It can be hard for a woman to imagine herself doing things she never saw women doing while she was growing up. (Herein lies the case for Biologist Barbie, but we digress.) So, when women first entered the workforce, they not only had to contend with lingering sexism in industries unaccustomed to having ladies around, but they had to overcome that innate self-doubt that, well, no one had ever told them they could be CEOs before. Since we're looking back on that time from present day we know that women obviously believed that they could, and then they did. This very journey is the subject of AOL's MAKERS: Women in Business, a new series airing on PBS, in which we'll hear directly from the most successful women on the planet.
Let's be clear: This isn't a history lesson in feminism. MAKERS brings personal stories straight from leaders like Ursula Burns, the CEO of Xerox and the first African-American woman to head a Fortune 500 company; Sallie Krawcheck, Wall Street powerhouse and current owner of the global networking platform for women, 85 Broads; Cathy Hughes, radio and television personality and the first African-American woman to head a publicly traded corporation; lifestyle mogul and business magnate Martha Stewart; and Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook who's been teaching us about leaning in for quite some time now.
The AOL series airs Tuesday, October 28 at 9 p.m. on PBS, and Martha Stewart will host a virtual screening on Wednesday, October 29 at 8 p.m. Preview an exclusive clip here before it's time to woman up and watch the whole thing.