For example, 'Michelle Obama's hair has a lot of movement, and if you look at Sarah Palin's hair, she has this bang and it's sexy,' says Ted Gibson, a New York City stylist who counts celebrities like Lupita Nyong'o but also many high-powered CEOs as clients. And even in more conservative centers, like inside the Beltway, in D.C., ladies have a more balanced relationship with their cans of hairspray. For one, the new chief executive of General Motors, Mary Barra, wears a sweeter, slightly longer 'do with side-swept bangs. (When I switched careers, I let my own blunt cut grow longer with soft, easy layers.) So it's with sweet relief that I'm sensing change afoot in other industries as well. 'You're taking a chance with a different hairstyle.'ĭespite the bob's proven power in the boardroom, I've never really been that big of a fan of the style itself. 'Fashion and hair are ways to express yourself or to get attention, but for many women who have a seat in the boardroom, that's not what they want to be noticed for,' says Sophie Eden, who has been conducting executive searches for a decade and cofounded the London recruitment agency Gordon & Eden. Power Bobs Sheri McCoy, Marissa Mayer, and Meg WhitmanThese women are the latest in a long Of the 23 female CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, 15 sport versions of it, including the curled-at-the-ends cut of HP's Meg Whitman, the layered, tucked-behind-the-ears interpretation of Avon's Sheri McCoy, and the stick-straight look of Yahoo's Marissa Mayer. That style remains the most powerful haircut in the United States. Looking back almost 10 years later, was I being overly dramatic? Maybe. The effect of my short chop? Polished, blunt, and to the point. To get ahead, I assumed my halfway-down-my-back waves had to go I needed to mirror the powerful women I saw around me-the ones with bobs that had side parts and the precise edges of a samurai sword. I had always loved my long hair, but I was in my twenties, fresh out of law school, and working at a firm with colleagues many years my senior. 'Make me look like a power lawyer,' I ordered a hairstylist in a chic Manhattan salon, my steely demeanor clearly an attempt to hide my apprehension about making such a major change in my hairstyle.

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