America leads major progression for women in business with 27 women acting as Female CEO’S of the S&P 500.
Of the U.S’s largest publicly traded companies, 27 are now run by women, up from just 18 in 2009. The women also reach a broad scope of sectors, including industries typically dominated by men, such as Energy and Utilities. It’s a massive breakthrough for female CEO’S, who traditionally have been associated with beauty and retail sectors. 
Patricia Kampling heads up Alliant Energy, a fast-growing company that joined the S&P 500 in June of this year. She became fascinated by energy as a kid when she lived through a blackout in New York City in 1965.
Whilst the milestone is record breaking, and despite the efforts of celebrity ambassadors such as Beyonce, Emma Watson and Lena Dunham, female CEO’S make up just 5.4% of the 500 companies. Author of a new study on the CEO Gender Gap, Pavle Sabic said ‘The overall numbers are up, but they’re still quite small’.
‘Lean In’ movement’s Sheryl Sandberg released a statement this week saying that America is still decades away from gender equality at work.
The list of Female CEO’S is as follows:
1. Debra Cafaro of Ventas
2. Irene Rosenfeld of Mondelez International
3. Indra Nooyi of Pepsico
4. Ursula Burns of Xerox
5. Denise Morrison of Campell Soup
6. Beth Mooney of KeyCorp
7. Debra Reed of Sempra Energy
8. Garcia Martore of TEGNA
9. Patricia Kampling of Alliant Energy
10. Virginia Romnetty of IBM
11. Heather Bresch of Mylan
12. Marissa Mayer of Yahoo!
13. Margaret Whitman of Hewlett Packard Enterprise
14. Lynn Good of Duke Energy
15. Phebe Novakovic of General Dynamics
16. Marillyn Hewson of Lockheed Martin
17. Mary Dillon of ULTA
18. Mary Barra of General Motors
19. Safra Catz of Oracle
20. Susan Cameron of Reynolds American
21. Barbara Rentler of Ross Stores
22. Susan Story of American Water Works
23. Margaret Keane of Synchrony Financial
24. Patricia Poppe of CMS Energy
25. Vicki Hollub of Occidental Petroleum
26. Tricia Griffith of Progressive Corp.
27. Shira Goodman of Staples
