Rosenfeld, Nooyi Top Most Powerful Female Executives List

Sept. 30, 2011
Woertz, Fields, Morrison, Gordon also on the Top 50 list.

With Irene Rosenfeld at the very top, food processing executives took the top three spots in Fortune magazine’s annual list of most powerful women in business. The magazine in September noted her for her “big show of power” this year in deciding to split Kraft Foods Inc. into two companies. Editors noted it was a reversal of previous philosophy of building the company by acquisition. A gal can change her mind …

The Kraft chairman and CEO switched positions with another chairman/CEO. Indra Nooyi of PepsiCo comes in second. Nooyi and Rosenfeld were 1-2 last year.

Ranking No. 3 is Patricia Woertz, CEO and president of agribusiness giant Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. Jan Fields, president of McDonald’s USA, rose to No. 17 from 25. Denise Morrison, president/CEO of Campbell Soup, came in 21st. Ilene Gordon, CEO and president of Corn Products International, ranked No. 42 — up 16 notches from last year.

By the way: Oprah Winfrey was No. 16, down from No. 6 last year.

The 14th annual ranking of powerful women looks at the size, health, direction and global importance of the business that a woman leads and the woman’s career path and social and cultural influence.

To see the full list, go to http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/most-powerful-women/2011.

Sponsored Recommendations

Revolutionizing Healthcare: The Impact of Digitalization in Biopharma Innovation

Biopharma enables an entirely new level of innovation that’s simply not possible in conventional drug development. It’s an approach that can fundamentally change the way healthcare...

Navigating the Automotive Industry's Electric Future

The automotive industry is at a turning point. Bloomberg estimates that by 2040, 54% of new vehicle sales will be electric. And by 2030, we’re looking at 100% of passenger vehicles...

Unified Process Control Brings Operational Clarity

Inland Empire Utilities Agency replaces its SCADA enterprise system with the PlantPAx Distributed Control System and reduces complexity for operators

PlantPAx DCS Improves Operational Reliability

KC Water calls on R.E. Pedrotti to replace obsolete wastewater SCADA solution with a unified Modern Distributed Control System (DCS).