Afraid to Fail, Yet Nothing to Lose

At the Women Leading Travel & Hospitality Roundtable earlier this month in Dallas, a panel discussion moderated by executive coach Quendrida Whitmore addressed industry trends, challenges and opportunities in an informative and wide-ranging conversation. Joining Whitmore were Michelle McKinney Frymire, former CEO of CWT; Whitney Eichinger, vice president, culture and engagement, Southwest Airlines; Cheryl Richards, senior vice president and chief diversity, equity and inclusion officer, VisitDallas; and Melissa Stillwell, vice president of revenue management at Quorum Hotels & Resorts.

The number of women in executive roles has boomed in the past few years, yet they are still in the minority. According to Richards, the percentage of women in general manager positions in the hotel industry barely exceeded 1 percent, yet over a decade later, they have only reached 3 percent. The lack of representation stems from the resistance to hire and mentor women into these executive positions. Richards dedicated a part of her journey to mentoring young ladies and providing the tools they need to sharpen their leadership skills.

“If you don’t have a seat at the table, bring your own chair,” Richards said.

To stand up for yourself in a room full of men shows that women do have a strong presence and a right to be in the room. These women have earned the right to sit at the table with these men. At that level of influence, it's imperative to demonstrate the skills you know you have. Similarly, Stillwell found her courage through the acceptance of speaking up in uncomfortable situations. It's essential that you use your privilege as an executive woman to represent those who cannot.

“As women, oftentimes it’s important to find those that are talented and that you can build talent from,” Stillwell said. “From within, in times like now where none of us can find employees, find those within your organization.”

To elevate women into leadership positions, you need to advocate for one another. Frymire brought up a scenario where a woman’s ideas are repressed in a meeting by a man. Her strategy is to draw attention to the disparity of female voices in the room, and offer the woman another chance to share.

“Use your privilege as the only one in the group able to use your voice,” Frymire said. “Everyone one of you has the opportunity to do this.”

Courage is dwindling without representation, however. Dominated by the voices of male executives, the strength of women has to come from within.

Eichinger's journey of finding courage within herself was tedious. Throughout various companies and positions, she acquired strong skills which led her to use role courage in her work, a quadrant of courage explained by Cindy Solomon in her keynote presentation at the same Roundtable event.

Through a decent amount of “parking lot tears,” Eichinger realized that she didn't care about the negative impacts of speaking up as she knew what she was saying was important. The role courage shown by Eichinger comes from her acceptance of failure.

“I wasn't afraid to fail because I was already failing,” Eichinger explained.