11/08/2025
It’s always an honor for our CEO Lenetra King to share expertise from her 20 years’ experience as a C Suite executive and as an Advisor/Coach to C Suite players.
Lenetra was a guest speaker for the Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. Southwest Region Delta PEARL cohort as part of their leadership and professional development discussions.
The message was simple: far too many think that hard work and talent are enough to advance careers — but this is one of the biggest workplace myths, especially for underrepresented professionals.
And for Black women in particular who desire senior leadership roles, having a sponsor is not a luxury, it is a career imperative.
The importance of sponsorship is validated by research studies that revealed:
-Women advance faster and get paid more when they have at least one sponsor
-Women and men are 75% more likely to remain in new roles for longer than 1 year when they are sponsored (other workplace data show the failure rate of executive leaders in new roles — startling that within the first 18 months, almost 40% of new executive leaders get demoted, quit altogether or get fired)
The reality check is that most people aren’t promoted based solely on their performance…and knowing the elements of how promotion decisions are made are a gamechanger.
Sponsors are just ONE element of the game we don’t talk about enough.
-Knowing what a sponsor is, is one thing.
-Knowing how to position yourself for senior level sponsorship is another thing altogether.
But who is willing to say your name in meetings and in rooms you’re not in— that is the multiplier.
Having a sponsor not only changes career trajectories, it impacts individual, family and community economic vitality when professionals use these levers to secure promotions with higher compensation packages.
Again, a game changer!
