Sixty-four percent of managers in the U.S. are afraid to be alone in a room with a woman. Mentoring is all about being alone in a room with someone. Let's start talking about this honestly. The lack of equal access is the silent killer for women and no one wants to talk about it.

Leadership is about making others better as a result of your presence and making sure that impact lasts in your absence." (Harvard Business School definition of leadership)

Women are not making it to the top. A hundred and ninety heads of state; nine are women. Of all the people in parliament in the world, thirteen per cent are women. In the corporate sector, women at the top - C-level jobs, board seats - tops out at fifteen, sixteen per cent.

Everyone knows that marriage is the biggest personal decision you make, but it's the biggest career decision you can make.

I think when tragedy occurs, it presents a choice. You can give in to the void, the emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even breathe. Or you can try to find meaning. These past thirty days, I have spent many of my moments lost in that void. And I know that many future moments will be consumed by the vast emptiness as well. But when I can, I want to choose life and meaning.

The best decision I ever made was to marry Dave.

For any of us in this room today, let's start out by admitting we're lucky. We don't live in the world our mothers lived in, our grandmothers lived in, where career choices for women were so limited.