A CEO With Extra Sparkle
Published in Questrom Magazine
Helzberg Diamonds’ Beryl Raff on making it to the C-suite.
Beryl Raff (BSBA’72) didn’t have to apply for the job of Helzberg Diamonds chairman and CEO—she was handpicked for it by Warren Buffett.
It’s not the first time she’s been headhunted: in 2001, Allen Questrom (BSBA’64, Hon.’15) recruited her to the management team at JCPenney. Raff started her retail career as an executive trainee in the housewares department at Macy’s, rising over nearly two decades with the company to become executive vice president and general merchandising manager of fine jewelry. She then spent six years at Zales, including a term as the jeweler’s chairman and CEO—just the tenth female chair of a Fortune 1000 company. At Helzberg, a Berkshire Hathaway company, she oversees 211 stores in 36 states. If you want a career like Raff’s, you’ll need to:
ASK WHY. “Too often we do things today because we did them yesterday, then we do them tomorrow without asking why. One day, many years from now, a different team will be here and they will assess all the different functions of this organization and wonder why we did things this way. That’s what we have to do ourselves every single day—challenge the status quo.”
DO MORE THAN EXCEL. “I find that when people get to a high-level position but haven’t yet crossed to the C-suite, it’s because they don’t understand the difference between leadership and doing an outstanding job. They feel like because they’re producing a result, they should have that top seat—but that’s not the case. Being a leader means becoming more of a generalist and less of a specialist. If you don’t have that critical leadership component, you won’t succeed.”
LOOK AROUND CORNERS. “Businesses need to reinvent themselves every five years or so. My job is that of a visionary and a strategist. I look around the corners, speculate as to what I think is going to happen—not just for the rest of the season, but over the next three to five years—and get the company ready for those changes.”
GO WITH YOUR GUT. “You have to have the courage of your convictions and the courage to balance critically important data with your gut to make a call. I’ve learned through the years that when I don’t listen to my gut, I regret it every single time.”
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By Toria Rainey