Postcards
HP's Whitman sets the record for female Fortune 500 CEOs
September 23, 2011: 2:00 PM ETWith Meg Whitman nabbing the CEO job at Hewlett-Packard--and the four women at the bottom of this list (below) new to the top job this year--America now has 15 female Fortune 500 CEOs.
Not a number to be proud of, but hey, it's a record and it is progress nonetheless.
Here are the women at the helm--including the rank of their companies on the Fortune 500:
11 Meg Whitman, Hewlett-Packard (HPQ)
39 Pat Woertz, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM)
42 Angela Braly, WellPoint (WLP)
43 Indra Nooyi, Pepsico (PEP)
49 Irene Rosenfeld, Kraft Foods (KFT)
68 Lynn Elsenhans, Sunoco (SUN)
84 Ellen Kullman, DuPont (DD)
119 Carol Meyrowitz, TJX (TJX)
121 Ursula Burns, Xerox (XRX)
221 Laura Sen, BJ's Wholesale Club (BJ)
226 Andrea Jung, Avon Products (AVP)
245 Deanna Mulligan, Guardian Life Insurance (not publicly held)
274 Debra Reed, Sempra Energy (SRE)
312 Denise Morrison, Campbell Soup (CPB)
417 Beth Mooney, KeyCorp (KEY)
As we send our 2011 Most Powerful Women list to press (a day late, as we scrambled yesterday to place Whitman in our rankings), the competition grows. Who will be No. 1? We'll announce that and reveal the new MPW list next Thursday.
For updates on the Fortune Most Powerful Women community, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.
-
The women on Fortune's Executive Dream Team
The 2011 Fortune Most Powerful Women list will be announced on September 29. Meantime, a few stars on the 2010 MPW list are on Fortune's Executive Dream Team--a fantasy all-star lineup of managers, selected by Fortune editors with assists from recruiters and other business know-it-alls.
I use the term know-it-all with endearment because the selections, revealed today, are good. The non-executive chair of choice: Anne Mulcahy, the former CEO of Xerox MORE
Patricia Sellers - Aug 22, 2011 3:55 PM ET -
Carly Fiorina, before she was famous
by Patricia Sellers
Today, two former No. 1's on Fortune's Most Powerful Women list will learn whether they have big new careers ahead -- in politics.
One is Meg Whitman, the former CEO of eBay (EBAY), who looks likely to win the Republican nomination for Governor. And then she'll go head to head against Democrat Jerry Brown, who has seen and done it all in California (including served as Governor). The other is MORE Patricia Sellers - Jun 8, 2010 10:52 AM ET -
Powerful women push the envelope
A Friday indulgence: While I try not to use Postcards as a promotional vehicle for what we do at Fortune, I can't resist telling about a milestone we reached yesterday. The Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, the confab that grew out of our annual Power list in the magazine, has sold out.
Eight months ahead of the 2010 event, October 4-6 in Washington, D.C.
That's crazy. Granted, for a few years now, MORE
Patricia Sellers - Feb 12, 2010 10:51 AM ET -
Behind Fortune's Most Powerful Women
What makes a Fortune Most Powerful Woman?
This is a question that we get constantly, since rising-star business women (or their PR people!) wrangle to get a spot on Fortune's annual Power 50 list. And many a male CEO takes it as a badge of honor to have one or more of his direct reports in the MPWomen rankings. In just 11 years, Fortune's MPWomen list, which we release in the MORE
Patricia Sellers - Mar 23, 2009 12:44 PM ET -
Why P&G's president quit
by Patricia Sellers
Procter & Gamble (PG) lost its president today: Susan Arnold, a 29-year veteran who drove the company's high-margin beauty business to $20 billion in sales and went on to oversee all of P&G's brands, stepped down one day after her 55th birthday.
"My dad retired at 62," Arnold said, phoning this afternoon on her way to a Walt Disney (DIS) board meeting. "Then he got really sick. You know MORE
Patricia Sellers - Mar 9, 2009 2:57 PM ETPosted in: A.G. Lafley, Amy Brinkley, Andrea Jung, Avon, Bank of America, banks, boards, Brands, Carrie Cox, CEOs, consumer goods, Disney, DuPont, Ellen Kullman, Fortune Most Powerful Women list, FORTUNE MPWomen, headhunters, John Mack, Leadership by Geoff Colvin, management, McDonald's, Morgan Stanley, Most Powerful Women, P&G, Personal Power, pharmaceuticals, Postcards, Power Shift, Procter & Gamble, Susan Arnold, Zoe Cruz -
Powerful women bet their careers
I'm on vacation this week -- or I'm supposed to be! The blog world never sleeps, I guess, nor does learning while away. So I'll share with you a few things I'm learning here in Allentown, Pa.
Aside from plowing snow, I've been plowing through the invite list for next year's Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit. This, as you may know, is the annual powwow that accompanies the release of what MORE
Patricia Sellers - Dec 23, 2008 2:16 PM ETPosted in: ING, FORTUNE Most Powerful Women Summit, Solera Capital, Wall Street, Fidelity, Morgan Stanley, AIG, GE, Leadership by Geoff Colvin, retail, CEOs, FORTUNE MPWomen, management, Fortune Most Powerful Women list, banks, finance, SAFECO, consumer goods, Power Shift, Cece Sutton, Kathy Murphy, Kathleen Murphy, stock market, Fortune 500, Washington, Paula Reynolds, Lorraine Bolsinger, ecoimagination, BJ's Wholesale, Karen Mills, Small Business Administration, SBA, Tootsie Roll, Ellen Gordon, Postcards -
Powerful Women: the final photo gallery
I've shared pictures and videos and stories of Warren Buffett in action at the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit--his idea of "heaven," he told the 350 women who gathered in California in early October. But there was much ado beyond Buffett at our 10th Summit, which drew, despite the market mayhem, a lineup of leaders that reflected our theme, "Extraordinary Talent." Here are a few glimpses of the talent on MORE
Patricia Sellers - Oct 28, 2008 3:05 PM ETPosted in: Melinda Gates, Arianna Huffington, Time Inc., Ann Moore, Dina Powell, Goldman Sachs, Warren Buffett, Citigroup, NBC Universal, Bonnie Hammer, Susan Lyne, PepsiCo, Indra Nooyi, Sallie Krawcheck, Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook, Fortune Most Powerful Women list, Time Warner, Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit, Martha Nelson, Andrea Wong, Lifetime, Gilt Groupe, Pat Fili-Krushel, Eva Muraya, Phyllis Mwangi, Fory=tune-U.S. State Department Mentoring Partnership, Postcards -
How to stretch your talent
My Fortune colleague Geoff Colvin reminds us in his Guest Post that the best time to test and stretch your talent is during tough times. Ever since we published Geoff's piece on Postcards yesterday, I've been thinking about this a lot. Last night, at a Bank of America (BAC) dinner at Manhattan's Four Seasons restaurant to benefit the International Women's Media Foundation's Courage in Journalism Awards, I sat with a MORE
Patricia Sellers - Oct 21, 2008 12:28 PM ETPosted in: 60 Minutes, Allen & Co., Anne Finucane, Bank of America, banks, blogging, CBS News, CEOs, Fortune Most Powerful Women list, FORTUNE Most Powerful Women Summit, FORTUNE MPWomen, General Electric, Geoff Colvin, Guest Post, Jim McNerney, Leadership by Geoff Colvin, Lelsey Stahl, management, Martha Stewart, Nancy Peretsman, Noeing, Postcards, Power Shift, Sam's Club, Sears, talent, Talent is Overrated, Wal-Mart, Wall Street -
Behind the Buffett and Blankfein meeting
Where did America's richest man and one of Wall Street's most powerful CEOs meet face to face for the first time after their $5 billion deal? The Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, a three-day, invitation-only gathering of the world's most prominent women leaders.
So who let the guys in? Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) and Goldman Sachs (GS) CEO Lloyd Blankfein were two of just three men invited this year; MORE
Patricia Sellers - Oct 16, 2008 3:16 PM ETPosted in: Andy Serwer, banks, berkshire hathaway, Carol Loomis, CEO, CEOs, consumer goods, Fortune Most Powerful Women list, FORTUNE MPWomen, Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit, GE, General Electric, Goldman Sachs, Goldman Sachs/Fortune Global Women Leaders Award, GS, investing, Investor, Leadership by Geoff Colvin, Lloyd Blankfein, Melanie Healey, Mentoring, Most Powerful Women, MPWomen Go Global, P&G, Postcards, Procter & Gamble, stock market, Wall Street, Warren Buffett
For the latest on the most influential women in business, philanthropy, government, and the arts, like us on Facebook. 
Fortune Most Powerful Women
Sheryl Sandberg:
Gina Bianchini
In her first public interview since taking on the CEO gig at Yahoo, Marissa Mayer outlines her priorities both in and out of the company. Watch
Brenda Barnes famously quit a big job to be with her kids. Years later, a massive stroke nearly killed her--and her daughter returned the favor. Watch
Fortune senior editor at large Pattie Sellers has written some of Fortune's most talked-about cover stories, including "Marissa Mayer: Ready to Rumble at Yahoo," "Oprah's Next Act," "Can Meg Whitman Save California?" "The $100 Billion Woman" (Melinda Gates), and "Remodeling Martha" (Martha Stewart). She has helped oversee Fortune's "Most Powerful Women in Business" package every year since its launch in 1998. Pattie is Executive Director of the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit, the preeminent gathering of women leaders in business and beyond. She oversees MPW programs that enable women leaders to extend their influence and empower the next generation—such as Fortune MPW Entrepreneurs and the Fortune-U.S. State Department Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership. Beyond her Fortune duties, she is also developing Live Content across Time Inc. Pattie grew up in Allentown, PA, graduated from the University of Virginia, and started at Fortune in 1984. Her blog, Postcards, is about how power players lead, manage others, and navigate their careers.
Subscribe: RSS feed | email newsletter
The Fortune/U.S. State Department Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership brings rising-star women from countries around the world to the U.S. for three-week mentorships with participants of the annual Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit - among them Ursula Burns of Xerox, Laura Lang of Time Inc., Marissa Mayer of Yahoo, and Tory Burch.
Read more
