How Marriott Achieved A 51% Female Executive Rate — And What Other Companies Can Learn From It

A quiet, startling number hangs in the air: 51 percent. In the United States, more than half of all executive positions from vice president up at Marriott are held by women. It’s a figure that doesn’t shout; it just sits there, a plain fact, looking a little out of place next to the national landscape, where women hold a mere 29 percent of C-suite roles. At Marriott, women also make up nearly half of the board and half of the CEO’s direct reports.

It feels like walking into a familiar room where someone has rearranged all the furniture, and suddenly you realize it’s better this way, more balanced, with a clearer path through the center.

Something is happening here that is less about grand initiatives and more about the texture of a simple conversation. The company has moved from the gentle, hopeful practice of mentorship to something more deliberate, a concept they call “career acceleration.” Mentorship often felt like a lovely form of happenstance, where a senior leader might keep an eye out for you, and if the right role appeared on a Tuesday when the sun was shining, they might tap you on the shoulder.

It was a system built on good fortune. The new expectation is a direct and disarmingly simple pact. As Frid Edmond, a senior vice president, puts it, the message from a leader to their associate is now, “Tell us what you want, and we are holding ourselves accountable to helping you to get there.”

This changes the very nature of ambition.

It is no longer a private wish you keep tucked away, but a stated goal that becomes a shared project. It’s the difference between hoping someone notices the detailed plan you sketched on a napkin for streamlining the European hotel supply chain and being asked to present that napkin in a meeting. It’s for the junior analyst who loves data but secretly wants to understand the tangible world of sustainable food sourcing for the hotel restaurants.

It’s for the mid-level manager who admits her real dream is to run a small, historic property in Florence, even if it seems impossibly far off. The conversation becomes the starting point, the moment a vague yearning is given weight and a blueprint.

This culture is stitched into the company’s regular rhythm, a required part of the annual performance review cycle for everyone, at every level.

For Edmond, this approach is personal, rooted in an indelible conversation with her own supervisor five years ago—the kind of talk that feels like a key turning in a lock you didn’t know was there, opening a door to a future you hadn't dared to fully imagine for yourself. Now, she holds those same conversations, asking her own direct reports about their aspirations.

It’s not just about filling roles; it’s about discovering the people who will one day redefine them.

• A Statistical Anomaly While women hold just 29% of C-suite positions nationally, they occupy 51% of executive roles (VP and above) at Marriott in the U.S. and nearly half of its board seats.
• From Hope to Accountability The company has shifted from passive mentorship—where leaders might spot opportunities for associates—to an active model of “career acceleration.”
• A Direct Pact Leaders are now held accountable for helping their direct reports achieve their specifically stated career goals, making ambition a collaborative, transparent project.
• System-Wide conversations These career development conversations are not a perk for a select few but a mandatory part of the performance review process for all associates at every level of the organization.