Carol Waters was in her early 30s—experienced, self-confident and unafraid to tell truth to power.

So when the chairman of the board of her insurance company told the gathered office about some supposed gains by women in the corporation, Waters told him he was wrong, fully expecting to be fired. The result changed her life.

Meet Carol Waters

Today the volunteer program coordinator for Snoqualmie Valley Hospital, Waters is a relatively recent Valley arrival. She moved to Snoqualmie from Kirkland five years ago with husband Jeff,  drawn in large part due to their membership in the Snoqualmie Ridge TPC golf club.

Waters was born a Texan, moving to the Northwest after her father bought a company in San Francisco, followed by her mother insisting on a Washington education.

Out of high school, she became a marine insurance underwriter before going to college at 26, studying business and communications at the University of Washington.

In the 1980s, Waters was an employee of Pacific Indemnity Insurance Co. of Short Hills, New Jersey. One day, the chairman of the board, Bill Chubb, came to meet with employees. In the conference room, in front of the whole office, Chubb mentioned how women were moving into branch management positions.

“I challenged him,” said Waters. She knew that the chairman had been misinformed, and wasn’t shy about saying so, despite the ire of her managers.

The next day, Waters was called into the board room. She expected the worst.

“I thought, if I was going to be fired, I was going to go down in flames,” she said. “I wasn’t a young girl. I had been in business. I knew I was right.”

Inside, she met the chairman, who admitted she was right.

“We had a chat about management,” she said. Waters told him that, ultimately, it was the boss’s responsibility to ensure that he is told the truth.

Chubb offered her a job at company headquarters. Waters turned it down for a chance to become the company’s first female branch manager, responsible for the state of Florida.

“I did break the glass ceiling,” she said.

There was a catch, though. Waters did end up working directly for Chubb, too, as a special troubleshooter. She flew around the country, reining in recalcitrant managers who would refuse to toe the company line.

“If he ran into a problem, my job was to turn it around,” she said. “I was very lucky.”

Waters never had to fire anybody. Her subtle threat to recommend the managers for a promotion to the Detroit office usually did the trick.

“I’d say, ‘This is a really nice view,” she said. “‘But I think you’re ready for a bigger challenge.’”

“There would be a long pause,” she said. “Almost without fail, there would be, ‘How soon do I need to start this new program?”

The managers she was talking to were usually men in their mid-to-late 30s, going places, with a lot to lose. Waters simply had to remind them of the need to be team players.

Back in business

She eventually took a leave to get married.

“I did the whole dogs, cats, kids routine,” she said. Waters is now married to her second husband, Jeff.

Carol and Jeff were friends for years before their marriage. With four grown children— two apiece—and now grandchildren, their is a close extended family.

“His kids are my kids, my kids are his kids.

Following parenthood, Waters went back into the workforce, became general manager of a regional insurance brokerage. When that business sold, she started her own company, training business owners how to cold call, or make unsolicited sales calls, and develop leads.

“I could teach you to cold call,” Waters said. “I could teach a dog to cold call.”

Eventually, Waters started her retirement. But she quickly found that life boring.

“I was a complete bust as a retired person,” Waters said. “I’m not very good at hobbies. You can only spend so much time playing golf, especially in this country.”

She could only spend so much time volunteering, too.

“There is a burnout,” Waters said. “The more you do, the more you’re asked to do. It’s like being nibbled to death by ducks.”

Volunteers must pace themselves to stay balanced. To Waters, the effort “never filled me up to make me feel like I was making a difference.”

That’s one of the reasons she took the job she has now: emphasizing ways for people to see and measure the impact they make.

Volunteer leader

As volunteer coordinator for Snoqualmie Valley Hospital, Waters launched a program that now oversees about 40 people, ensuring that their efforts streamline the work of paid specialists.

“Volunteers never replace a paid employee. They do jobs that take time away from staff members who need to be focusing on what they do best,” Waters said. By handing off administative tasks, like filing and scanning, paid staff can spend more time working with patients and families. In return, volunteers get a sense of satisfaction.

Hired two years ago, she brought deep experience in volunteering, non-profits and management, including as president of her own company.

Waters makes a point of passing on her experience to the young people, teens and students in their early 20s, who help at the hospital. Those young volunteers often don’t know what it’s like to be in the ‘real world.’

“I try to give them something to take with them for the rest of their lives,” he said. “I teach them things that my mentor, who was chairman of the board, taught me.”

One important lesson: “There is no such thing as a menial task,” Waters said. “Every single person has a job; they wouldn’t have it if it wasn’t important.”

She makes sure they don’t say ‘He’s just a janitor,’ or ‘She’s just a receptionist.’

“You have to learn that if you take these important positions away, you take a big chunk out of the team.”

Career advice

Waters developed her approach to business from within, while learning several important lessons from the corporate leaders who molded her. From early bosses, she learned that benevolence is important in a manager, as is the velvet fist—the strong but subtle approach that allows employees to understand their parameters.

“A lot of it was just scrapping—figuring things out, being a logical person, looking at the long term effects, not just solving the problem.”

Her advice to women, indeed applicable to anyone, is about empowerment.

“Don’t blame. Don’t complain. Don’t explain,” she said. “Women lose power when they walk into a meeting late and feel they have to explain why.”

Start making excuses, Wates said, and “any credibility you had went out the window. Walk in, sit down and shut up.”

The same goes for blaming others.

“If it’s a mistake, say ‘I’ll solve it.’ Don’t say ‘It was her fault,’” Waters said.

As for complaining, Waters doesn’t accept whining.

“You’ve got a problem? Go to the top. It doesn’t do any good to complain to the janitor about what happens in the management.”

Part of what helped Waters connect to Chubb, the chairman of the board, was that she was unashamed to speak truth to power.

“That was one of the things that was a tenet of his successful life,” she said. “That’s what I did as a brash young woman.”