“Marianne Hamilton’s book should be required workplace reading. The more people who take her advice, the more successful and better run our organizations will be – for everyone.”
PETER VOSER
Chairman of ABB



Believe in yourself

Many companies target improving their gender mix. The challenge includes finding ways to attract female professionals, and also to motivate more women to pursue managerial roles.

The utmost goal must always be to have access to managers with the necessary competence. To achieve this companies need to have: internal mobility and employees who want to contribute both today and going forward. But above all, you have to have a culture that focuses on inclusion and on creating space for a gutsy attitude.

Why is a better gender composition important? Because it’s good for business. It’s been proven in study after study that diverse teams deliver better results. And if you want to hire the best, you need candidates representing 100% of the talent pool.

So, what are companies currently doing to improve their gender mix? Some focus on internal structures and processes. For example, you can set a requirement that there always has to be at least one female among the final candidates in a recruitment process. Mentoring programs are also commonly used. In addition, many companies set targets e.g. that 30% of all employees (or managers) should be women by 2030, compared to the 17, 18 or 19% they have today. In some cases, the completion of gender diversity targets is even part of managers’ compensation assessments.

But there is another angle. An angle that provides a complement. Because in order to achieve real change, the driving force must come from the women themselves. A woman must understand how she can influence her career. She must believe in herself.

Marianne Hamilton’s book, “Advice to My Dear Daughter”, can help propel women forward in their careers. It can also support managers – male and female – in better understanding and guiding their employees through challenging situations. This book will help employees seize opportunities and make a difference. In the end, it’s all about getting a better pipeline of managers.

 

Leverage the advice

“Practical and no-nonsense advice to young women interested in building a career. Also a very concrete guide to managers, male or female, interested in understanding the subtle challenges of building diversity in their teams.”
EEVA SIPILA
CFO and Deputy to CEO, Metso Outotec


Safeguarding a pipeline of managers

Advice To My Dear Daughter can be used to make sure a company captures the full breadth and depth of talent available. Both when recruiting and as part of ongoing development, as well as to safeguard the company’s pipeline of future managers. This is indeed a business-critical issue.

CIRCLES

One efficient way to share information and spark change is to sit together and discuss different advice in a Circle setting. The ideal group size is 6-8 people.  

When you start using Circles in an organization, you should start at the very top with the executive team. Everyone is tasked with reading the book and underlining what he/she finds important (this could be one or several pieces of advice, a statement, or just a word). The executive team then meets for an open, straight-forward discussion based on what the individuals found important. Some conclusions are ideally written down to be disseminated later by one of the Circle members.

Each participant in the first Circle then initiates the same process within his or her own team. This process continues with subsequent Circles throughout the organization.

The idea is that a member of a Circle not just reads on his/her own, but also gains insights from the discussions. The overall conclusions should be summarized for the benefit of the entire company.

MENTORSHIP

A mentorship program has the mentee in focus. It is the mentees actual situation that should be discussed as a basis for finding the way forward. The mentor, with far more experience, should trigger this process. However, to really understand a mentee’s actual situation is not easy. Perhaps the situation is hard to describe, or the mentor isn’t asking the right questions. It is important to ensure that the mentor doesn’t end up in focus.

This book can be used to trigger fruitful discussions between mentors and mentees. By reading one or a couple of different advice prior to meeting the mentee can get insight into possible dilemmas which can facilitate a dialogue by providing objective exampes. The book contains 46 advice, and can lead to better discussions throughout a mentoring relationship.

ON YOUR OWN

Distribute the book into the organization and let the employees read for their own benefit.

Ask them to think of:
1) Which of the 46 advice would you give to a young adept?
2) Are any of the advice counterproductive?
3) What advice do you miss?

The book can inspire them by providing chance to reflect and to learn more about what characterizes a sound company culture, based on performance and development, as well as gender issues in business. It can also prompt conversations and opportunities to share and learn with others who are curious and open-minded, with the passion to create an environment in which people can flourish.

Buy the book

Available in English in boxes of 50 copies

This book inspires women - and men - to take charge of their own careers. It is valuable for anyone in an organization. It can be especially useful as discussion material for mentorship programs, to be read by both the mentor and the mentee. We currently only distribute the book within the EU. The listed price is for 50 books, excluding freight and VAT. If you have questions regarding orders, please send us a message using the contact form.

€1,000.00

 

Buy the book from our local distributors

EUROPE

BELGIUM
Dei Monti

ITALY
Business Partners

SWEDEN
Campus Kämpasten

ASIA

JAPAN
The Swedish Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Japan



Meet Marianne

“Marianne Hamilton draws a wonderful map that you can use to navigate – and succeed – in the business world”
FRANÇOISE CHOMBAR
CEO and co-founder of Melexis


Today there’s nothing preventing women from going all the way professionally. The obstacle many women frequently face is inside themselves. Their self-image mirrors what they see in society and within the companies they work for.

I believe in people’s inherent strengths: individuals make it happen. It’s a woman’s own drive and motivation that will enable her to reach a position where she has can truly make a difference, creating lasting results that benefit the company and the community.

Having an organization with smoothly functioning processes and clearly defined accountabilities definitely helps, but at the end of the day it is your own determination and competence that will take you to the top.

My dear daughter, certainly there are obstacles, but your focus should be on the possibilities. The book Advice to My Dear Daughter contains 46 pieces of advice. Take them to heart and be the change!

Marianne Hamilton has extensive business experience. She was Atlas Copco’s Senior Vice President, Organizational Development and Management Resources, for sixteen years,  and she has also been on multiple boards. Her ground-breaking introduction of an internal global job market at Atlas Copco, allowing employees to apply to all open positions, spurred a unique opportunity to improve the organization and strengthen the corporate culture. The internal job market model has subsequently been copied by several other world-leading companies.

In Advice to My Dear Daughter, Marianne Hamilton gives advice, in her own way, to help you reach top executive positions – if that is what you want. Her advice draws on her own experience and observations, as well as on conversations with her mentees (both women and men) from the Swedish business world. Marianne believes in the power of the individual. Her thoughts and ideas provide pragmatic, down-to-earth advice that help you take charge of your career and thrive.

Advice to my dear daughter is Marianne’s fifth book. See www.ekobok.se for information about her previous books (available in Swedish only).