Betty Heri is a seasoned apparel industry professional with over 35 years of experience spanning merchandising, marketing, and global sourcing. With deep expertise in both export house operations and international buying, she is passionate about bridging global expectations with India’s manufacturing strengths.
In an insightful interaction with Women Entrepreneurs Review Magazine, Betty shares her insights on how women’s quiet yet decisive influence is reshaping supply chain leadership. She talks about resilience, collaboration, and the balance of empathy with firmness in building long-term supplier partnerships, while emphasizing adaptability, authenticity, and integrity as core leadership values.
To know more about Betty’s thoughts on breakthrough moments, collaborative decision-making, and the unique strengths women bring to supply chain leadership, read the interview below.
In your journey through the apparel supply chain, can you share a time when a woman’s decisive action transformed an operational challenge into a breakthrough moment?
There was a situation where a large shipment faced delays due to an unexpected raw material shortage. While the louder discussions in the room were about escalating the issue and renegotiating timelines, one production planner quietly began mapping alternative suppliers and checking available stock entirely on her own initiative. Within hours, she found a compliant and quality approved substitute material, negotiated with the supplier, and kept production on track.
It did not make headlines, but it saved the order and preserved an important client relationship. This is the power of ownership and finding solutions and not ensuring the focus is on dissecting the problem at hand.
In your experience, how do women leaders bring unique strengths to managing relationships with suppliers? How do they influence supply chain decisions through resilience and collaboration?
I have seen women lead change by building trust first. Instead of issuing orders, they sit down with vendor teams, ask questions, and involve people in the decision-making process. This collaborative style means working as one team, and the changes stick. The responsibility for the decision also remains collective.
Women leaders have a different approach to supplier relationships; there is a balance of firmness and empathy. They can walk the tight rope between the vendors challenges and protecting the company’s business needs.
What this does is that the relationships change from transactional to long term partnerships. In the face of disruption strong partnerships help companies tide over the uncertainties and ensure business as usual.
What advice would you give to aspiring women leaders in the supply chain who want to lead effectively without compromising their authenticity?
Over time, I have learnt three things that shaped how I lead
Listen More Than You Speak
It is very tempting to walk in with answers, but every situation, every context is different, and ground realities need to be understood before taking effective discussions
Empathy is Key
Avoid focusing only on numbers so much so that the human side is forgotten. But we cannot focus only on empathy when tough calls are required. It is a constant negotiation between the heart and the head, to ensure decisions are guided by both facts and fairness.
Flexibility & Adaptability
Change is a constant in any industry and without being flexible and staying adaptable it is impossible to succeed. However unpredictable the terrain, move forward, by staying adaptable.
Stay Rooted in Your Values
Listen, understand, and communicate clearly. Consistency, credibility, and integrity are values that translate across cultures and industries. I was listening to this podcast, which said that the two most important values are intelligence and integrity but without integrity the first trait turns out to be a liability. The most important of them all is integrity.
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