我得到过的最佳忠告：杜邦CEO柯爱伦

    “我父亲开办、经营过一家景观美化公司，他常让我帮奶奶浇花，装饰我们家的院子。他常挂在嘴边的一句话是：“如果你不浇水，花草就会枯死。”我非常讨厌这份差事：给这些讨厌的花朵浇水。可我母亲和奶奶的花园是镇上最漂亮的。

    “当我走出去闯世界之后，父亲的建议可以理解为：全情投入事业，它才会发展。1998年，杜邦（Dupont）高层要求我在公司内创设安全业务。我得到的指点很少，只好从公司里挑了四个背景各不相同的员工加入我的团队。每逢周五下午，我们感到疲惫不堪、灵感枯竭时，我就把团队聚在一起‘浇水’。我们一起探讨我们做的事，哪些是对的，那些是错的，，哪些有效、哪些不管用。我们开创的安全咨询业务的营收数年内就增长到了数亿美元，日后更演变为杜邦安全与保护平台，后者的规模如今已达50亿美元左右。看看杜邦现在所从事的业务，你会发现当初那个小团队其实就是如今我们一个重头业务的前身。”

柯爱伦

年龄：56

工作经验：通用电气（General Electric）商业发展经理；通用汽车（General Motors）前董事；联合技术公司（United Technologies）现任董事；奥巴马总统设立的就业与竞争力委员会（Council on Jobs and Competitiveness）成员

职业成就：首位领导杜邦这家已有210年历史的化工巨头的女性；从她三年前接任算起，杜邦股价累计上涨了141%，远高于同期标普500指数的67%涨幅；她还是美国国家工程学院（the National Academy of Engineering）“改变对话主题：从研究到行动”委员会的联席主席；她在财富最有权势女性排行榜上高居第4位。

译者：小宇

    "My dad started and ran a landscaping business. He put me to work watering plants for my grandmother and for our house. His mantra was, 'If you don't water it, it's going to die.' That was the job I hated most: pouring water on those darn flowers. But my mother and my grandmother had the most beautiful gardens in town.

    "When I got out in the world, my father's advice translated into investing yourself in what you're building in order for it to grow. In 1998, I was asked to start a safety business at DuPont. I wasn't given a lot of direction. I picked four other people in the company with different backgrounds to join me. On Friday afternoons, when we were dead tired and out of ideas, I used to bring the team together and 'water plants.' We'd talk about what was wrong, what was right, what was working, and what wasn't. We created a safety-consulting business that grew to a couple hundred million dollars in revenue in a few years and became the genesis of our safety and protection platform, which grew to about $5 billion. If you think about the things DuPont does today, that small group was the genesis of what is now a large focus of what we do."

Ellen Kullman

Age: 56

Job Experience: Business development manager at General Electric (GE, Fortune 500); former board member of General Motors (GM, Fortune 500); current board member of United Technologies (UTX, Fortune 500); member of President Obama's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness

Claim to Fame: First woman to lead the 210-year-old DuPont (DD, Fortune 500); since she took the helm three years ago, DuPont has returned 141% compared with 67% for the S&P 500; co-chair of the National Academy of Engineering Committee on Changing the Conversation: From Research to Action; ranks fourth on Fortune's list of Most Powerful Women.