The Most Influential Women in Sports

Many women wielding power, influence and positive energy in the very competitive and still male-dominated sports world are in the boardroom pushing for equality in opportunity and salary.

And whether they play, coach, referee, own or operate a team, administer a league or negotiate better conditions for play and play, the impact of women, now more than ever is being felt in all aspects of sports.

So below we celebrate a half-dozen women, in no particular order, who are making a difference. This is just a fraction of the energetic, powerful and influential females who are a force in sports:

The Most Influential Women in Sports

Kim Ng.  As MLB Senior Vice President for Baseball Operations, Ng is the highest-ranking woman executive in Major League Baseball with a goal to be the league’s first female general manager. She has worked for the NY Yankees, Chicago White Sox, and LA Dodgers and has come close to GM selection for the San Diego Padres, Seattle Mariners, SF Giants, and NY Mets.

Now overseeing a pepper game of responsibilities — international baseball operations, scouting division and the fall league for the MLB. – Ng calls her job a “chance for me to contribute in a very meaningful way to the game” while still keeping her eye on her long-term goals.

Serena Williams. Yep, the world’s highest-paid female athlete hasn’t won a grand slam final as of late but she’s still a winner in her impact on sports, the fashion industry and the business world.

Most importantly, she’s a role model to up-and-coming tennis players and working mothers. The number of young women in amateur and professional tennis – some part of Black Girl Magic – is a growing trend attributed to Serena and her sister Venus.

She also serves as an inspiration to mothers returning to the workforce, a challenge for Williams due to the difficult birth and recovery after the birth of her daughter, Alexis. Whether she bests tennis champion Margaret Court’s grand slam total or not, Serena already has aced her legacy.

Charlotte Jones Anderson – The Dallas Cowboys’ executive vice president and chief brand officer joined her father, Jerry Jones, in the family business in 1989. She is in charge of maintaining the brand of “America’s Team” and helped her dad build the Cowboys into a $4 billion Texas empire.

A longtime big dreamer, she turned the halftime show during the Cowboys annual Thanksgiving Day game into a charitable opportunity for the Salvation Army, where she is a board member, providing millions the worthy cause.

Recently she unveiled the team’s latest venture, The Star, the billion-dollar headquarters and Cowboy training facility. As part of the first-ever partnership between an NFL team and a local school district, the facility is open to area students as way to assist and inspire future athletes. She also chairs the NFL Foundation and is a member of the league’s Safety, Health and Conduct committees.

 

Megan Rapinoe. The co-captain of the FIFA World Cup-winning US National Women’s Soccer Team spreads her arms wide to embrace a wide range of causes and injustices that her celebrity and soccer abilities casts a bright light on. Whether it be equal pay for herself and teammates, (the US team just won “class status” in it gender discrimination fight), or overall equality, gay rights, and social injustice, Rapinoe stands for change in the world.

The FIFA Golden Boot winner and co-winner of the Women’s Sports Foundation “Sportswoman of the Year” takes her role as influencer very seriously: “I want to reimagine what it means to be successful, what it means to have influence, what it means to have power, and what that all looks like. … I’ve gained this incredible platform in such a short period of time, but I’m not going to stand on it alone.”

Shelia Johnson. co-owner Washington Mystics, Wizards and Capitals. The epitome of an overachiever, Johnson is founder and CEO of Salamander Hotels & Resorts and vice chairwoman of Monumental Sports & Entertainment, where she is the only African-American woman with ownership in three pro sports teams – Washington Wizards (NBA), Washington Capitals (NHL) and the Washington Mystics, who just beat the Connecticut Sun to win the WNBA Championship.

This year she was the recipient of the Billie Jean King Leadership Award given by the Women’s Sports Foundation for setting an example of outstanding leadership and for making significant contributions to the advancement of wownba men in sports and the workplace. She also is a global ambassador for CARE, a humanitarian organization that provides disaster relief to areas in crisis.

Jill Gregor. As NASCAR’s first woman chief marketing officer, Gregory is truly living life in the fast lane. With multiple responsibilities including content development, brand marketing, analytics, and other marketing roles, she has the challenging job of expanding the fan base with an eye toward diversity while maintaining the excitement of longtime fans.

Gregory, who was recently named one of the most powerful women in sports by AdWeek magazine, takes very seriously her responsibility as a trailblazer at NASCAR. She is eager to maintain the momentum that will provide more opportunities for women in leadership roles at the sports behemoth. She draws inspiration from another visionary woman in motorsports, Lesa France Kennedy, executive vice chair of NASCAR.

Gregory says, however, that regardless of mentors, her advice to women is “follow your own compass and do what you think is right, and be authentic to who you are,” according to an AdWeek profile.

 

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