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A figure hunched over her computer screen sporting a black pantsuit accessorized with a tight bun and frameless glasses is typing away, ignoring all possible distractions around her. Her desk is organized, all her papers piled on one corner and her calendar full of hourly events. Her room is bland, with no personalization and the only noise is the clicking of her fingers. However, this isn’t the case for the Chief People Officer at VMware, Inc. On the contrary, Betsy Sutter has a vivacious personality and is always seen sporting a smile. Her room is drowning in light, photos of her family and experi-
ences from VMware are placed throughout her office, and gifts from other coworkers fill empty space. Betsy balances a hectic schedule in a calm demeanor, hiding any possible stress, putting all she associates with at ease and comfort. Sporting a pixie cut hairdo with thick locks that have changed color lately, with matching glasses, she wouldn’t strike you to be such a powerful woman. Her work attire is formal yet chic and is always paired with a friendly expression. You can find her bouncing around from the gym, to her office, or the cafe, smiling and saying hello to everyonefamiliar or new. She’s
constantly making appearances at multiple conferences, locally, and worldwide presenting in front of extremely large, diverse groups of people. Living in the Bay Area, tech companies are extremely popular in all local communities, almost everyone knows someone who works at some business, large or small. However, not everyone knows the fundamental backbone of companies and how you continue to make a business so successful, motivated, and love the work they do. Betsy has experienced challenges like this and embraced them, actively trying to improve the work atmosphere for everyone.
Through many different work experiences, Betsy has found a way of leadership where she focuses on not only helping others but also making it more enjoyable for those around her. Betsy has been working for 15 years at VMware, a company that has been around since 1998. She’s seen the company expand from 150-20,000 in just one location, go public, and hold international projects. The company focuses on virtualization, “a proven software technology that makes it possible to run multiple operating systems and applications on the same server at the same time.” (Virtualization), making two user interfaces compatible with one another. In order to motivate a large company, Betsy has become an activist for implementing and rede-
fining the culture at VMware. Her position as Senior VP of HR has allowed Betsy to have a direct shaping of the atmosphere. More of a leader than a manager, Betsy has evolved the culture at VMware and reestablished their values. She’s instituted many programs that allow the company to give back to the community and now balances a tight schedule between working on the VMware foundation and VMwomen. Other than focusing on VMware’s efforts to give back as well as women’s initiatives in the workplace, Betsy is incorporating the values of EPIC2, which are made and centered around the words and definitions of Execution, Passion, Integrity, Customers, Community throughout all departments of the company trying to enrich the company’s culture. Betsy attended school at the
University of California at Berkeley. After graduating she knew she needed to get a foot out the door. She had started at “a very small tech company and then moved on to a large company then a small company, large company, then a small company that has turned into a large company” (Sutter). She has always maintained the “big people” job, holding leadership roles at companies. Being a mother and a leader, she is able to recognize similar leading tactics she uses in both realms of her life, noting that she has always been a “highly collaborative person” (Sutter). In 2008, she spoke with the current CEO about finding the VMware Foundation, and he agreed. They then began to start drafting, and by 2010 she had hired Nicola Acutt to help build the foundation. After transforming the
“We’re doing multiple things on these Good Gigs Treks” -Betsy Sutter
foundation and taking a “bottoms up” approach where they “democratized philanthropy” they reconnected worldwide in 2012 to restate the values that the employees believed were most important. With feedback from that, the company was able to reinstate the values, and Betsy has been working hard since then to make sure they are present in everyday events. Aside from work, one of Betsy’s greatest accomplishments includes being a marathon runner. She believes that her passion for long distance running is vital for her career and leadership style. She compares building a company to running a marathon rather than a spring or even a 10k. In fact, anything could happen out on the course for 26.2 miles, so you need to be physically and mentally prepared, always anticipating and ready to tackle something that is unexpected. That mindset has helped Betsy get past some really hard and challenging times at VMware and to lead by example. Something she does interesting and unique with marathons though is that she always runs the second half fast than the first, trying to end with a strong finish. She also uses this
technique in the office, no matter how unusual it seems. Betsy is currently striding to help VMware, and the organizations she runs there, to have a much stronger second half than first while she is still Chief People Officer . Easily, Betsy is able to credit her leadership ability completely to her parents and upbringing. A memory still fond from her childhood was taking daily trips to the grocery story with her mother to decide on what to eat for dinner throughout the week. This small and simple task that her mom fronted her at such a young age impacted Sutter and she believes it’s what helped her strengthen the muscle of being able to make a decision. Betsy knows how difficult making decisions is for some people and that they usually take awhile to try and digest, however Betsy has become much more confident with her choice making and has been able to decide many important things on developing VMware’s organizations. It’s wasn’t just her mother’s traditional shopping outings that helped shape Betsy’s journey, but her father as well. From a young age, Betsy’s dad was al-
ways encouraging her to pursue her passions. He would tell her “Do what you love, because life is short, and you’ll spend most of it at work”. So when it was time to go to college, his words of advice maintained, “Go study what you love, and you’ll succeed.” That’s exactly what she did, now Betsy is able to hold a leadership role, something she’s always strived to do. Along with that, she has found balance into bringing her personal life to work and getting to learn many things about the people she works closely to. Those people she does meet with often would probably describe Betsy as someone who is creative, fluid, and agile, “She’s bold, funny, ambitious, has a big heart, and is powerful” (Acutt). Betsy loves to listen and learn about people’s lives, claiming that “although it’s a small part in people’s lives, it’s important, and I believe that it’s truly the meaning of life.” “I can always go for her when I need to, and it’s not just me I know she’s like that for everybody” (Boyle). With a love to connect the dots, Betsy is always trying to listen and hear employees experiences at work and any desires they have to try and work with the VMware
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““I’’ve learned an incredible amount from her and her leadership style.”” ~Nicola Acutt on Betsy
Foundation to try and make the culture a supportive and productive community to everyone so they can give back positively. After focusing her time specifically on leadership through working with women and citizen philanthropy, Betsy knows that she wants to spend rest of her career fo-
cusing on VMwomen, establishing VMware foundation in terms of ways creating new ways to give back, and working on diversity and inclusion particularly in women in business and tech. She wants to help prepare VMware for its next transformation that the economy is demanding and make sure to keep pushing the phi-
losophies and ideology that is being incorporated at VMware. She’s very passionate about the organizations she’s been heading and can’t wait to see them blossom, and approaching VMware with new creative views, hoping to make an everlasting inclusive company.
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Works Cited Acutt, Nicola. Personal interview. 23 Sept 2015 “Betsy Sutter Archives - VMware Careers Blog.” VMware Careers Blog. Price Peacock, 14 Jan. 2014. Web. 5 Sept. 2015. “Betsy Sutter.” VMware Leadership -. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Sept. 2015. Bradberry, Travis. “Are You A Leader Or A Follower?” Forbes. Forbes Magazine, 18 Aug. 2015. Web. 10 Sept. 2015. Boyle, Amber. Personal interview. 22 Sept 2015 DeMers, Jayson. “How To Be A Leader People Want To Follow.” Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 16 Oct. 2014. Web. 10 Sept. 2015. Sandberg, Sheryl, and Nell Scovell. Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print. Sutter, Betsy. Personal interview. 8 Sept 2015. “Virtualization.” Technology & Virtual Machine Software. VMware, n.d. Web. 07 Oct. 2015. “VMware Foundation.” We Are All Citizen Philanthropists. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Sept. 2015.
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