Shownotes
As the world continue to shift and improve, the spaces for women in leadership positions have greatly opened up. Cheryl Campbell, former Senior Vice President of Xcel Energy and the Independent Director of Hoffman Southwest, takes us to the boardroom as she engages her experiences as a woman functioning in board roles. Together with Jo Lynne Whiting of Board Bound, we follow Cheryl as she describes her responsibilities from working with Xcel Energy to Hoffman Southwest. She provides great insights and advices to those young men and women who would love a career path that would soon serve on boards, laying down some pointers on how you can make key decisions and add value – from compliance and progress to employee safety and acquisition. Cheryl then sheds a light for women who want to participate in nontraditional areas, encouraging them to have the confidence to pursue what they love to do.
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Entering The Boardroom with Cheryl Campbell and Jo Lynne Whiting
We’re doing a cohosted version of the show. My cohost is Jo Lynne Whiting. She is a previous guest on the podcast. She is with Boardbound by the Women’s Leadership Foundation. Our guest is Cheryl Campbell. She is the former Senior Vice President of Xcel Energy, retired and she’s also the Independent Director of Hoffman Southwest. For the folks that don’t know what Hoffman Southwest is, they are the parent company of Roto-Rooter.
They do Roto-Rooter and Pro-Pipe. They do a lot of pipeline work for the utility industry.
Tell us a little bit about what you do, what you’ve done in the past. We’ll bring it forward to your service on boards and the relationship that you have with Boardbound.
I spent about 35 years in the energy industry, about twenty years with the old Coastal Corporation, Colorado Interstate Gas and the last several years was with Xcel Energy. I retired from there. I spent a lot of time doing engineering, strategic planning, operations, regulatory work and a wide variety of things. I was very fortunate to have many opportunities and do a lot of interesting work over the course of my career. I got interested in boards relatively early on. I sat on a number of nonprofit boards. I decided I wanted to serve on company boards. It’s been a great career. I’m really happy to be here and talk to you about what I’ve been up to in the Boardbound Program.
Cheryl, you were an executive in the energy business. We have a lot of energy businesses here in Colorado. For those people that may not be familiar with Xcel, could you describe the scope of your responsibility?
Xcel Energy is a combination gas and electric utility provider and they serve eight states. We had two million gas customers and about 3.4 million electric customers. It’s a good-sized company. Overall, I ran the gas business for Xcel. I was responsible for those two million gas customers, our employees and our asset base. I have spent the last several years or so building their asset management programs and their risk management programs. Working with our board to improve our risk management and our safety both for employees and the public around our system. It was a great opportunity. We made a lot of good progress while I was there and they continue to make a lot of good progress now.
For the young men and women that are out there and they’re going to go, “I’d love to have a career path where I progress and succeed and end up running a division and being able to serve on boards.” What advice would you offer to our audience that has an interest in heading and trying to replicate your success?
First of all, you’ve got to be good at what you do. You need to be good and competent at the work that you do. You need a broad skill set. You can’t focus on being an engineer or an accountant or a financial analyst. You need to broaden your capabilities, your skill set and your leadership. Some of the stuff that made a big difference for me was I never shied away from trying something new and different. A lot of times people would say, “Nobody wants to volunteer and do that,” and I’d say, “I’ll try it. I’ll do it.” Step up and try to do stuff that might be a little bit out of your comfort zone. When I decided that I wanted to get more involved in serving on boards, I started talking to a lot of people. You start thinking about whom I know that can tell me about this or has done it before. I started realizing I knew a lot of people that already sat on boards or interacted with boards. I started asking a lot of questions. One of the big things that came out was your leadership capabilities and the ability to think strategically. I started looking at getting more involved nationally. For instance, in the gas industry and taking on leadership roles at the national level with the trade associations and with the Department of Transportation that does a lot of the regulatory work. You need to investigate what skill set you need to do it. You need to look at ways that you can build that skill set on the career path that you’re on. That’s a broad overview.
Jo Lynne, your career was not that dissimilar because you progressed and then both of you have pursued higher education and more expertise in the formal education system. The thing that we’ll dive off into is for the folks that have a career and then go, “I’d like to serve on a board,” and they go short of a mentor somewhere. How in the world do I figure out what I need to do? Jo Lynne, that plays into Boardbound.
We were excited. Cheryl, you were part of the Corporate Boardbound program. Tell us about that year and the year before because you were involved over a period of their time.
I was and I initially got involved. I’d heard about the Boardbound program from a colleague and reached out and joined it. Unfortunately, the mentor that I had ended up having a serious health problem. I didn’t get to complete that first year. Jo Lynne and her colleague reached out to me and said, “Come back and we’ll pair you up with a different mentor,” which was John Kelley. I got to restart the program and do it again. It was helpful as far as that goes. It’s not going to teach you some of the things you learn by working in Corporate America and interacting with boards and other executive leaders. What it does do is help you understand how to frame your value that you can bring to a board, how to build a board resume. I had a board bio. How to go through the interview process and then how to get your name in the right places so that you might be considered for a board role.
We did some play interviewing. It was helpful because people are making suggestions and critiquing. You came across this way. Is that the way that you meant to come across? All of that was a helpful process. The other thing I liked about it was the program brought in relevant topics. One time we talked about cybersecurity and board governance. That’s a hot topic for boards. How should boards be thinking about cybersecurity and how it impacts their company and the future of their company? That helps you understand that broader strategic thinking that you need to be doing when you’re on a board as opposed to, “I own this business unit or I am focused on that particular aspect of the company.” It helps you look a little more broadly. That’s an important aspect of the program.
We’re proud of your cohort because there was great chemistry and we had seven people that are on boards that some of them are public boards. Some are private boards and some are advisory boards but they’re all corporate board positions.
If you go through the Corporate Board Bound Program, you have a clearer idea of what your value proposition is.
It was a great group of people. You get a chance to bond together and to share stories and to say, “This happened to me and I wasn’t sure how to respond to that.” You’re not only learning from your mentor, but you’re also learning from the other people that are participating in the program. It was a great experience.
Much of that is trying to find a mentor or finding a resource for information. Do you find that you reach out to your classmates?
We do sometimes. We’re all connected on LinkedIn, which is a great way to stay in touch with each other because nowadays, people just disperse. You might be together for a little while, but then you move to another part of the country or your role in a different part of the city even. It’s difficult to stay connected with people. We do communicate via LinkedIn on a regular basis and we could see what other people are up to. Jo Lynne has talked about getting up the alumni group back together, which would be a terrific thing to do to keep people connected over time. It’s been a helpful group. It was an interesting group. Everybody came at it with different backgrounds. I learned something from everybody in the program.
A lot of it is your own personal network. Tell the story about how you got on the Hoffman Southwest Board.
I went to a board meeting for the American Gas Association for my boss who was Xcel’s board member. He couldn’t make it so I went. I had dinner with one of the other board members and I’d known her for a while. She worked for National Grid, one of the other utilities in the country. We got to talking about women on boards and helping women learn how to take on senior executive roles in companies. Two things came out of that. One was the American Gas Association built a Next Level Women’s Leadership Development Program. It’s helping women understand the skills that they need to develop to take that next step in corporations. The second one was this woman called me a few years later and said, “Cheryl, are you still interested in serving on a board?” I said, “Yes, I am.” She said, “I’ve been talking to these guys and they’re looking for someone in the utility industry that would be interested in serving on the board.” We started talking and it’s a private equity company. It worked. I’ve been on the board for a while now and it’s been a fantastic learning experience. I like to think I’m adding some value to the board. I had no idea that this would end up coming out of that conversation after that trade association dinner over one last glass of wine basically is the way it all came together.
A lot of times people do get the positions of their own network. What we found is if you go through the Corporate Boardbound Program, you have a clearer idea of what your value proposition is. People can help you more if they know what role you can play. That was one thing that was great is you’ve got crisp on where your value was and how you could add value. Was that hard to think through?
It is hard to think through. It’s easy to say, “These are the things I’m good at.” You have to look at it from the point of view of what can you offer the company as board governance and from a board role. The boards don’t run the day-to-day company. That’s what you have leaders, managers and executives for. The board’s there to provide guidance and strategy and key decisions. How can you help them make those key decisions and add value? You do need to think about it from a little bit different point of view as opposed to here’s the value I bring a company and my day-to-day leadership capabilities to what can I offer a company from a governance role or from a strategic role? Those are different things. It did take a while to say, “What do I think I can add to a board?”
Boardroom: Being in a program not only makes you learn from your mentor but also other people who are participating.
When you first got involved with Boardbound, you were still working for Xcel. What’s your time commitment to go through Boardbound?
It wasn’t too bad. At first, it felt a little daunting with the pre-work and the different things that they gave us. As you got into it, it didn’t feel too bad. We met every two or three months. You had a little bit of homework to do and a book to read. I traveled enough. I found I had plenty of time on an airplane to do that work. Part of it is introspection. How do you think you can add value to a board, talking to other people? I did that. I admit it. I talked to some people that I know that I think highly of like, “I think I have value here. What do you think?” and got some feedback from them. You hear about strengths from some of these people that you didn’t think of necessarily as strength. That helped me coalesce around here’s the way I should phrase this to say how I can add value to a board. It did feel a little daunting at first because the job I had took a lot of time. It was a 60 to 80-hour a week job. It did feel a lot at first. Once I got past the first meeting or two, I found that it wasn’t that bad. It was easy enough for me to stay up with the class and to get a lot out of it. It’s like everything else. You get out of it what you put into it.
Thinking of the first board meeting that you went into after you got brought on this board. Take us to when you’re in at that board meeting. What were you thinking?
It’s fair to say I was nervous. I had met most of these people beforehand as either part of the interview process or having lunch with them. I knew almost all of them. Still, you’re nervous because you don’t necessarily understand the dynamic. You don’t know how their board governance and their structure works. I was pleased to be placed on the audit committee at first because that’s one of those prized committees on boards. You can learn a lot on an audit committee and you get a chance to see the goings on the financial side and the goings on at the company. I went into it very much, “I’m going to be an open mind and a sponge. I need to learn a lot.” I was nervous. You’re watching the dynamics and trying to understand the different roles different people are playing. It’s probably quiet for the first half of the board meeting and then try to make sure that I was contributing and asking questions and things of that nature. You don’t want to just be there. You need to contribute and to participate and engage. It was like your first day on a new job because it is a job. A board role is a job and you have to remember that it’s not a, “It’s cool,” and all that stuff.
We get pre-work, financial statements, information and the agenda. You need to go through that and spend some time before the board meetings. I had done that. I had reached out to the CFO and said, “Will you take me through this stuff beforehand?” He set up a web conference and we went through a lot of the stuff beforehand so that I knew what I was getting into. I wasn’t asking rudimentary questions in the board meeting. I’m not going to tell you that I immediately went in there and had my feet under me and felt comfortable because it’s not true. I’d say by the time we got to the second meeting, I was starting to get a little more comfortable with the process, how it works, what to expect and knowing people and how they communicate or don’t. Not everybody’s an effective communicator. Understand what some of the dynamics are and do a little bit better job engaging and participating in the meetings.
Are there any women besides you on that board?
People can help you more if they know what role you can play.
There are not. It’s a small board. I’m the only independent Director. The rest of the directors are members of the parent holding company. My perspective is that independent outside, a strong operations background and then connections into the utility industry that they’re looking and hoping to market their services to. I am the only woman. The company has a woman Chief HR officer. She’s usually in the room for the board meetings as well, but the rest of the participants are men.
The value adds when you come in the board. You’ve got the first board meeting. How many board meetings have you been at?
Four, the fifth one will be later.
When you think about day one, the first board meeting and you go in now, what’s your mindset difference between the two?
I’m not nervous anymore. I feel like I understand the numbers and the process better. The company has been through a lot. They weren’t hitting some of their targets and their numbers. We’ve had some challenging board meetings as we’ve talked through what some of those issues have been. We worked the plan a little bit. It’s been intense at times. It’s like a lot of other things when you’ve been through some more intense, things aren’t always rosy conversations. It helps you focus on what’s important and what the dynamics are.
Certainly, the financial side is critical but you can’t hit your financial targets without a lot of other things working correctly in a company. That’s true if you’re a public company or a private equity firm. We’ve had a lot of interesting conversations about the employees, their incentive programs, the culture and the way the employees are interacting with their frontline leaders. I feel a lot more comfortable now. I know a lot more about the company. I know the people a little bit further down in the company. I have a good idea of what their weaknesses and their strengths are. You’re trying to help them build on their strengths and how to make sure that weaknesses aren’t taking them down. It’s different now than it was before and I’m a lot more comfortable with the process.
You’re working for this company and strengths and weaknesses and progress and not progress in some of the areas. Do you have the bandwidth to be on another board?
Boardroom: A good board can provide good direction and focus for a leadership team.
I think so. I’m retired. I’m doing a little consulting and I’m doing board work. That’s what I wanted to do when I was retired. My bandwidth is going to be how many do I want where my husband and I could still travel and do the things we want to do? I could easily do...
