In 2025, Andrea Cross was awarded the Actuaries Institute Women Leaders in AI and Data Science Scholarship. Thanks to generous funding from the Actuaries Institute, she travelled to San Francisco to attend the Executive Program in Leadership at Stanford Graduate School of Business. Here, she shares her reflections on her experience.
Having completed her studies, Andrea shared with us some of her experiences.
Twenty years in technology teaches you a lot. What it doesn't automatically teach you is how to lead. That's a different skill and arguably the one that determines your overall impact.
I applied for the Women Leaders in AI and Data Science Scholarship because I wanted to push myself beyond the everyday, draw ideas from different people and places, and come back thinking and leading differently. The CEW scholarship made that possible.
I'd done my research, but nothing quite prepares you until you're there. Stanford's Executive Program in Leadership is intense with 7am starts, back-to-back sessions, and dinner conversations running well into the evening.
I won’t say I was always comfortable - there were moments I was genuinely stretched, challenged to think differently, and sit with ideas that didn't resolve neatly. But alongside 60 executives from across the globe, that discomfort felt purposeful.
Taking a social science lens, the lecturers at Stanford, don't just present ideas. They demand you to challenge your assumptions, consider that power isn't inherently good or bad, it just limits what you can change. Women especially can feel uneasy with ambition and inclined to wait until we feel "ready’, but our biggest barrier to power is often ourselves.
Equally striking was a simpler idea, that as leaders we are "trustees of other people's time." The best leadership is often about what you remove, not what you add. Every unnecessary meeting, every unclear process or decision, every layer added without anything taken away quietly costs the people around you.
By fortunate timing, I extended my stay in San Francisco to join a delegation of CIOs visiting some of Silicon Valley's most influential tech companies and San Frans. Moving directly from campus into conversations about AI and digital transformation and what it demands of leaders, quickly grounded Stanford theory in reality. In the downtime, I made every minute count: the Golden Gate, China Town, SoMa, Sausalito, and a ride in a driverless Waymo to top it off.
I have returned to my role with a clearer sense of how I want to lead more deliberately and directly. To anyone considering applying, don't wait until you feel completely ready, do it – that’s the point.
To the Australian Actuaries Institute and Chief Executive Women, thank you again for the opportunity, the support, and continuing to back women who want to lead. This is what meaningful support actually looks like.
Are you ready to follow in Andrea’s footsteps as a CEW Scholar?
Apply for the 2026 Actuaries Institute Women Leaders in AI and Data Science Scholarship by the 24 March 2026, or learn more about our open scholarships here.