Woman Executive On The Rise: Karen Licitra.

More women are breaking the glass ceiling in the corporate world. For some reason the senior posts have always been the reserve of male executives. Nowadays more and more women, though still not in equal numbers as men, are occupying top positions in large companies.

One of these women is Karen Licitra. She was born in Bridgewater, New Jersey and took up undergraduate studies at Rider College earning a B.S. degree in marketing. Licitra started her career at Johnson & Johnson (J&J) as a sales representative in 1984 with Ethicon, Inc.

Owing to her performance she gained promotions in sales and marketing. In 1991, she joined Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. as director of marketing. Then Licitra earned a promotion as vice president for product management.

J&J acquired the Biopsys Medical business in 1997. Licitra was subsequently named vice president for breast care management. Under her guidance this business was successfully integrated with J&J.  In September 2000, Licitra was named vice president and general manager, Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. and became president months later on December 2000.

On July 2002 she was promoted as a group company chairman for J&J and Worldwide Franchise Chairman for Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. including the Advanced Sterilization Products business and J&J Medical, Canada.

Whether male or female her corporate rise is a great achievement. It just so happens that she is a woman who is a source of inspiration for other career women.

Company Man At The Top

There are many stories of company outsiders recruited to run a particular company. Nothing is more encouraging to employees when the CEO rose through their ranks. This gives ambitious lower ranked employees hope and inspiration that they too will lead the company one day.

This is exactly what happened to William C. Weldon who worked all his life at Johnson & Johnson (J&J).  One thing about this company is it never hired an outsider to lead it since its founding in 1886 in New Brunswick, New Jersey.  Working his entire career at J&J allowed him to prove himself as an able executive and become the company’s only 6^th chairman in 2002.

Weldon was not particularly an academic achiever in school and was more inclined to sports.  He got married while in college studying at Quinnipiac University.  He said marriage made him more serious with his studies. After graduating with a bachelor of science degree in 1971 he got a job in the sales and marketing department at McNeil Pharmaceutical a division of J&J. 

From their Weldon quickly rose through the ranks.  By 1982 he was the manager of J&J’s ICOM Regional Development Center in Southeast Asia. More promotions followed. Weldon became president of Ethicon Endo-Surgery (EES) a newly formed J&J company in 1992. Although coming from a pharmaceutical background Weldon worked hard to make the company a market leader in the medical-instruments market overtaking the number one company by 1996.

This stunning achievement led to more promotions and in 1998 he became worldwide chairman of J&J’s Pharmaceutical Group and became a member of the company’s executive committee. The group was lagging in performance and Weldon was tasked to revive it. He engineered the acquisition of Centocor which had a number of promising drugs. Weldon led another major acquisition in 2001 when J&J acquired Alza Corporation which was known for its transdermal patches. 

Weldon was eventually appointed CEO and chairman of J&J in January 2002. His tenure has been marked by growth and major acquisitions. It has also been rocked by recalls of liquid children’s Tylenol, other medications, and products like contact lenses. He relinquished the CEO post in April 2012 while remaining as chairman.

Avon’s New Boss: Sherilyn S. McCoy

Avon has had some strings of bad luck lately. After having a great run for a good number of years the company has experienced declining sales.  It also faces embarrassing charges of bribery allegations in China and perhaps other parts of the world.  Another company has also been trying to buy it.
Sheri McCoy has been appointed as Avon’s CEO and will definitely have a lot of things to work on. She isn’t exactly a greenhorn. Sheri was a vice chairman at Johnson & Johnson.

Johnson & Johnson is a $65 billion a year healthcare company while Avon is an $11 billion dollar a year beauty company. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind about Sheri’s ability to run this size of a company.  While at Johnson & Johnson she handled a business unit which was into beauty products. 

Sheri also knows how to work under tremendous pressure managing to turnaround the pharmaceutical business of Johnson & Johnson.  She has also done acquisition of an enterprise that would later help improve the company’s bottom line.

Despite her experience including having a master’s degree in chemical engineering from Princeton and an MBA from Rutgers, some are concerned that she has not handled a company with a direct sales force like Avon.  There are 6.4 million of them worldwide.  Others point out though that Johnson & Johnson also has a sales force but knocks on doctor’s doors and not house-to-house.  Some view this concern as overblown.

This executive who is known to be caring yet can be tough does have one advantage; she is a woman and in this business where women are the main customer it just may spell the difference.