Our goal is to help women executives maximize their leadership impact through access to a vetted executive community and valuable insights. Diversity is core to our community — we want our member base to be a reflection of what leadership should be, not what it is today. We understand there is a steep hill to climb for women and others across the gender spectrum in business, and it's even steeper when you consider the experience due to factors including one’s race, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, or disability. In addition to our membership criteria, we strive to build a diverse community that serves multiple and intersecting identities. That is why one of our membership goals is to double the current representation of women of color in corporate America. And we welcome leaders who identify as a woman, transgender, nonbinary, and gender nonconforming.
Our membership experience is designed for those who have senior leadership responsibility within their organization. We vet applicants for executive seniority to ensure our members can get support from true peers. We use a range of factors to determine if your seniority level meets the criteria for the Chief community.
See our membership criteria here.
After applying, if you have questions about your application or want to provide additional context about your professional experience, please reach out to [email protected].
We welcome extra-small business employees (company size under 30 full-time employees) whose experience within the last two years meets our membership criteria OR whose current business generated $2M or more in annual revenue, during the current fiscal year. For these reasons, we may request additional information or documentation including:
Criteria effective date: 9/14/23.
We understand the power of a strong network naturally leads members to doing business with each other, and we encourage this connection across our community. It is, however, critical that Chief is a trusted community for our members. We have a strict non-solicitation policy and do not allow proactive sales or marketing efforts within the Chief community for the sole purpose of driving future business.
The first step is to submit an application. If you meet our membership criteria, we reach out, on average, within one month to schedule a 30-minute membership consultation. During the consultation, we spend time getting to know your career and professional goals and discussing how Chief can help address them, including which membership plan is the best fit for your needs. We’ll also have plenty of time to answer questions you may have about the Chief experience.
If you have questions about the status of your application, please contact [email protected].
If an applicant does not meet our criteria for membership, we keep their information on file until they experience a role change and/or scope increase. We invite all applicants to proactively email [email protected] for an update or if they meet the criteria for membership based on a role or scope change. We are exploring how we update this process to be more clear about pending membership status. We also provide clear and detailed criteria on our website so applicants have an understanding of how we vet applicants for membership. For more information on our membership criteria, visit our Membership Criteria page.
We welcome our members to submit nominations by logging into the member site and navigating to the Nominations page in the side bar.
Our membership experience is designed for those who have senior leadership responsibility within their organization. We vet applicants for executive seniority to ensure our members can connect with true peers. If you do not yet meet our membership criteria, it is not a no, but rather a not yet. We hope to invite you to join as you progress with your career or we evolve to serve more segments of women in the workplace.
Yes, certain industries and titles can vary in terms of the qualification for Chief membership. Below are examples of industry-specific titles that can inform qualification criteria for Chief membership.
Banking / Financial Services:
PR/Advertising/Marketing Agency
Nonprofit Organizations
Law Firms
Government Administration
Higher Education
Titles such as "Chief of Staff" and "Head Of" can vary with company size, reporting structure, levels away from CEO, and past experience.
Different geographies may use alternative titles, such as Managing Director or Director as the seniority equivalent of CXO or Vice President. We consider size of company, levels from the CEO, and size of team, in addition to scope and responsibility for qualification in those circumstances.
We believe it’s incredibly important for all women, at every stage of their career, to have access to a supportive community. That being said, Chief’s services are specifically designed to support people in executive leadership positions, typically in the corporate sphere. Individuals in executive management are often asked to be the mentor, but go without support for themselves. Our goal is not exclusion — we are focused and intentional in building a trusted community of executive peers. Right now, our member experience is not expressly tailored to address the unique needs of independent consultants or executive coaches, but we recognize that the value of a Chief membership can show up differently to different individuals. If you are interested in membership, please reach out to [email protected].
Chief membership is designed to maximize the leadership impact of women executives. We offer three membership packages that are tailored to executives’ individual leadership goals:
All Chief Members have access to our network and services, including in-person and virtual community gatherings and bespoke networking events. Additionally, our Concierge team is always on hand to connect them with the most relevant Chief resources at any point in their membership.
To learn more, visit chief.com/explore.
All of Chief’s membership packages — Executive Advisory, Executive Coaching, and Executive Education — offer:
Community Experiences:
Chief is not a career service or business development network. While we provide general workshops and community groups to support a member’s journey to a board seat, Chief is not a board placement service.
To learn more, visit chief.com/explore.
We love receiving event and speaker ideas from the broader business community and invite you to share those recommendations by emailing [email protected]. Because we receive an extremely high volume of these requests, and plan our programming roster in advance, we are only able to respond to event and speaker submissions that may potentially fit into our editorial calendar.
We would love to learn more about a potential partnership. Please email [email protected] with background on the opportunity. Because we receive an extremely high volume of these requests, we are only able to respond to partnership ideas on which we would like to move forward.
Chief was founded as a place where women executives could grow, learn from, and support one another. As an organization whose mission is to maximize the impact of women executives, we want our membership to be a reflection of what leadership should be, not what it is today. We understand there is a steep hill to climb for women and others across the gender spectrum in business, and it's even steeper when you consider the experience due to factors including one’s race, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, or disability. In addition to our membership criteria, we hope to build a diverse community that serves multiple and intersecting identities. That is why one of our goals is to double the current representation of women of color in corporate America. And we welcome leaders who identify as a woman, transgender, nonbinary and gender nonconforming. For more details on the above other commitments, please see our full DEI commitment here: https://join.chief.com/DEI-Commitment.
Chief was created to connect and support women and all those on the gender spectrum who are executives. We believe the diversity of our community makes us exponentially more impactful, and our vision is a future where one's race, gender identity/expression, sexual orientation, disability or nationality is not a barrier to leadership.
The Chief Grant Program was developed to reduce the financial barrier for executives who have historically faced identity-based inequity and those employed in the nonprofit sector.
Grants offer a subsidy toward annual Chief membership and are available for both new and existing members at their time of renewal. The subsidy offered is the same for all grant recipients.
Grants are available for executives who have historically faced identity-based inequity (as defined by our criteria below) and those employed in the nonprofit sector. We give grants to both new and existing Chief Members at their time of renewal.
Eligibility is defined as meeting at least one of these criteria:
In addition to meeting at least one criteria, we also request a personal statement from each applicant to understand any circumstances that led them to apply for a grant.
Because we have a limited number of grants, we prioritize a number of factors when evaluating applications, including intersectional identities and individual circumstances (i.e., meeting multiple criteria) and whether or not an applicant’s organization is able to sponsor their membership.
New members can apply for a grant after they complete the application process. The grant application is separate from the Chief membership process.
Existing members can reach out to their Membership Manager or [email protected] as they approach membership renewal.
Once an application is received, our Grant Committee evaluates applications based on a short personal statement, criteria that includes racial and ethnic identity (racial ethnic minority, underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, people of color), LGBTQIA+, non-binary/gender fluid, veteran, disability, nonprofit senior executive, and whether or not an applicant’s organization is able to sponsor their membership.
Applications are reviewed on a monthly basis. We aim to notify members of their grant status via email within four weeks of application receipt.
Because we have a limited number of grants, we prioritize a number of factors when evaluating applications, including intersectional identities and individual circumstances (i.e., meeting multiple criteria) and whether or not an applicant’s organization is able to sponsor their membership.
To access Chief's Clubhouses, members need to purchase the Clubhouse add-on for an additional $1,000 annual fee. Visit https://join.chief.com/clubhouse-overview for additional information.
Chief has Clubhouses in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. They feature elevated lounge spaces, bookable meeting rooms, private call rooms, and mother’s rooms, as well as all-day food and beverage service. With the Clubhouse add-on, you can host clients or team offsites, enjoy cocktails, and attend member gatherings at any of our five exclusive locations.
Yes, Members with the Clubhouse add-on can bring up to three guests to any of our Clubhouses in New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.
Yes, in January 2023 we announced Chief Enterprise for businesses looking to proactively invest in their women leaders. Chief Enterprise is for companies that want to progress their gender diversity commitments by engaging, developing, and retaining their women executives. Companies can learn more about Chief Enterprise here.