Alpha Woman: Inspiring Leadership

By Cristiana Xavier de Brito

Alpha Woman is neither a manual nor a leadership guide. It is a portrait of contemporary Brazilian women and A homage to their authenticity, creativity and resilience to lead their private and professional lives. Written by Cristiana Xavier de Brito, the book highlights Brazilian feminine leadership and its characteristics, it gives voice to women from different sectors, opens dialogues about dilemmas facing Brazilian women in the 21st century. And it serves as a source of inspiration for her generation's contemporaries and the future leaders of this country. The book offers profiles of ten Alpha Women who stand out thanks to their leadership. Cristiana intends to reinforce leadership not as in being a boss, but as an attitude and behavior in her own life.
CRISTIANA XAVIER DE BRITO has worked for national and multi-national companies for more than 25 years, with focus in management, public relations, communication, marketing and sustainability, in addition to taking part in NGO councils. She graduated in Social Communication from the Fundação Arnaldo Álvares Penteado, did a course specializing in Administration at the Fundação Getúlio Vargas and at the Universidad Iberoamericana, and a course on Creating Shared Value at the Harvard Business School. Cristiana has wide international experience. She's from São Paulo, although her family is from Rio de Janeiro, she lives in São Paulo, has a son and is married. She's dedicated to the development of feminine leadership and her desire for a fairer and more diverse society was the main motivation for writing this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Editora Letramento
• Release date: Sep 21, 2018
• ISBN: 9788595301245

Book preview

References

Therefore, our competent Cris decided to write a book and share many of her recurrent reflections with an audience.

A long time ago, we said that, due to the new reality in which the different environments integrate, shrinking the space between work and private life, new approaches are necessary. And to observe someone who already lives with such a challenge is valuable.

I increasingly realize that numbers explain companies less and less. I see the issues of greatest challenge in corporations in business models, in the effort to find alignment, in the strategic planning and in the attention to the human factor. I increasingly admire companies who search for the right balance between their tangible and intangible assets.

The future is no longer as it used to be, as Arthur Clarke said: Wherever we are going, things are moving fast, and I believe that the world will reinvent itself. Indeed, Cris navigates somewhere around there in her initial evaluation of the challenges in her area and in the humanist depth of her questions to her female alpha-partners, who are more than well chosen.

We shall not waste the sum of valuable experiences, we thank her for extracting what is relevant. We reap the pearls in this opportune book.

Horacio Lafer Piva

Facing the challenge of writing an introduction to my wife’s first book I thought about giving an excuse and giving it a pass. But I knew that, being married to an Alpha, like I myself named the book upon her request, it was impossible to turn down the request without a very good reason. So I gave in with pleasure.

I met Cristiana in Miami in 1997, soon after I had moved to the US, facing a professional challenge. She had moved to live in Mexico, also alone, and I was introduced to her by a common friend. We were both in an emotionally fragile phase, she had had a difficult divorce and I was an untimely widower, we started an intense and very deep relationship.

Two and a half years after a busy Miami-Mexico City air bridge, I decided it was time to move back to Brazil. She still stayed six more months in Mexico, but then she also came back to São Paulo so that we could live together permanently, close to our parents, who already needed more attention.

We made a plan for our careers and to have a beautiful family, which was consolidated by the arrival of our son, João Paulo, in 2003.

Cristiana’s big professional rise happened naturally. In a few years she became the director of a multi-national company. My career, however, didn’t develop as planned. So, the moment arrived for us to decide what was the best path for our family. It was not easy, but also not very complicated. We decided that she would totally unleash, while I would take a more backstage role, looking after the house, practical things related to our son and our parents and working as a freelancer in advertising from our home.

A wise decision! Today we are in complete harmony, happy, fulfilled, without any impossible problems to solve, and with the certainty that we made the right decision.

To achieve all of this, I accepted to be here. I felt that it was necessary to give my testimony and say to those who are intimately related to Alpha Women that, even if that isn’t the most tranquil of things, it’s pretty dynamic, fun and exciting. I gave up being a macho and became a real man!

I would also like to tell women, who are aware of being an Alpha, that they can and should exercise this leadership in full. Their partners, like me, soon will realize that they are with sensational partners, real accomplices, ready to be much, very much loved.

Roberto Bandeira

What am I doing here?

That was the first phrase I thought of when, for the first time, I stepped into that spacious room divided by a large table. There have been only a few occasions I’ve realized that I’m part of statistics. I’m part of a small group of women who represent 13,6% of the executives of the 500 biggest Brazilian companies, for I’m the director of a multi-national company, a group consisting of, at the time, other seven members – all men.

This thought popped in my head on my first day at work, in a completely new sector to me. I was, yes, in an unequal situation – not for being the only woman, but for being the least prepared in that environment. I had experience in other sectors of the Economy, with totally different functions and dynamics.

I graduated in Advertising in the 80s and, despite passing through agencies, my goal was always to grow in a big company. Inspired by my father, who ended up as the president of a multi-national company and remained in the position for 22 years, in addition to further eight years in the Administrative Council. I imagined that in large organizations I could generate more impactful actions.

I joined the technological industry when I was still young and, during almost ten years, I had the opportunity to learn and develop my management skills. It was there that I also had my first international experience, when I accepted a challenge to go to Mexico, where I lived for three years, with the mission of developing the Marketing Communication for the eight main Latin American countries.

When I changed from the Technology sector to Paper and Cellulose, I was moved by the opportunity to develop and implement communication and social responsibility plans for four business units and eighteen industrial plants. I learnt a lot from working in a national company, a global reference company in its sector. In the corporate ladder, I reached a position closer to decision making, given that I ended up responding directly to the president. In this journey, I saw diversity gaining more and more importance in my career and in the organizations. As an executive of social responsibility, and afterwards of sustainability, I always made sure part of my work was to participate, interact with and contribute to non-governmental organizations, associations and municipal, state and federal governments. I see that this exchange is fundamental for the evolution of companies, which become stronger as relevant actors in the society and the system in which they belong to.

After nearly five years, the dynamism of the tech industry invited me again to a multi-national software company, in which I took on my first directorship. Since 50% of the members of the board were women, I saw the advantages of diversity on a daily basis. The multiplicity of views and the capacity to have a dialogue increased innovation of products and services as much as the experience of the employees, clients and suppliers. The exchange between human beings literally fueled the relationships and the machines. And it was from this environment that I left, four years later, to be the first woman in the Executive Committee of a global chemistry company, in which I took on the mission to run the department of institutional relations and sustainability, at a moment of big expansion of the company in South America.

Entering that meeting room, I had reasons to feel butterflies in my belly, but I soon convinced myself that it was the effect of the air conditioning, which temperature, in any place, is more compatible to who uses a suit and not a skirt. The answer came as soon as the question: I came to be myself.

It was because of this that I was hired. It was because of this that I was brought here. What I did that day I repeat ever since then: I sat next to the president, a place that I consider strategic to whom wants to discuss, collaborate and make a difference for the future of the company.

My Roots

I learnt confidence and determination at home, where I lived surrounded by strong women. The main one being my mother, who was born in the state of Minas Gerais and lived in Rio de Janeiro, where she studied to be teacher. Upon marrying she decided to accompany her engineer husband, whose career in the steel industry took them to different cities. And I’m not exaggerating, my older brother was born in Volta Redonda; my older sister came to this world two years later, in Rio de Janeiro; after four years, I was born in Santos; and our youngest, a girl, was born in São Paulo to complete the family fifteen years later.

My mother has always been an unmatched intellectual force, capable of nurturing different personalities and managing the most diverse resources to feed our needs and maintain an inspirational social coexistence. Charismatic, she has always been loved, and continues to be surrounded by people. I had other examples of great female leaders: my maternal grandmother, who moved five children from the countryside of Minas Gerais to Rio de Janeiro; my paternal grandmother, who was ten years older than my grandfather; and her sisters - especially my godmother, who also accompanies my path and continues to be a great influence in my life.

My mother was a housewife until her children grew up. Then she changed her dream of becoming a criminal lawyer to become an entrepreneur. In addition to looking after her family and having an intensive social life, she started a clothing factory in São Paulo, which contributed to the maintenance of various families for more than fifteen years. With all this, I learnt early to adapt into new environments and to relate to people from different backgrounds, with different roots, cultures, and identities. I always had an eclectic group of friends who were open to my ideas. At eighteen years of age, for example, I convinced a friend to embark with me on the Train of Death, which left from Puerto Quijarro, at the border of the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, to Santa Cruz de la Sierra, in Bolivia. Some years before this, I exercised my leadership in forming a girls’ club. I dedicated myself to it so much that I practically lived in our neighbor’s house, where the headquarters of the club was.

It was my father who instigated the curiosity, discipline and zeal in me. I didn’t have to be the best in class, but to do my best. I carry this with me to this day, appreciating quality in each and every delivery. Genetics provided that I