Women's Leadership Blog

Top 5 Most Powerful Women in the World

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It is a fact, that women make extremely effective leaders in various industries. There are hundreds of women in top positions—both governmental and entrepreneurial—across the globe. The following is a list of the top five most powerful women in the world.

Angela Merkel

How would it feel to have the fate of an entire union of countries resting in your hands? Just ask Angela Merkel. Elected to the German Bundestag in 2005, this Chancellor has been on quite a ride since the start of this global economic crisis. Given that Germany is one of the few financially stable countries in the European Union—and thereby one of the few capable of bailing out the at-risk nations such as Greece and Italy—Merkel is in quite a prominent position. After all, Germany has remained a heavy export nation during her time as Chancellor, and is the only European country with the means necessary to bail the bankrupt countries out.

In addition to her current role, she served as chairwoman for many years in various political parties, and in 2007, she became the second woman ever to chair the G8 summit. She is staunchly focused on health care reform and future energy policy for her country, but right now, she is most focused on ensuring the collapse of the EU doesn’t occur. Because the fate of several nations’ economies and an entire currency could be in her hands, Merkel lands the #1 position of most powerful women in the world.

Hillary Clinton

Next up on our list is Hillary Rodham Clinton. She is currently the Secretary of State under the Obama administration, but this is just one of many outstanding achievements she has accumulated in her extensive political career. Before becoming Secretary of State, she was a US Senator for the state of New York from 2001-2009. She ran against Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008, but even though she didn’t win the nomination, Obama realized her resourcefulness and appointed her as the Secretary of State in his presidential cabinet.

Before she became a senator, Hillary Clinton was the First Lady from 1993 to 2001 under her husband’s administration. Here, she was actively involved in the public policy process, and aided her husband in making several important decisions in regards to the presidency and his executive duties during this term.

Dilma Rousseff

As the first female president of Brazil, Dilma Rosseff garners the #3 slot on this list. Before getting into the arena of politics, she protested against the then-military dictatorship and was even arrested on one of these occasions. She later delved more into her own education and found a strong interest in economics. She helped to found the Democratic Labour Party, which would later be her platform for running for the presidency. She also served as a Minister of Energy in an administration prior to the resignation of Jose Dirceu. In 2010, she took a leap of faith and ran for the presidency and won the election.

Indra Nooyi

As Chief Executive Officer of the second largest food/beverage business in the world, Indra Nooyi takes the #4 slot on the list of most powerful women in the world. PepsiCo, the company she oversees, operates in dozens of countries across the globe, and it has been positively flourishing under her administration. Nearly every list—Forbes, Fortune, Time Magazine, Wall Street Journal, etc.—have listed her as one of the top women in business for several years running. She was responsible for many mergers, including one that brought popular sports drink Gatorade under PepsiCo’s jurisdiction. Revenues have been dramatically increased ever since she was promoted to CFO and later CEO, and the future only looks brighter with Nooyi in charge.

Sheryl Sandberg

This is a woman that has served in governmental roles and private sector positions. As current chief operating officer for the popular social networking site, Facebook, Sandberg lands #5 on the list of most powerful women in the world. Before landing her new position at Facebook, she worked for many years at Google. She was VP of the Global Online Sales and Operations division and primarily responsible for the creation of Google.org, a philanthropic organisation headed by Google. The sky is the limit for this ambitious internet entrepreneur, and we will be seeing much more of Sandberg in the coming future.

Merkel, Clinton, Rousseff, Nooyi, and Sandberg prove that women can handle vast amounts of power and exercise it wisely. Whether it’s heading an entire country or running an important division in an internationally-run company, these women are responsible for some of the most important tasks in the political, economical, and business communities.

This article was written by Justin Toladro from Life Insurance Finder. He blogs about different policies and affordable life insurance for you and your family.