World Economic Forum 2018: Pioneering women are chosen to lead again

For four days, the seven chairwomen of the World Economic Forum in Davos will be the faces of successful women around the world

For four days in January, the seven chairwomen of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, leaders who hail from France, Australia, the United States, India, Italy and Norway, will be the faces of successful women around the world.
 
Below is a look at six of the seven, who will serve along with Isabelle Kocher of Engie.
 
Sharan Burrow, General secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation
 

Was named one of the most influential women in Brussels by Politico in 2016. Was the first woman to be elected general secretary of the ITUC in 2010 and re-elected in 2014
 
Fabiola Gianotti,  Director general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN)
 

She is the first woman to hold this post. From 2009 to 2013, the globally renowned particle physicist, led one of two teams of physicists that discovered Higgs boson, the ‘God particle’
 
Christine Lagarde,  MD of the IMF
 

In 2005, Lagarde was appointed France’s trade minister, and in 2007 she became minister of finance, the first woman to hold the position in any of the Group of 8 countries. She became the first woman to lead IMF in 2011
 
Ginni Rometty,  Chairwoman, president and chief executive of IBM
 

Rometty became the firm’s first female chief executive in 2012. She joined IBM in 1981 as a systems engineer, after having worked at General Motors
 
Chetna Gala Sinha,  Founder and president of the Mann Deshi Mahila Bank and Mann Deshi Foundation
 

In 1997, she founded India’s first rural cooperative bank owned by women: Mann Deshi Mahila Bank, which provides women access to financial services, business loans and training
 
Erna Solberg,  PM of Norway
 

Nicknamed Norway’s Angela Merkel, Erna Solberg was elected in 2013 and again in 2017, becoming the first Conservative PM to win a second term since 1985. In 2016, she was appointed a leader of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals Advocacy Group