Women Managing for the Millennium

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‘The two years had not been fulfilling as a job, but we had a lot to sort out on the personal side. My husband, David, moved first to Hampshire and then to Kent, so I was commuting long distance and managing three homes! By now I was expecting our first child and suddenly, in 1986, everything was starting to come together. A group of us devised the Integrated MBA and teamed up with Warwick Business School as our academic partner. We also formed a Business School Network with British Airways and offered back critique to the business schools.

‘I was beginning to experience problems with a boss who was finding my innovative approach both disconcerting and a threat. I realized that I had found the glass ceiling in this organization and decided to move on. The choice was either to take up a senior post with my local county council, or to go out on my own. I decided I needed more experience before I became a consultant, so I applied for the education job. I knew that financially it could be a major problem, but also that I would never be given the same level of responsibility in the old job. It would mean a huge drop in salary, loss of an interest-free loan, car and so on. Coincidentally, the Economist had been writing reports on MBAs and asked me to be their adviser. They also required an author for their report, Guide to Executive Programmes in Europe and the USA and I offered to do it. The payment was exactly the sum I needed to make up the shortfall in salary so I resigned – BP was stunned that I should leave after seventeen years. They made a counter offer, but I knew I had to go to the new job where I would be in charge of many more people and have greater responsibility. I also felt that BP’s professional standards had declined and that, if I did not act, they would compromise my own standards.