Ahead of International Women’s Day on March 8th, Stephanie McMahon sat down with leading female journalists from across the globe to discuss a range of topics including her WWE career, female empowerment and the importance of representation within the WWE.
During the media panel, McMahon would discuss topics including BME representation within the WWE, how WWE is changing the global landscape of women’s wrestling and the impact her gender has had on her ability to speak and be heard within corporate meetings.
Speaking on the later, the WWE Cheif Brand Officer would state:
“I have been the only woman in very large groups of male-dominated meetings, many times. I do have the advantage of being the boss’ daughter but there have been times when I felt my voice didn’t matter as much. In those situations, you just have to speak louder. You have to grab the moment; you can’t let it intimidate you. If you want to make a point that really matters, you just make it. You have to use your voice and have the confidence to do it.”.
The rise of female representation at board level has been part of an international focus from a range of organisations including ‘Equilar Inc’ and ‘5050 Women on Boards’, most recently achieving their target of having female representation at board level in the top 3000 global organisations surpass 20%.
In 2020 this number would rise to 20.2% a strong rise from 15% in 2016, as reported by The Wall Street Journal.
The WWE Cheif Brand Officer would continue on to discuss her critically acclaimed WrestleMania 34 match alongside partner Triple H against the duo of WWE Hall of Famer Kurt Angle and women’s combat sports icon Ronda Rousey.
Discussing the importance of her match against Rousey, Stephanie McMahon would refer to the face-off as her toughest challenge in wrestling before stating that as the only non-respected athlete within the match, she felt the need to prove herself worthy of the WrestleMania slot:
“Facing Ronda Rousey at WrestleMania 34 was one of my big challenges personally and professionally. She’s so amazing that I had to train myself to just be able to showcase her because it was her debut in WWE. She was the first women’s champion in the UFC, the first female fighter to be inducted into the UFC Hall of Fame and she was the first American woman to earn an Olympics medal in judo. She was an incredible person with a great backstory, but she was tough. It was her debut, and it was a tag match. She teamed with Kurt Angle who is another medallist, against me and my husband Triple H who is an iconic star. The only one who didn’t belong to this professional athlete circle was me. I had to train three times a day for three months. On top of this, I was also a mom by then and I was competing with my husband, I didn’t want him to look bad or my father to look bad who had created WrestleMania, it was a huge challenge. I learnt so much about myself even though I was so scared.”
Ultimately, McMahon’s hard work and training would pay off, with the Mixed Tag Faceoff considered one of the highlights of WrestleMania 34 and considered one of the most successful wrestling debut matches of all time.
Capping off this segment of the interview, McMahon would recall her eldest daughter reminding her of a quote on managing fear and growing as a person, stating that she still aims to follow this advice every day and how it led to her accepting the WrestleMania match:
“Actually, my oldest daughter reminded me of a quote by Eleanor Roosevelt, ‘To do something you are afraid of every day,’ I still follow it. So back then I chose to go for the match because it was a privilege that not many people have.”
Ronda Rousey would last wrestle for the WWE during the WrestleMania 35 main event, dropping the RAW Women’s Championship to the massively popular Becky Lynch. Rumours surrounding Rousey’s WWE status have spread ever since however no official announcement has been made on if or when ‘The Baddest Woman on the Planet’ may return to the WWE.
Stephanie McMahon continues to lead the WWE both backstage as the Cheif Brand Officer and also occasionally on screen as an authority figure, McMahon would last wrestle for the WWE at WrestleMania 34 however her role and impact within the organisation can be seen and felt every day.