Marisa Estévez has spent more than 27 years at the telecoms company BT, where she is now global director of business operations. She is also president of EJE&CON, the Spanish association of women executives and directors, and has made the case for leadership that is open to people regardless of gender or age.
An engineer in a male-dominated field
Estévez studied telecommunications engineering at the Polytechnic University of Madrid, at a time when very few women chose the subject. After an MBA and executive training abroad, she worked at Hewlett-Packard and DHL before joining BT.
She believes an engineering background is good preparation for running a business. Engineering, she says, teaches a systematic way of solving complex problems, comfort with data, and the habit of working in mixed teams — all skills that translate directly into management.
Equality in leadership
As president of EJE&CON, Estévez leads work to increase the number of women in senior positions. Women are now well represented in middle management in Spain, but much less so on executive committees and in chief executive roles. In her view, real progress needs changes in how companies promote people, not just goodwill.
The association has promoted a code of good practice for companies on merit-based promotion, and runs an initiative that makes women experts more visible, so that conference organisers and the media can no longer claim they cannot find them. “Visibility creates role models,” she says.
AI does not remove responsibility
Having watched technology evolve over three decades, Estévez argues that artificial intelligence must be adopted responsibly. “AI doesn’t eliminate human responsibility,” she says. Companies, in her view, should check their systems for bias, be clear about the data they use, and make sure that people can override automated decisions when it matters.
What makes a good leader
She sums up her leadership philosophy in a few principles: setting an example through ethical behaviour, communicating transparently, delegating while keeping oversight, developing talent, and having the courage to take decisions based on evidence.
