Helen Zhou was born in Shanghai, where she was raised by her grandmother. She graduated from the Sun Yat-sen University in English and Business and started her career at a beauty brand in Guangzhou. She is now General manager of Guerlain, China.
In 2013, she applied to Sephora, her first job within the LVMH Group. She had to be interviewed by the Group's President for China. To her great surprise, when she opened the door, the President turned out to be a woman, Anne-Véronique Bruel.
Anne-Véronique, who is now CEO of FRESH, asked her to sit down not in front of her, but beside her: "And this has completely changed the relationship, because sitting on the opposite side as I used to do to report to my line manager, it gives some kind of hierarchy." Helen remembers.
This particular moment made her realize that women can reach the highest positions, while remaining true and authentic: "Being a female leader doesn’t request being a copycat of other leaders”.
Since then, Helen has completely changed her way of being a manager, she doesn't hesitate to express her feelings to her team, to talk about her own difficulties. Finally, Helen realized that « [she can be true to who [she is]”.
All content for Confidences particulières is the property of LVMH and is served directly from their servers
with no modification, redirects, or rehosting. The podcast is not affiliated with or endorsed by Podjoint in any way.
Helen Zhou was born in Shanghai, where she was raised by her grandmother. She graduated from the Sun Yat-sen University in English and Business and started her career at a beauty brand in Guangzhou. She is now General manager of Guerlain, China.
In 2013, she applied to Sephora, her first job within the LVMH Group. She had to be interviewed by the Group's President for China. To her great surprise, when she opened the door, the President turned out to be a woman, Anne-Véronique Bruel.
Anne-Véronique, who is now CEO of FRESH, asked her to sit down not in front of her, but beside her: "And this has completely changed the relationship, because sitting on the opposite side as I used to do to report to my line manager, it gives some kind of hierarchy." Helen remembers.
This particular moment made her realize that women can reach the highest positions, while remaining true and authentic: "Being a female leader doesn’t request being a copycat of other leaders”.
Since then, Helen has completely changed her way of being a manager, she doesn't hesitate to express her feelings to her team, to talk about her own difficulties. Finally, Helen realized that « [she can be true to who [she is]”.
Since she was little, Mathilde Christiansen had always been interested in making clothes, but never really considered that maybe it could be a job.
But when the choice came to study, she picked a foundation course in fashion, and has worked in the sector ever since. In 2013, Mathilde was senior designer at Kenzo when her boss left the Maison. No one amid the management team had approached her to offer her to replace him at the head of the menswear design team. And she, "as often women" as she said, was too afraid to ask. Then, one day... at the coffee machine, she dared to ask. At first, the Director was not very convinced, so he put her to the test for six months.
Six months later, Mathilde had proven she was capable of being Head of Design for menswear at Kenzo, that she could be trusted. She has learnt how to manage a team and in the end, even if the collection she presented was not – in her opinion – the best she had built, she did it and got the job.
It was quite a pivotal moment because she also realized that if she had not asked, they probably would never have considered her.
Now she's more confident. "It's worth asking. The worst thing that can happen to you is someone saying no”.
Confidences particulières
Helen Zhou was born in Shanghai, where she was raised by her grandmother. She graduated from the Sun Yat-sen University in English and Business and started her career at a beauty brand in Guangzhou. She is now General manager of Guerlain, China.
In 2013, she applied to Sephora, her first job within the LVMH Group. She had to be interviewed by the Group's President for China. To her great surprise, when she opened the door, the President turned out to be a woman, Anne-Véronique Bruel.
Anne-Véronique, who is now CEO of FRESH, asked her to sit down not in front of her, but beside her: "And this has completely changed the relationship, because sitting on the opposite side as I used to do to report to my line manager, it gives some kind of hierarchy." Helen remembers.
This particular moment made her realize that women can reach the highest positions, while remaining true and authentic: "Being a female leader doesn’t request being a copycat of other leaders”.
Since then, Helen has completely changed her way of being a manager, she doesn't hesitate to express her feelings to her team, to talk about her own difficulties. Finally, Helen realized that « [she can be true to who [she is]”.
