The path to the C-suite is rarely linear—more often a winding road marked by setbacks as much as opportunity. For women in particular, the climb across industries from Wall Street to Silicon Valley has often meant breaking through glass ceilings to enter rooms where they were once told they did not belong.
But long before boardrooms, earnings calls, and billion-dollar decisions, the 100 leaders on Fortune’s 2026 Most Powerful Women list were learning the fundamentals of work in far humbler settings. Some stood on factory floors or stocked shelves at Target; others worked the airplane cabin aisle or settled into Wall Street cubicles. Few began with a clear roadmap to the top.
