WHEN FORMER PEPSICO
CEO Indra Nooyi joined
the beverage and snack gi-
ant in 1994, she had never
worked with a more senior woman or
even had a close female colleague at
her level. The 15 top jobs in the com-
pany were all held by white American
men in blue or gray suits. The bylaws
of corporate America had been writ-
ten for men by men. Nooyi would go
on to change some of those rules, but
to get to the top, first she had to learn
them. “If you don’t understand what
happens in the corridors of power
by interacting with men, you end up
falling further behind,” she says.
Those corridors, like the rest of
our lives, have moved online over thepast 18 months, making it even more
challenging for women to elbow
their way into the spaces that have
long shut them out. In a survey of
members of Fortune’s Most Power-
ful Women community—a group
that primarily consists of CEOs and
other C-suite executives—55% said
they did not think they could have
advanced to their current role if they
had spent significant stretches of
their career working remotely. In a
virtual world, how do you know that
no one clued you in on the important
Zoom that is happening right now?
When you’re physically present, you
can walk past the conference room or
peer into your boss’s office. “At least
then you know you weren’t invited,”We know working
women—particularly
those in low-wage
jobs or with young
kids—are in crisis.
But for those taking
the long view, there’s
an urgent question
on the horizon: Will
the pandemic also
infect the pipeline to
the top of corporate
America?Are Women
on a
Collision
Course With
the COVID
Ceiling?
By Beth Kowitt
ILLUSTRATION BY JANELLE BARONE