- Accenture CEO Julie Candy has a plaque in her house that claims, “If your dreams don’t scare you, they’re not big enough.” “I look at it every day when I think about where I need to take our company, and where I need to continue to learn as a company,” she mentioned at Fortune‘s Most Highly effective Ladies convention in Riyadh.
Accenture’s chair and CEO, Julie Candy, has shared the motto she repeats to herself when she looks like she’s bitten off greater than she will chew in her profession.
“My own inspiration is a plaque on my wall that says, if your dreams don’t scare you, they’re not big enough,” the CEO revealed at Fortune’s Most Highly effective Ladies Summit in Riyadh. “And I used that when I was trying to become CEO of Accenture.”
Ambitiously reaching for the issues that scare her has labored out effectively for Candy’s profession. Earlier than becoming a member of $199 billion market cap tech big Accenture in 2010 as common counsel, she spent a decade as accomplice at Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP. In 2019, she grew to become Accenture’s first feminine CEO and took on the function of chair in 2021.
At the moment, the 57-year-old attorney-turned-CEO ranks second on Fortune’s Most Highly effective Ladies record, which was simply launched as we speak. She is amongst simply 5% of Fortune International 500 firms helmed by a lady chief—and none of these have extra staff than Accenture’s 800,000-plus.
But, regardless of her accomplishments, she nonetheless finds herself trying again at that motivational plaque at her house every day.
“I look at it every day when I think about where I need to take our company, and where I need to continue to learn as a company,” Candy concluded. “So I hope for all of you that your dreams scare you, because that means you’re going to make the impact that I know you can.”
Go for the goals that scare you—however don’t ignore any abilities gaps
It’s not sufficient to simply shoot for the scary stars. Candy revealed that her promotion to CEO required a tough have a look at the gaps in her ability set. Having climbed the company rankings in regulation, she needed to critically brush up on her tech data earlier than stepping up on the tech powerhouse.
“When I joined Accenture in 2010 as the general counsel, I didn’t know what a CIO (chief information officer) was,” Candy mentioned on stage. “I come from a law firm. We didn’t have such a thing. We didn’t use technology. I’m old enough to remember when we didn’t have the internet.”
At the moment, she says leaders—irrespective of their background or present business—can’t do the highest job with “deeply understanding” know-how, “not as plumbing, but because AI is going to change everything in the front line.”
However all is just not misplaced if you happen to don’t know what a CIO is; It doesn’t robotically imply the door to management is shut.
“I share with you where I was in 2010 because anyone can learn these skills,” Sweet added. “At 42, most of the skills that matter today I didn’t have. 15 years later, I have them.”
This story was initially featured on Fortune.com
