I don't want a female successor!

Yes, this is really what Myriam was told by her male boss.

Her director is ultimately responsible for a European country, namely France, of an organization with offices worldwide. The head office is in the Netherlands. He will retire soon. For convenience, let's call him Peter.

In principle there are three possible successors, including Myriam and two other men. Both men also officially stand in for Peter. Peter also clearly prefers one of these two men and certainly not Myriam. Because, and he even says it, she is a woman. Yes it still really exists.

Does Myriam still have a chance to ultimately become his successor?

Honest answer:

Of course she always has a chance, but it's not going to be easy.

It's not her resume. She is an excellent candidate in terms of both education and experience. The only question is, do the decision makers know this too?

Well, that is something Myriam has to work on. Until now she has mainly focused on her work in France. After all, she is responsible for a large department (450 FTE) with many challenging issues and a boss who is not a fan of her. At the moment she is mainly frustrated about her boss's opposition. For example, he and her two male colleagues ensure that when executives from the head office visit France, she gets little opportunity to profile herself. And the directors at the head office ultimately make the decision about who will be the successor.

Myriam is of course frustrated by so much opposition and yet she continues to fight against it. Every time again. Does it work? NO.

I advise her to make herself more visible in the Netherlands. Go there more often to tell her what she does and what her results are. She knows the secretary of the general management very well and she now meets with him regularly. This man is an ally for her and she decides to make her ambition known, but also the struggles she encounters. She is already informally told that head office is not a fan of Peter because of his very conservative ideas.

Female leadership is a theme within this organization and I advise her to make use of it. For example, she decides to organize a conference on female and male leadership together with a number of other women and men working at the head office and in the various countries. In this way she ensures that everyone is welcome and feels heard. Moreover, she wants to prevent this conference from being seen as a 'women's thing'.

Of course, she doesn't organize all of this herself, but she makes sure that she is always mentioned as the initiator. She invites top management to play an important visible role. This makes her very visible to top management. And that is exactly the goal. Increase her visibility among top management, the decision makers.

We do not yet know whether she will ultimately be Peter's successor. I did tell her to think about what to do if she ultimately does not become the successor. At first she thought she could continue in her current role. But that usually doesn't end well. You are often seen as the one who is just not good enough for that ultimately responsible country role. She has now decided that she will apply for a role elsewhere in the world.