10 Women CEOs to Follow in Global Market

The top 10 Women CEOs have demonstrated their aptitude for altering workplace cultures, encouraging sustainability, conducting turnarounds, and boosting earnings – all while forging new ground and shattering stereotypes.

Sadly, only 6% of Women CEOs are in the S&P 500 (SNPINDEX: GSPC) enterprises. There are 41 Women CEO among Fortune 500 corporations or 8% of all top executive positions.

Despite being few, Women CEOs have a significant impact. Below is a look at ten female leaders demonstrating that gender is not a barrier to success.

10 Women CEOs to Follow

1. Rosalind Brewer, Walgreens CEO

Rosalind Brewer’s appointment as CEO of Walgreens was announced in January 2021, and the company’s stock price increased by 8% in after-hours trading. Brewer formerly worked at Starbucks as COO, group president, and board member (NASDAQ: SBUX).

Brewer became the only Black woman CEO of an S&P 500 and Fortune 500 business when she took over Walgreens in March 2021. Only two other Black women have held the position of CEO of an S&P 500 company before Brewer: Mary Winston, a previous interim CEO of Bed Bath & Beyond (NASDAQ: BBBY), and Ursula Burns, a former CEO of Xerox (NASDAQ: XRX).

Brewer has already broken down demographic barriers before. She previously served as president and CEO of Sam’s Club before joining Starbucks. She was the first Black woman and woman of color to lead a division of Walmart as a result (NYSE: WMT).

Brewer has held positions on the boards of directors at Molson Coors, Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Lockheed Martin (NYSE: TAP). She also serves as the chairman of Spelman College’s board of trustees.

Brewer is listed as the sixth most influential woman in business by Fortune in 2021.

2. Mary Barra, the Women CEO and Chairwoman of General Motors

Since 2016, Mary Barra has served as the board chair and CEO of General Motors 2014.

In 1980, when Barra was still a college student, she started working at G.M. She ascended G.M.’s corporate ladder during the ensuing decades, earning an MBA from Stanford along the way.

Barra is leading G.M.’s move to autonomous and electric vehicles. The Chevrolet Bolt, the first all-electric car under $40,000, was introduced by G.M. in 2016. She supervised the purchase of Cruise, a self-driving, all-electric shared vehicle service, in the same year. The next year, G.M. bought Strobe, a business that creates the laser sensors used in driverless cars.

Barra declared G.M.’s intentions to phase out internal combustion engines and produce exclusively electric vehicles by 2035 in 2021. She also stated that by 2040, G.M. would have zero carbon emissions at all of its plants worldwide.

Barra is a board member at Duke University, Disney (NYSE: DIS), and the Detroit Economic Club. Barra was named sixth on Fortune’s list of the most influential women in business in 2021.

3. Gail Koziara Boudreaux, CEO of Anthem

Anthem Health’s president and CEO are Gail Koziara Boudreaux. After establishing herself as a recognized leader in the healthcare industry, Boudreaux was promoted to the position of CEO of Anthem in 2017. Since 2008, she has served in executive leadership positions at GKB Global Health (NYSE: GSK), UnitedHealthcare, and UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH).

Under Boudreaux’s leadership, Anthem successfully acquired the Medicare Advantage companies America’s 1st Choice and HealthSun, as well as the palliative care company Aspire Health. More crucially, the stock price of Anthem has increased by a factor of two thus far under Boudreaux’s leadership.

Boudreaux is a member of the board of directors for Target (NYSE: TGT). Fortune listed Boudreaux as the seventh-most powerful woman in business in 2021.

4. Thasunda Brown Duckett, TIAA’s CEO and president

Duckett joins Brewer of Walgreens and Winston of Bed Bath & Beyond as the third Black woman to hold the position of full-time CEO of a Fortune 500 firm.

Before being named CEO of TIAA in 2021, Duckett was already known as a highly accomplished Black leader in the financial services industry. She has previously held the CEO positions of Chase Consumer Banking and Chase Auto Finance.

Throughout her career, Duckett has spearheaded initiatives to increase financial and professional possibilities for Blacks and women. She has served in important leadership capacities for the Advancing Black Pathways Program, The Fellowship Initiative, and the Women on the Move programs at JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM).

In addition, she established the Otis and Rosie Brown Foundation in honor of her parents. The foundation honors individuals and groups that develop straightforward strategies to improve families and communities.

Duckett serves on numerous boards, including those for Nike (NYSE: NKE), Brex, Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights, Sesame Workshop, the National Medal of Honor Museum, the Economic Club of New York, the University of Houston Board of Visitors, and Baylor University’s Hankamer School of Business Dean’s Advisory Board.

According to Fortune, Duckett was the tenth most influential businesswoman in 2021.

5. Safra Catz, Oracle’s CEO

Oracle, a leading software provider, is led by Safra Catz, a former CFO. She took over as CEO for the first time in 2014, sharing the position with co-CEO Mark Hurd. Notably, Oracle gave Hurd and Catz the same compensation. After Hurd passed away in 2019, Catz was the only CEO of Oracle.

Oracle has expanded under Catz’s direction by making many acquisitions. When Catz was the president of Oracle in 2005, she assisted in closing more than 130 transactions, including the $10.3 billion acquisition of PeopleSoft.

Oracle’s transition from aging hardware industries to faster-growing cloud computing and infrastructure products has been driven more recently by Catz.

In 2015 and 2016, Catz has recognized as the highest-paid Women CEO thanks to yearly remuneration packages exceeding $40 million. Fortune listed Catz as the 15th most influential woman in business in 2021.

6. Phebe Novakovic, Chairman and CEO of General Dynamics

Since 2013, Novakovic has served as the chairman and CEO of the military defense industry giant General Dynamics. After holding several senior positions at the organization, she took on the post. She was president, chief operating officer, executive vice president for marine systems, senior vice president for planning and development, and vice president for strategic planning at General Dynamics between 2001 and 2013.

Before joining General Dynamics, Novakovic worked for the Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Management and Budget, and the Secretary of Defense in the public sector.

Under Novakovic’s direction, General Dynamics’ stock price has more than doubled. That growth was reinforced when Novakovic guided the business in the strategic purchase of I.T. firm CSRA for $9.8 billion in 2018.

According to Equilar’s report from 2021, Novakovic earned $18 million in salary, ranking her as the 34th-highest paid CEO among the top U.S. corporations in terms of sales. On Fortune’s list of the 20 most powerful women in business, she is ranked 20th.

7. Sonia Syngal, Gap’s CEO

The share price of apparel retailer Gap increased in after-hours trading when the firm revealed in March 2020 that Sonia Syngal would take over as CEO. And with good reason: Syngal led Gap’s Old Navy division to a $1 billion rise in sales between 2016 and 2020.

In 2004, Syngal started working with Gap, where she held several executive positions. Before taking the helm at Old Navy, she oversaw Gap’s worldwide supply chain and improved the product-to-market process for all Gap brands. She also served as senior vice president of the business’s international division and the managing director of Gap’s European operations.

In 2021, Syngal was listed by Fortune as the 35th-most influential woman in business.

8. Lynsi Snyder, the CEO, and owner of In-N-Out Burger

In 2010, at 27, Lynsi Snyder was named president and CEO of In-N-Out Burger. She soon rose to become one of the richest and most well-known Women CEOs, the only surviving burger company heir. Since then, she has established herself as one of the nation’s most reputable and successful business executives.

Snyder oversaw the chain’s growth from 215 sites to over 370 locations as it entered Texas and Colorado. She purposefully kept the expansion rate slow to maintain the integrity of the In-N-Out experience. Snyder is thought to have raised the company’s worth from $500 million in 2010 to more than $3 billion.

On Glassdoor’s Employees’ Choice Awards, Snyder consistently receives high ratings. Top CEOs are ranked in these honors based on voluntary, anonymous employee feedback.

In 2019, Glassdoor rated Snyder the third-best CEO overall, the greatest restaurant CEO, and the highest-rated Women CEO. She continued to have a 99% approval rating in 2021 and was rated as the 20th best CEO in North America and some of Europe.

The company’s market-leading salary, perks, and possibilities for professional advancement have been mentioned by employees, as well as Snyder’s emphasis on culture.

9. Abigail Johnson, Fidelity Investments’ chairman, and CEO

Abigail Johnson is the CEO and board chair of the privately held brokerage business Fidelity Investments. She comes in at number six on Forbes’ list of the most powerful women in the world, surpassing Oprah, Queen Elizabeth II, and Beyonce.

In 2014, Johnson took over as CEO of Fidelity, succeeding her father, Ned Johnson III. In 2016, she changed her title to chairperson.

Johnson had been making her way up the corporate ladder at her family’s business for years. She had a part-time job at Fidelity while in college and began working there full-time as an analyst in 1988 after getting her MBA from Harvard. Johnson oversaw mutual funds as the Asset Management division president starting in 2001.

She then assumed important leadership positions across Fidelity’s growth and capital appreciation divisions and the retail, office, and institutional businesses.

Under Johnson’s leadership, Fidelity introduced the first zero-expense-ratio mutual funds for individual investors and an institutional cryptocurrency trading platform. Additionally, Fidelity has retained its position as a top supplier of 401(k)s and IRAs for American businesses.

10. Martine Rothblatt, chairperson and CEO of United Therapeutics

United Therapeutics’ chairperson and CEO is Martine Rothblatt, Ph.D., J.D. She founded the business to create cures that would prolong her daughter’s life. In addition, Rothblatt co-founded Sirius XM Radio (NASDAQ: SIRI), and he previously held the positions of CEO of GeoStar, a provider of satellite communications, and Sirius.

United Therapeutics is now an $8.6 billion company, thanks to Rothblatt. The business creates treatments for pediatric neuroblastoma and pulmonary arterial hypertension. Using 3D printing and the patient’s cells, United Therapeutics is also developing a manufacturing procedure for customized human lungs.

Rothblatt frequently appears on lists of top-paid CEOs. She was the highest-paid Women CEO in 2013. She received the highest salary of any CEO in the biopharma industry in 2018. With a total remuneration of $45 million, Rothblatt had the ninth-highest salary of any CEO in the Russell 3000 in 2019. Rothblatt is the transgender CEO with the highest pay.