Early in her career, Maggie Ruvoldt spent a day shadowing a team of human resources professionals at General Electric, watching them act as the beating heart of the company. That day convinced Ruvoldt she wanted to work in HR.

“As a function, [HR has] to be experts at what we do,” but “we also have to be experts at what everybody else does,” explained Ruvoldt, CHRO of Baltimore-based LEARN Behavioral, a national organization that provides personalized, evidence-based applied behavior analysis therapy for children and young adults with autism and other special needs. Three decades later, she has a breadth of experience in HR. 

While advancing her own career, she also cultivated a passion for developing women in leadership. In 2024, Ruvoldt attended a fireside chat focusing on women’s leadership that featured Mary Margaret Frank, dean of the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School — where Ruvoldt earned her MBA — and Tamla Oates-Forney, CEO of SHRM Linkage. At the time, Ruvoldt had let her SHRM membership lapse, but hearing Oates-Forney speak compelled her to renew.

“Early in my career, [SHRM] was really critical to how I met other HR folks and how I developed my initial HR skills,” Ruvoldt said. “Now with this different point in my career where I’m more focused on how to give back to communities that helped me grow ... I [decided to] renew my membership.”

Overlooked Skills

Ruvoldt particularly values soft skills — such as communication, teamwork, and adaptability — which are among the unique strengths women bring to leadership and to the workforce. These are “by far the hardest skills for anybody to develop,” she said.

However, Ruvoldt pointed out that these qualities might not be valued at every organization, and there is no one-size-fits-all approach to leadership. That said, data supports her valuation of soft skills. Women rate higher than men in leadership skills such as taking initiative, acting with resilience, practicing self-development, driving for results, and displaying both integrity and honesty, according to 2019 research published in Harvard Business Review.

And yet, the same study found that women — especially those under age 25 — rated their confidence much lower than men. Additionally, despite outperforming men in many leadership capabilities, women make up just over 10% of Fortune 500 CEOs — a record high to date.

Ruvoldt said she’s dealt with “all the traditional” gender-related workplace obstacles, such as being asked to take notes as the only woman in the room and having colleagues question whether she would return to work after adopting her children. In situations like these, Ruvoldt has developed standard responses, such as suggesting a junior employee join the meeting to take notes as a professional development opportunity or asking what prompted the inappropriate question.

Women Are Stronger Together

Women in leadership more often feel left out of key networks than their male counterparts, according to a 2021 SHRM survey. But feeling left out doesn’t mean you should give up.

Instead, Ruvoldt encourages both aspiring and current women leaders to build their own networks. She is a champion of building relationships but notes that it’s not about the number of connections you have — it’s about having people you’ll show up for and who will show up for you. It’s essential to have people outside of your current organization whose expertise you can tap into, she said, as well as people who have already accomplished things that you may want to emulate.

Ruvoldt also emphasized the importance of women leaders seeking out those with shared identities and experiences for support. There are many ways women can advocate for one another in the workplace. Ruvoldt is a firm believer in both mentorship and sponsorship, which are two separate concepts.

“A mentor is somebody who you [can] be 100% vulnerable with,” she explained. They can work within your organization or outside of it — unlike sponsors, who work within your organization. Mentors “give you career advice; they have no stake in your career game other than wanting you to be successful.”

During her tenure as chief people officer at 2U, based in Arlington, Va., Ruvoldt began a “Mentoring Mondays” group to bring together women she was mentoring across the organization. It provided an opportunity for the participants to build what Ruvoldt calls a “personal board of directors” — a network specifically cultivated to give career advice and to demonstrate the potential of your own career trajectory.

Member Resource: How to Build a Successful Mentorship Program

Ruvoldt once experienced pushback from a male colleague related to Mentoring Mondays, as he thought men should be involved in the group as well. Her response was simply to invite her colleague to form his own group for men.

Over the years, Ruvoldt had a few mentors of her own to show her the impact HR has on a business, to act as a sounding board, and to also be her sponsors when they worked in the same organization.

Sponsorship comes only from within your organization, but according to Ruvoldt, it’s “the most important thing leaders can do. ... A sponsor is somebody who puts your name up for things. Being [a] sponsor for others is all about amplifying their voice, amplifying their accomplishments.”

She pointed out that decisions about your career are made when you’re not in the room, so having a sponsor is vital to anyone’s growth.

Ruvoldt also acts as an advisor to women-led startups, connecting women founders with her own network and exposing them to potential funding opportunities. For example, Summer, a student loan and education assistance benefits company based in New York City, connects HR teams to programs that reduce student loan debt for employees as high student loan payments have resurfaced as an issue post-pandemic.

Less than 3% of venture capital funding is awarded to women-led startups, according to PitchBook, a global data and insights company based in Seattle. That number climbs to approximately 20% when the organization has a male co-founder.

“I joined [Summer] as an advisor because mission-driven companies solving problems like these are important to me,” Ruvoldt said.

Paying It Forward

In her approach to women’s leadership development, Ruvoldt also homes in on the importance of intersectionality — the idea that discrimination varies across overlapping identities — in addressing the unique challenges faced by different groups of women.

For example, a LeanIn.org and McKinsey & Company report found that women of color held just 6% of all C-suite roles at U.S. and Canadian companies in 2023, while white women held 22% of those roles. Ruvoldt began to incorporate intersectionality in her mentoring and sponsorship after building relationships with women who have different identities than her and realizing that this piece was missing from her approach.

It’s a continuous learning process, but “expecting people who have different lived experiences than you to shoulder the burden of teaching you is the first mistake you make,” Ruvoldt explained. “Get yourself educated as much as you can. Be curious. Be open. Hear their stories.”

Once you’ve made it to the upper echelons of the workforce, particularly as a woman, “you’re responsible for kicking that door open and holding it open for everybody who’s coming up behind you,” Ruvoldt said.

She advises aspiring women leaders to cultivate sponsors, build and maintain those relationships, and “when you do make it into the room, make the most of it. Own the moment that you got invited to the meeting, that you’re there for your expertise.”

Ruvoldt reiterated the importance of networking and relationship-building. “Work is not a meritocracy, and it’s never going to be,” she added.

HR professionals can also be a particular help to advance women in the workforce. “Whatever your purview is, if it’s benefits, if it’s policies, whatever it is, look at that through the lens of across the life cycle for women ... and particularly at those moments of change,” Ruvoldt said. Working women have different needs across different stages of life that require different benefits, such as fertility coverage, inclusive parental leave policies, and menopause care. Ruvoldt advised both HR professionals and women workers to share their stories with one another to initiate these important conversations.

Whether you pursue mentorship, sponsorship, or simply advocate for yourself on an unequal playing field, Ruvoldt said success is about acting on “small moments of courage” and building upon that momentum. “There’s very little that, when you’re doing [it] with good intention, will get you fired or in trouble or hold you back,” she said. “And if it is, you’re in the wrong company.”