10 Most Powerful Women in IT

Here is our list of the 10 most powerful women in the IT industry. Plus one who is no longer with us, but whose absence would disqualify any list that omitted her.

10. Kim Polese, CEO, SpikeSource

After having been president and CEO of Marimba, this Silicon Valley star took over the reins for this Kleiner-Perkins funded open-source business applications vendor in Sept. 2004.

“[Customers’] IT staff are consumed by scouring for patches and features and downloading those and then incorporating them into an integrated installation process. That takes an enormous amount of time, and that’s the problem we are setting up to solve for these companies, offloading that task for them.”-Polese to eWEEK.

9. Susan E. Sheskey, Senior Vice President, CIO, Dell

Named to her position in Aug. 2005, Sheskey also compiled key planning, development and operational experience during 20 years with Ameritech’s corporate and services functions and at Ohio Bell.

8. Padmasree Warrior, Executive Vice President and CTO, Motorola

Warrior holds the purse strings on the company’s $3.7 billion research and development investment. She is leading the company toward more acceptance of things open source, leading some to believe Motorola will stop being an also-ran in chips and cell phones.

7. Shona Brown, Senior Vice President, Google Business Operations

Brown took on responsibilities for Google’s business operations in 2003. She is the author of the best-selling business book, “Competing on the Edge: Strategy as Structured Chaos”, which introduced a new strategic model for competing in volatile markets. She has also published broadly in both applied and academic journals. Shona has a bachelor of computer systems engineering degree from Careleton University in Canada and a master’s degree in economics and philosophy from Oxford University as a Rhodes scholar.

6. Ann Livermore, Executive Vice President, HP Technology Solutions Group

Livermore leads Hewlett-Packard’s Technology Solutions Group, a $33 billion-plus business that encompasses storage and servers and software and services.

5. Susan Decker, President, Yahoo

Decker is responsible for driving strategy at Yahoo, and is responsible for driving the company’s recent reorganization plan and advertising platform.

4. Pat Russo, CEO, Lucent

Russo has served as the CEO of Lucent since 2002, and is one of the executives who helped launch the company in 1996, out of the rubble of Bell Labs.

She previously served as president and chief operating officer at Eastman Kodak.

3. Meg Whitman, CEO, eBay

Whitman has served as president and CEO of eBay since March 1998, and has overseen its expansion into broader e-commerce areas, including the acquisitions of PayPal and Skype and the taking of an equity position in Craigslist.

Previously, Whitman was general manager of Hasbro’s Preschool Division, responsible for global management and marketing of the Playskool and Mr. Potato Head brands. From 1995 to 1997, she was president and CEO of FTD (Florists Transworld Delivery), the world’s largest floral products company. While at FTD, she oversaw its transition from a florist-owned association to a for-profit, privately owned company.

2. Anne Mulcahy, CEO, Xerox Mulcahy has been chairman of the board since Jan. 2002 and CEO since Aug. 2001. Previously, Mulcahy was president of Xerox’s General Markets Operations, which created and sold products for reseller, dealer and retail channels.

1. Diane Greene, CEO, VMware

Greene is simply the CEO of a company that enjoyed a rather massive IPO (initial public offering).

“I think you’re going to see the ability to run more desktops on servers and companies investing more in thin clients. This is going to allow companies to have PCs with instant restart, no booting and have a lot more control over the management of the data.”-Greene to eWEEK

Grace Hopper (Dec. 9, 1906 – Jan. 1, 1992)

No list of powerful women in IT could be complete without mentioning Grace Hopper, a true pioneer, not just as a woman in a man’s world, but as a brilliant computer scientist at every level. She is credited with inventing, among others, the code compiler and the COBOL programming language. She received the National Medal of Technology in 1991.