiration, and essential tips to help you launch and lead impactful winning businesses. Our guest today is Dr. Sheryl Pegas, one of the country's most influential healthcare leaders and clinical executives. Her focus has always been on delivering affordable, high quality care to millions of Americans.

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Dr. Pegas is a woman of many first. The first Chief Medical Officer at Walgreens, and then another first at Walmart. She's an investor, she's a board director, she She started as a practicing cardiologist, and she was the first female chair of the Board of Directors for the Association of Black Cardiologists. Do you know how smart and exceptional you need to be to get into medical school to be a cardiologist? Do you know how hard it must be to be the first at something? Can you imagine how amazing Sheryl must be to be any one of those things? She's all of those things. Meetings, and I cannot wait to talk to Sheryl to understand what she knows, how she got here, and how to bring all the other women leaders along with her. I cannot wait to talk to her. And so here we go. And of course, naturally, our conversation begins with basketball.

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Here on the side, keep your eye on number 22.

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Here's Clark.

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She fires. And it goes. She hit it.

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Wow. All things are possible when Kaitlyn Clarke has the Basketball. On April 15th, Caitlin Clark was drafted. She was the number one draft pick and NCAA all-time scorer. Economists project she added $80 million to the Iowa economy over her four years. The woman's final March Madness Game, true as many as 24 million viewers. It surpassed the men's final. Her entering salary in the WNBA NBA, $77,000. The entering salary in the NBA, $10.5 million. And so you have to ask yourself, why the difference? About 40% of All NBA league revenue goes to player salaries. For the WNBA, only 10%. So now the players themselves are now pushing to change their compensation agreement. The next chance they'll have to do that is 2025, and they've got to get ready for that. You've know the market. You have to do your research. You've got to understand the business model. Then you have to negotiate your contracts using experts. This is not a go-it-alone exercise. When we do it together, we can bring around significant change.

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Okay, this is an unbelievable story, right? But that's the story of first. They break through. And that story hasn't even begun. Kaitlyn Clarke first WMBA game, that was to a sold-out audience. Packed. This is so exciting. It is just getting started. And so that's what we're doing here. We are breaking through and breaking glass and accelerating the crap out of getting more women into leadership. This is our time. The trends are here. The women are here. We don't need one more single study to tell us that when women lead, companies companies are successful. And so we just need to get going and get on with it. And here we go. Sheryl, let's start with some grounding in some of the historic obstacles for women in the healthcare space. What's the data that can help us understand what's going on? And how can we speed up the pace of change?

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I really like the way you're framing this is know the history and know the data to cause change. Because that's really how it happens. This is a 4.3 trillion industry in healthcare. Women account for 80% of all the purchasing decisions as a patient, as a consumer in the healthcare industry. The healthcare's workforce is overwhelmingly female. You would think that would lead to a natural progression as you move up the line. Women earn nearly half of all the medical degrees that are handed out each year. And according to the World Health Organization, women comprise nearly 70% of the healthcare workforce globally. Now, let's talk about leadership. In healthcare because change is actually happening. Again, according to the World Health Organization, women account for 25% of the leadership positions in healthcare globally. But women represent just 10% of C-suite positions across Fortune 500.

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That's what I'm talking about. There's this gap, but we're also making progress.

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There are things that we should be very proud of. In the US, CV OBS, Elements Health, and Santeene, some of the nation's largest healthcare organizations, are helmed by women. That's a huge change that we have to recognize, and that's happening today in 2024. But there's also more that we know, mounting research in favor of women's leadership, not just in health care. Organizations with the highest percentage of women's leaders, management, and board deliver better results for shareholders.

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I just think that is one of the confounding things that don't make sense. When we have diverse leadership teams, and gender diversity is the easier one to get to, those are companies that outperform financially than peers, but yet the progress is still slow. How do you square that circle, Sheryl?

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Yeah. No, it's a really important one. It's understanding who has written the existing rules, who's in the room when those decisions are being made. If you look at investing in health care, one of the things you will hear many founders who are female tell you, I I presented a company today and it was about IT or it was about AI, and the entire room of who I was presenting to were all men. If your private equity investors don't mirror You, as you are raising a company, you are less likely to be funded. How do we innovate and how do we lead and how do we get more women leaders on the business side of health care? What's absolutely required is that those investing must include people of that gender.

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The Inspiring Women Leadership Lab will be right back. This show is sponsored by Betterhelp. So, listeners, what are your self-care non-negotiables? Maybe you never skip leg day at the gym or a therapy day. When your schedule is packed with kids' activities, big work projects, and more, it's easy to let your priority slip. When you feel like you have no time for yourself, non-negotiables like therapy are more important than ever. We know that therapy works. Making time for therapy is one of those things that just makes a lot of sense. It's always worth it, and I highly recommend using that time each week to step back and take a breath. Betterhelp is an online platform that makes therapy accessible and convenient. You can do it from the comfort of your own home on a schedule that works for you. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist, and you can switch therapists anytime at no additional charge if you need to. Never skip Therapy Day with Betterhelp. Visit betterhelp. Com/inspiringwomen today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp, h-e-l-p. Com/inspiringwomen. Today's podcast is sponsored by Midi Health. There's so much that we don't talk about as women, especially when it comes to topics like perimenopause and menopause.

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Oftentimes, it comes and we don't even realize that the symptoms we're facing are actually tied to our hormonal changes. I've experienced so much I wasn't expecting to as I aged, and we really don't prepare the women in our society for any of it. If you are a woman over 40 and you're dealing with hot flashes, insomnia, brain fog, moodiness, vaginal dryness, or weight gain, you don't have to accept it as a given. That's why I want everyone to know about Midi Health. They are clinicians dedicated to providing safe, effective, FDA-approved solutions to support the natural hormonal changes of menopause. What's even better, Mitty is covered by insurance. With specialized insurance-covered care, Mitty puts relief within reach for more women than ever before. Schedule a virtual visit to discuss your symptoms and health background in-depth today. You'll come out of the experience feeling heard and with a plan to start feeling better. You deserve to feel great. Book your virtual visit today at joinmidi. Com. That's joinmidi. Com. Despite the history which has been slow moving, change is happening, and that needs to be done, and we need more of it. We still need women to succeed, and we still need women to innovate, be the business leaders that they're capable of being, and we need more of them.

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And we know it can be done. And I want to focus on how to accelerate it with the people who are capable here and now in doing it. Sheryl, just as somebody who is an incredible, successful leader, you've done it. So give us a little bit of just your own personal story of how you got to the place that you are, and you're barely getting started yourself.

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I get up every day and I'm like, All right, what's next? I don't focus on what hasn't happened. I focus on, Where do we go? My My ability, I think, to do this work comes from the fact that I have a very strong support network. That network makes me feel incredibly stable, stable enough to make me want to do things that are new or that are on the leading edge. But that grounding group that says, All right, there's no drama here. Go out there and take it on. But I'm also okay starting at the in different areas. You heard me say, I trained as a physician. I trained as a physician because that's all I knew in health care. I'd never heard of a pharmaceutical clinical researcher or frankly, what someone did at an insurance company. And as I've learned, what I've hopefully done has been open to understanding all of the different pieces of health care. And it's taken me from clinical to trials, to insurance, to starting companies, to working in retail health, to investing in some of the gaps that I've seen. I would also say that I'm really focused on how I show up.

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As a person and as a leader. I'll share five just key basics. One is just to seem positive intent.

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Positive intent. So I agree.

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This is hard work that we need to do. And every time someone asks you a question or someone frankly challenges what you've laid out, it's a time to listen and learn. And if you're a leader and you assume positive intent, you will develop a team who is willing who will take risks, but who will also work with each other.

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Yeah, I so agree with that, Sheryl. Once upon a time, I was leading a development team, and I remember we were trying to hit this deadline. It was critically important for us. I had these two developers who were absolutely adamant that we had to redo a whole section of the code, which we had literally no time for. So we were in a debate about this, maybe heated debate, and they were absolutely dug in. And I was the leader. I could have absolutely not listened or pushed back because I was setting the deadlines. And I just took a beat and backed up and really was trying to hear where they coming from, decided to go their way to the surprise of everyone. Of course, they doubled down. They worked so hard. We absolutely did hit that deadline. And it was only because I was able to see through the emotion of the moment and realized that the place they were coming from was absolutely one that was critical for the team. So great point.

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My second is to deliver bad news early and personally. And I We really think if we want to help people develop to be leaders, we've got to tell them what's working, what's not working, and give them the support tools to do that, whether that be coaching, whether it's joining a team. But if we do not give people feedback, how do we expect them to improve? Lebron James is at the top of his game, and he still got a coach. It's just that simple.

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Are we back to basketball now? Can you tell him a little bit of a basketball fan?

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My third is is respectfully probe and then listen to the response, particularly if you're the leader. People are nervous enough to come in and say, I disagree with you, or, Here's what I'm thinking. Listen. Listen to their responses. There's some humility in being a leader and being willing to learn. My last two are very business-oriented. If you didn't measure it, you didn't do it. When people talk about, I did this, I go, Show me the results. Show me how you got there. Really important for us to begin to teach each other how important that is, particularly if we're going to go start companies and go raise money. And the last is appreciate effort, but reward results. That's how you run a business.

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I really like these five different points. One of them that particularly resonates with me is the respectfully probing, trying to get at the the answer behind the whatever you're talking about. And that takes tact. That takes sometimes listening intently, like you're pointing out, Sheryl. The number of times that I've had a conversation, it might be with a customer, It might be with somebody that I'm selling to. And you want to give the answer. It might be the company answer. But if you ask those probing questions and really get at what's behind what someone's trying to tell you, that's where the magic happens. That's where the real insight happens. And I agree with you, those are the things that really help build strong businesses. I want to talk about the piece of it, though, Sheryl, that is for the women who are moving into leadership level and getting to the next levels. Yes, of course, there are obstacles. Yes, of course, the playing field is not equal. So set your own table. Yes, all these things may be true. However, succeed anyway?

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Yeah. I think the first is to acknowledge that you're doing something difficult. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it. This is difficult. Starting a company, raising money, leading it, it's difficult. I'd also say that we're not always taught the mindset of innovation. We're taught safety, efficacy, make sure we do no harm. But when you innovate, you take risk, you get bold. To do that and succeed, you need other people to sit at the table that you're building. This is not a go it alone track, even if you're building the table. You've got to build the relationships to enable that to happen, because there's still not a lot of money going towards women. It is okay to ask for help. It is okay to not have all of the answers. That is how you become a better leader.

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What are some of the other fundamentals that you look for, whether it's as an investor, as a company builder? What do you see that is absolutely critical for a successful, sustainable company?

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So it's the recognition that this is going to take a lot of work. And so we are not building consumer We're building businesses that can really impact someone's life, can impact their medical conditions. When I look at a business presentation, I look for who are the clinical experts who are supporting you? Did you go and bring them in as an equal? Or I'm really, really psyched when someone says to me, I'm building this business, and by the way, I went and saw how this would be implemented and executed. I either in an office, in a health system, or at home. Here is what I saw and where the gaps are. And acknowledge, here is where we will be adding in people for this team. That really makes me feel, okay, this person wants to succeed, and they know all that's necessary for the workflow. So when they're asking to raise money, they know what's needed to implement and execute. When they look at what's measured for success, they know exactly what that would look like. That pre-work, a founder who's done that pre-work, really matters to me.

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I'm sure it was memorable. I remember every morning during the summer going to swim team at the local swimming pool. Fun outside, super fun memories. Now, as a mom, I want to share with my kids everything I loved about summertime and nature growing up, the parks, beaches, and camping trips. But with all these heatwaves, wildfires, and storms, un-natural extreme weather events caused by fossil fuel pollution, the places we love are being threatened. The Science Moms are a non-partisan group of scientists who are, like many of you, moms. Whether it's understanding the real cause of extreme weather or simply talking about it with your friends and family, the Science Moms want you to know that a better future for our kids is possible. Human-made problems require human-made solutions, and no one is more equipped and motivated to lead the charge than our nation's millions of moms. Science shows us pollution is causing unnatural disasters that are making our world more dangerous. That's why I'm excited about the millions of moms who are taking action to protect all that we love. Join us at sciencemoms. Com. Let's talk about some of the blockers. So when there are obstacles to innovation, how do you think about Sheryl just like, breaking through?

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And again, we don't really have that much time. How can we shorten those life cycles and speed up the pace of innovation?

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We've talked a bit about women CEOs and women founders and just getting funding and the challenges that can occur in getting funding when people don't really understand the business model as well. So there are some easier ways to do that. And one is going in as cofounders. We should take every opportunity we have to be a CEO or to be a founder. We know that companies that are co-founded, where there is a man and a woman co founder, they get funded more frequently than women founders alone.

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27%.

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You may see that as an obstacle. I see that as, have we made sure that every man going in has a woman by his side? See that? I just doubled the number of women being funded. The second thing I've shared with others who are looking for investments to do, if your private equity or early-stage investing company does not have a woman principle, a woman leader, or something else, it's a little bit more challenging. Why aren't you going to the companies that do have them? If they start winning, others will follow. It's an opportunity to show that that's how you win. Then there is this, we need help, but one willing to ask for the help. I I think that's a huge obstacle. I can't tell you how many people reach out to me on LinkedIn to connect and will simply ask the question, How did you get on a board? How did you raise money? Guess the ratio of the people asking me that question, 80% men, 20% women continues to surprise me.

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Oh, wow. That surprises me.

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We win when we raise our hands and say, Here's what I know. Here's where I need help. Then I think as women, we all we're looked on not just as people who care about health care and care about how people do, but we're looked upon as people who support each other and support the next generation. For every one of us who I know we're all working and we've got the home job when we get home, God forbid, time to care for ourselves, when someone is asking us for help, we have got to spend some time doing it. I tell people, you actually have to mentor. There are private equity groups that I've worked with. Welsh Causton is one that I would mention, Morgan Health. Today, you must mentor. We have to do that give back. We've got to do it for each other. That's how we win.

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Well, Sheryl, as you know, I could not agree more with that. For every woman who has made it or is at the top of leadership, make that extra time even when you don't have it because it is necessary. And I would also say that I am seeing more and more in an extraordinarily positive move. Top male leaders everywhere. If they're not mentoring some exceptional woman, then they don't feel like they have a rounded-out experience as a leader either. And the more that we can see that, the better. So let's just close out here, Sheryl. It's been such a rich conversation setting the landscape stage for us, which has been excellent. But if we look at to be a successful CEO, to be a successful leader, there are many things that are needed. But what are those perhaps extra things? Just if we just turn that lens towards the women, specifically, so that we can, again, accelerate the move of more women into leadership.

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Totally agree with you. The first thing that I want everyone to know is that leadership is learned. I think people think you're a natural leader. No, you learn it. You've got to learn leadership skills on top of your technical skills. Being great technically, that's awesome, but you've got to learn leadership skills. This is a continual learning journey. If you have been in healthcare and you really understood FIFA Service, guess what? You had to learn managed care. Guess what? Now you've got to learn value-based care. If you've understood the components of how we look at clinical studies, now you've got to understand real-world evidence. You should be continually learning. The second is you have to use the whole team's expertise. Yes, you will have to make a final decision as the CEO, but you need to use your entire team's expertise. How do you get that balance? You learn it. Leadership is learned. I've had a career coach. I have had many 360s through my life. They're all important because every stage of my career, I'm a little bit different. I need to remember to go back and go, Okay, how was I when I was in that position?

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How am I now that I'm in that position? And be my authentic self. To want to succeed means that you want a team because this work that we're doing, that we're innovating at, it's going to take a team. It is hard work. It's incredibly fulfilling work. I know I am excited more now than back when I said, Some of this didn't exist. Just think of this in 2024, what's possible and what we can do today because we have women leaders, we have funds that have women who are investing. This is the best time to be in health care as a woman leader.

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Sheryl, I just can't thank you enough for all of the wisdom that you shared and opening up this education series with such a strong set of information data and coming from your own experience. So thank you so, so much. I So appreciate it.

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Thank you, Lori.

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Ken, I got to tell you, I am just so excited to be having this time with you to talk about what it means to build a really great company, what it means to be a successful CEO, a founder, an entrepreneur, an innovator. And when I was thinking about putting this whole thing together, honestly, you were the first person that came to mind. You have been a mentor, you've been a friend, you've been the first person that I call when I've got good news or bad news, I've leaned on you for many years for advice. As somebody who's had a long career in healthcare and technology and innovation and done a lot of things, I really recognize some defining moments in my own career that were really important. And one of the very earliest ones was a time when I was working extraordinarily hard at something. And and wasn't really noticed. And then along comes this guy, Ken Kaufman, who was running a big operation, who plucked me out of obscurity, walked me down to the HR room, and literally sat me down in front of the HR director and said, Maddie, this is Laurie McGraw.

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She is going to now run this development team. We need to promote her, and she's now working for me. Do you remember that, Ken?

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I remember a little bit differently. I came to a new company and they were developing a clinical product, and it was a failure. I remember walking into a room of about 20 people, and there was probably 19 men. Then there was this one woman who was keeping everything on track. After two or three meetings where nothing was getting done and I was just observing, I said, Okay, I got to change things. I said, Who's the person who's taking all the notes and who's really smart? They said, That's Laurie. The next day, I came to Laurie's office, and I think she thought she was going to be fired at first, but I grabbed her down to HR, and she became the manager of our project and actually became a very, very successful company.

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Well, those were opportunities. I took them. I think those are the things we're going to talk about. We're going to get a lot of great lessons from a lot of luminaries here. I think for you and I to just think back to how these resonate and can be so impactful for building many more women leaders out there. So, Ken, I really want to talk about this interview with Dr. Sheryl Pegas. The key basics that she provided in terms of leadership, I thought were exceptional. Positive intent, delivering bad news and delivering it personally. The idea of just always respectfully probing with humility and always being willing to learn, which is so critical as a And I love that if you didn't measure it, you didn't do it. And then, of course, always appreciate the effort but reward results. These were gems, Kim. What did you think?

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First, I thought we were talking to Dr. Jerry Buss, who owns the Lakers, because there's so much basketball. But I love what she had to say.

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That's funny, but I don't even know who he is. So I'm sorry. I just cannot keep up with the basketball, I have to say. I was trying to think, and you could see if you heard me, And I had no idea who all these people were.

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Well, if you don't know who Kaitlyn Clarke is, you're probably not going to know who Dr..

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I know who Kaitlyn Clarke is.

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You know what I find most funny? She brought up Kaitlyn, and there's so much news now about Kaitlyn Clarke and what she's done for women's basketball is just amazing. However, it's really hard to be a leader, and it's even hard for a woman basketball player. I mean, when Michael Jordan came to the league, or Steph Curry, or Luca, who's currently a star, came to the league, they were just great basketball players. Now, Kaitlyn Clarke is carrying this burden of everything. And it just shows you how hard it is to be a leader, a changer, and how hard it is to be a woman, and even in a field like the WMBA.

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Yeah, look, Ken, but this is the point, because guess what? It's hard. It's hard enough to be a CEO, a leader, build a great business. Now, try doing that. If you're a woman, try doing that if you're one of only a few people who have done it super successfully. That's exactly why we're doing this, Ken.

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And it's amazing to see how topical this is because it's unfolding right before our eyes with Kaitlyn Clarke.

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Yep, for sure. Okay, but that's enough on the basketball stuff. What do you think about some of these five key lessons? Which ones really struck it for you?

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From experience, if you didn't measure it, it didn't happen, is so relevant to me, and especially in today's corporate world, because sometimes people take others' ideas, sometimes people take credit for others. Often a woman will go ahead and do something, and people will just assume it happened via luck or not get the attribution that's deserved. I think you have to measure and you have to take credit for the work that you've done. It's a really important component that I think is often overlooked.

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Ken, And remember when we were building software together and we had the teams working on it, we would talk about whether it was quality or how fast and responsive the programs are. And I just remember a million times hearing, oh, Oh, yeah. It's in there. Absolutely. This is really important. But it wasn't until we tied people's compensation to responsiveness or quality that things started to actually change.

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It's amazing how when you go ahead and put a target out there and you put money to that target, how things just tend to happen.

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Yep. And that goes to Sheryl's fifth point, which is the one I really like as well, which is, appreciate effort, but reward results. I mean, there are many people who work very hard at things, and we should appreciate all of that effort. But when you put your reward system on the actual results that are achieved, that is what moves companies forward. That is what really leads to the growth and success of things.

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Yeah, I'm going to bring up a personal story about results. Unfortunately, recently, I'm in good shape, and I had a congenital heart issue, and I had to have open heart surgery. And so us being in health care, we went around. And the two best places in the world, our Cleveland Clinic, where I have a personal friend there, and Cedar Sinai. And I interviewed at Cedar Sinai, a doctor, Joanne Chickway, and she's a woman of color, and she runs the whole entire program. And to go ahead and be a woman of color and run Cedar's Cardiac Robotic Heart Surgery program, once I just met her, I just made the decision because for her to be where she was, the results had to be amazing. It was a great story because she did a great job, but results is really where it's at.

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Well, it's a great story because you are in great health, and that's the most wonderful thing. And really, I'm so happy about that. I know, obviously, you are, Kim, but you're also underscoring such an important point. And in terms of what it must take to be a top female, black woman in that position, you know what it took. Actually, when I talked to Sheryl, she doesn't come out as like, this is who I am. But you know for her to be at the top of her game all that she's accomplished as a cardiologist, as a female, as a woman of color. She has to be more than exceptional. So I think we'll just close out on that, Ken. I thought it was a great first opening episode of what it takes to be a strong, successful business leader. And I really appreciate having had Sheryl on the program.

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Yeah, very powerful and a great first try.

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Thanks for listening to the Inspiring Women Leadership Lab. The Inspiring Women Leadership Lab is a production of Lemonada Partners Studio. I'm your host, Laurie McGraw.

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And I'm contributor, Ken Kaufman.

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This series is produced by Katherine Girardeau and Alex McCohen. Our research assistant is Messia Delgato. Jackie Danziger is our vice President of Narrative Content. Mixing and Sound Design by Noah Smith. Executive producers are Stephanie Wittels-Wax, Jessica Cordova-Kramer, and me, Lori McGraw. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. You can follow me on Instagram at inspiring inspiringwomen-pod, and Lemonada at Lemonada Media across all social platforms. Follow the Inspiring Women Leadership Lab wherever you get your podcast and listen ad-free on Amazon Music with your prime membership. To learn more about what we talked about today, including additional resources, tips, and guidelines to build your successful company, visit inspiringwomen. Show/leadershiplab. That's inspiringwomen. Show/leadership-lab. Thanks so much for listening, and see you next week.