Are You Going to Jump?

How as a Young Woman I Learned to be a Risk Taker

In university I went sky diving with six girlfriends. This was a spur of the moment plan that seemed a good idea at the time. Later as I crouched in the tiny space by the airplane door I asked myself how I can jump when I am literally trying not to fall out.

The airplane rumbles and shrieks. The door is wide open and the wind rips through trying to suck us out. I am kneeling on the floor, hanging on for dear life. My friends leap out one by one. I was placed last, because I am smallest. It is my turn to jump. I am terrified.

I slide gingerly towards the gaping door. The instructor makes eye contact.

“Are you going to jump?”

This is madness surely. Taking two deep breaths, I fill my lungs with the cold October air.

“We can take the plane back if you aren’t going to jump.”

Failure was an option that comes with a full refund. They would take me back to the hanger. I am stubborn. Given the choices; succeed or fail, I will never choose failure. I accept that goals are not always attainable. But this day with my future in my own hands, I will not give up.

As trained, I reach out to grab the strut below the wing and jump. Thirty seconds later I am floating with a glorious canopy open above my head. The descent lasts forever as every moment becomes a memory for eternity.  Autumn red and gold stretches from horizon to horizon turning pink as the sun balances on the edge of the world. I float down. The ground almost catches me unprepared. I pull up in the last minute and manage a tiptoe landing. After today, I can do anything.

That was years ago. Looking back I feel that I owe my career to embracing risk despite feminine instincts for caution. For twenty-two years I have traded financial products on a football field sized trading floor.  We sit elbow to elbow surrounded by computer screens. Switchboards connect us to financial centers around the world. The air crackles with adrenaline as we plug into a global market.

As a managing director in capital markets, I mentor young talent. Despite my efforts, few women follow in my footsteps. Why is it so hard to draw woman into the trading profession?

The answer came to me one day watching my eight year old son skate across the kitchen floor using a yellow Fisher Price bus as a shoe. He is wearing the bus on his left foot. His right foot pumps the ground for speed through the kitchen. Arms spread out for balance he careens past us.

Men, even little men, are hard wired for taking risk.  As they grow this tendency is reinforced. Their emergence into adulthood is punctuated by trials of manhood. University in particular is an arena for contests of adrenaline. As ill conceived as young men’s stunts may be (skiing down the stairs in a freshman dorm), taking risk in escalating challenges builds important foundations for ambition and success. Woman can be taught to embrace risk too. We can learn to take risk and then pair it with our natural desire to measure action against consequence. This creates a powerful combination. I believe that women are exquisitely suited for taking measured risk. In finance where risk must be measured against reward, the art of intelligent risk taking is the critical ingredient for long term profit strategies. This is how women can carve out important niches for themselves in traditionally male dominated professions. Take an inherently male quality such as testosterone infused risk taking. Learn it. Own It. Make it a female quality. The result, risk with controls could change the world.

Step one is that women need to learn to take risk. 

I was lucky, my father taught me.

I am three. My Dad hoists me on his shoulders. He rises slowly blinded by my arms that strangle his head. “Let go”. “Stand up”. I rise from my knees. My bare feet plant on his shoulders but I am still crouched with arms around his head. He grabs my ankles. “You can stand I have your legs”. Slowly I stand. “Spread your arms for balance”. My airplane arms spread wide. He starts walking, laughing. The world of our living room unfolds before me with new and dizzying perspective. Anything is possible if I can fly.

Dad took me up my first cliff at age six - a real cliff - we used ropes, harnesses and hard hats. These climbs with Dad were precious events made rare by my mother’s horror that this was what her ex-husband considered acceptable childcare.

When I was ten my Dad took me up a more serious climb at Bon Echo. “Don’t tell your mom”. Fear stole its way back to me unexpectedly after three rope lengths. The water below looked like shimmering glass that would tip and spin away from me. Ripples of waves undulate far below. Balance departed. Standing still felt like falling forward one millimeter at a time. Practically speaking this was not the appropriate time for a change of heart. So I faced the rock wall. Ignoring the voice in my head whispering “look down”, I resolutely fasten my gaze at the rock while climbing the rest of the way.

Dad took me up my first mountain at the age of sixteen. At the bottom he asked me whether I wanted to take the easy way or do a true climb. I choose the hard way. I am to this day frightened of heights but I learned to seek out the things that scared me, face my fears and challenge myself.

To teach ambition we must first teach bravery. We all feel more comfortable in a familiar setting. But to venture beyond our comfortable circle to try new things and meet new people that requires bravery. We all have the capacity for bravery. It means accepting the fear of failure - that sinking feeling in the bottom of your stomach or lump of worry that knots in your throat. Face what you fear and do it anyway.

I watch my friend’s young daughters run through the cottage woods with my boys. I realize that girls have the raw material for risk taking. They lose it somewhere on the path to womanhood.

So I share the story of how exhilarating it can feel to take risks in your personal life. Leap quite literally into your own future and in so doing equip yourself for ambitions in a more corporate context.