Over the past twenty years, we have seen the amazing growth in women's leadership.
While women are now leading everything from giant tech to international banks, they remain significantly not indicated in the strongest corporate positions.
To highlight the changes of this narrative, we recently reviewed more than 3,000 people to identify the most inspired women's leaders in each state.
Here's what stands for us as we dig the results.
| Name | Position | Business | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cynthia Crutchfield | CEO | Modern Alabama | Alabama |
| Betsy Lawer | Chairman, President and CEO | First National Bank Alaska | Alaska |
| Christine Ehrich | CEO | Axis for autism | Arizona |
| Marcy Doderer | President and CEO | Arkansas Children's | Arkansas |
| Lynsi Snyder | With -owner and president | In-n-out burger | California |
| Linda Alvarado | President and CEO | Alvarado construction | Colorado |
| Krista Bradford | Founder and CEO | The good search / intellelati | Connecticut |
| Janice Nevin | President and CEO | Christianacare | Delaware |
| Christine Duffy | President | Carnival Cruise Line | FLORIDA |
| Carol Tomé | CEO | United Parcel Service (UPS) | Georgia |
| Sherry Minor-McNamara | President and CEO | Chamber of Commerce Hawaii | Hawaii |
| Anne Reeve | CEO | Chris Reeve Knives | Idaho |
| Erika Allen | CEO | Urban growers collective | Illinois |
| Kristen Cooper | Founder and CEO | The startup ladies | Indiana |
| Tiffany O'Donnell | CEO | Women lead to change | Iowa |
| Cheryl L. McAfee | CEO | Mcafee3 architects | Kansas |
| Amy Luttrell | President and CEO | Good Kentucky industry | Kentucky |
| Deanna Rodriguez | President and CEO | ENTERGY NEW ORLEANS | Louisiana |
| Melissa Smith | Chairman and CEO | Wex Inc. | Maine |
| Crystal Hansley | Founder and CEO | Wesolar | Maryland |
| Carolyn Kirk | CEO | Massachusetts Technology Collaborative (Masstech) | Massachusetts |
| Mary Barra | CEO | General Motors | Michigan |
| Beth Ford | CEO | Land O'Lakes | Minnesota |
| Donna Ladd | CEO, co-founder and editor | Mississippi Free Press | Mississippi |
| Kathleen Mazzarella | CEO | Graybar Electric Co., Inc. | Missouri |
| Mary Johnson | CEO | Wavelength electronics | Montana |
| Denise M. McCauley | CEO | Woodmenlife | Nebraska |
| Karen S. Haller | CEO | Southwest gas holdings | Nevada |
| Holly McCormack | CEO | Cottage Health Care System, Inc. | New Hampshire |
| VALERIE MONTECALVO | President and CEO | Bayshore Recycling Corp | New Jersey |
| Steph Sherrodd | President and CEO | Sandia Laboratory Federal Credit Union | New Mexico |
| Joanna Geragty | President and CEO | Jetblue airways | New York |
| Sheila Robinson | Founder and CEO | Diversity Woman Media | North Carolina |
| Twylah blotsky | President and CEO | Butler Machinery Company | North Dakota |
| Gina Boswell | CEO | Bath & Body Works, Inc. | Ohio |
| Kari Watkins | CEO | OKLAHOMA CITY NATIONAL MEMORIAL & MUSEUM | Oklahoma |
| Katie Poppe | Co-founder and CEO | Blue star donuts | Oregon |
| Madeline Bell | President and CEO | Children's Hospital of Philadelphia | Pennsylvania |
| Kristen Adamo | President and CEO | Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau | Rhode Island |
| Lou Kennedy | CEO | Nephron pharmaceutical | South Carolina |
| Sarah Eagle Heart | CEO | Back to Heart Foundation | South Dakota |
| Fawn Weaver | CEO | Uncle the closest premium whiskey | Tennessee |
| Kathryn farmers | CEO | BNSF Railway | Texas |
| Jenny Grberg | CEO | Booksmarts | Utah |
| Mari mcclure | President and CEO | Green Mountain Power | Vermont |
| Kathy warden | Chairman, CEO and President | Northrop Grumman | VIRGINIA |
| Denise Moriguchi | CEO | Uwajimaya | Washington |
| Elizabeth Mcilvain | President and CEO | The Fiesta Tableware Company | West Virginia |
| Shawna Nelson | CEO | Organic Valley | Wisconsin |
| Heather Shoemaker | CEO and founder | Language I/O | Wyoming |
Basic findings:
Health care is a strong line for women's leaders.
A noticeable chunk of top CEOs hospitals, nonprofit health systems, or health care changes.
From the Madeline Bell to the chop to the Marcy Doderer in Arkansas Children's and Dr. Janice Nevin in Christianacare, these women are not just in charge of hospitals – they are recovering how health care has been delivered to their communities. In a historical industry shaped by male executives, these leaders bring new depth to care, policy, and access.
Some of the most influential leaders are not household names – yet.
While figures like Mary Barra and Beth Ford are well known, others like Christine Ehrich (Axis for Autism) and Jenny Groberg (Booksmarts) quietly re-consist of the way critical services are delivered, often with more hands-on, personal approach.
The balance of national recognition and innovation of indigenous people is part of what makes it feel fresh and real.
States with fewer corporate offices often raise leaders in nonprofit, education, or community businesses.
You see this especially in places such as South Dakota, West Virginia, and Vermont, where the traditional Fortune 500 powerhouse is scarce.
In these cases, inspiration is drawn from women who run economic development groups, nonprofit reading, or local manufacturing companies.
It is a powerful reminder that the “impact” is not always measured in income – sometimes it is about changing ground level.
Women are at the forefront of male -management industries – but they are still excluding, not the rule.
Transportation, energy, aerospace, and tech all appear on the list – Kathy warden in the Northrop Grumman, Patricia Poppe in PG & E, and Joanna Geraghy in jetblue are strong examples.
But their presence features a broader issue: development is real, but the pipeline still has serious gaps.
The spirit of the entrepreneur is alive and prosperous.
Many leaders on this list are the founders, not just CEOs – women like Whitney Wolfe Herd (Bumble), Erika Allen (Urban Growers Collective), and Monica Smith (Marketsmith) build companies from ground up.
Their stories are not just about climbing stairs – about developing them where no one is ahead of.
There is a growing emphasis on leadership led by values.
From Sustainable Farming (Beth Ford) to ethical manufacturing (Gail Friedberg Rottenstrich to Zago) and Equity Equity (Fawn Weaver of Uncle closest), many of these leaders not just operate businesses – they use business as a vehicle for the good of society.
The thread of decision -based values is something that seems strong to female executives today.
Final thoughts
This list is not just inspiring – it is informative. It shows that leadership is no longer a size-fits-all.
These women carry a mix of emotional intelligence, skill operation, and deep goals in the table – and it changes not only what companies look like, but how they operate.
We often talk about breaking the glass ceiling, but what these women do is more annoying: they redesign the floor plan.
They prove that success can look like compassion, cooperation, and community impact, not just stock prices and IPOs.
Procedure
Online panel survey of 3,021 people based on age, gender, and geography. Sources of internal data are used to obtain population data sets. We use a two-step process to ensure representativeness through stratified sampling and post-stratification weighting.
The respondents were carefully selected from a geographic representative of the online-opt-in members of the online panel. This selection is further aligned to meet the accurate standard required for each unique survey. Throughout the survey, we designed the questions to carefully screen and prove the respondents, guaranteed the survey alignment with the perfect participants.
To ensure the integrity of our data collection, we used a set of data quality methods. Next to conventional steps such as digital fingerprinting, bot checks, geo-verification, and speed detection, etc. Our commitment extends to open responses, undergoing them to be evaluated for gibberish answers and discovering plagiarism.
