How to get into the room where the real vote happens
By the time the steering committee holds its vote, the outcome is already set. It was settled in a hallway, a text thread and a pair of brief calls the week before, and the meeting simply makes it official. When you refine your most persuasive case for an upcoming session in Salt Lake City, you are effectively drafting something that will end up in the official record. That isn't cynicism. It's how organizations operate, and it's the reason sponsorship counts for more than polish once you reach a certain level. According to the 2025 Women in the Workplace study by McKinsey and LeanIn, 45% of men starting out have a sponsor, while only 31% of women at the same stage do. Put simply, a sponsor is the colleague who gives you a heads-up about a meeting while it is still forming, well ahead of anything being scheduled.
The gatekeeper
Think back to the most significant decision that affected your role or your group most recently. For each statement below, respond yes or no, and then tally how many of those outcomes made sense to you only after they had already happened.
1st You could identify the two or three individuals who would effectively settle the matter.
2nd In private, you talked with at least one of those people before the agenda went out.
3rd You foresaw the objection most likely to come up and knew which colleague was going to raise it.
4th During the previous week, you posed this question to a senior colleague: "What are people saying about this?"
5th You grasped what the decision maker's own boss was hoping to accomplish with the result.
6th You lined up one ally who agreed to speak first in your favor.
7th You brought your proposal to someone who would test it before the formal review took place.
8th You were able to sense whether the question was still under discussion or had already been resolved.
9th Across a table at a Salt Lake City coffee shop, a colleague talked you through the entire plan face to face instead of flipping through slides.
Question ten You were pulled into a discussion that existed on no one's official calendar.
Interpreting your score
Eight to ten: fully embedded within the circle of influence. You're in the rooms that count. What you need to do now is help another woman step into those rooms alongside you.
Four to seven: close to the core, as in Sandy or Murray. News reaches you on the Wasatch Front, sometimes soon enough to make a real difference. You handle the work and part of the politics, yet a vote still catches you off guard now and then.
Zero to three: standing on the outside. You get ready thoroughly for meetings that, in practice, were over before anyone walked in. This says nothing about your character. Nobody explained to you that the agenda marks the last stage of a decision, not the first, and women frequently have to work this out on their own because fewer of them have a sponsor to walk them through it.
Your following step
Between eight and ten, pick one woman two levels below you in a place like West Jordan or Sandy and let her know what is actually happening before the next big decision. This is precisely the role a sponsor plays, and you are now well placed to fill it.
Between four and seven, before your next proposal, set aside twenty minutes with whoever is most likely to push back and ask them to help you find the weak spots. When people voice doubts in private, those doubts tend to turn into public backing, since individuals support what they helped to shape. The Salt Lake Chamber's Women & Business Conference and local groups such as Business Women's Forum – Salt Lake Chapter are good places to find those people.
Between zero and three, this week, put one simple question to a senior leader in Murray or Draper: "What's being said about this before it goes to the committee?" Then take the time to listen. The answer tells you who to speak with next, and the fact that you asked signals to them that you understand how things really run here.
Count your yeses, and send this to the woman in your office who always seems to hear first.