Jim McCaffrey

TBS

If only all male bosses were like Jim McCaffrey, EVP of Operations & Strategy at TBS. Well, we can dream.

A few years ago, Michelle McGuire, a senior director at TBS, approached McCaffrey with a plan to give 100 women the chance to advance their careers by joining WICT.

“It was supposed to be an hour-long meeting because I thought I was going to have to give him the hard sell,” McGuire recalls. “Right away he said, ‘Great, I don’t see why not.” Currently Atlanta-based McCaffrey underwrites membership for more than 500 employees in the Atlanta chapter of WICT. The national headquarters of WICT is located just outside of Washington, D.C.

For McCaffrey, mentoring is finding talented employees and helping them reach their potential. Mentoring women brings a broader range of perspectives into leadership.

“At that intersection you get the highest probability of success. That’s where you get the best thinking.” It’s also about math. “Nobody’s getting 30 shares anymore. It’s all about aggregating smaller and smaller audiences. How are you going to reach them if you don’t understand the shoes they’re standing in?”

McCaffrey mentors six employees in a formal program. He mentors informally as a matter of routine. “It allows me to understand what people are thinking and what the challenges are…The information flows both ways.”