If the consumer economy had a sex, it would be female.
If the business world had a sex, it would be male.
And therein lies the pickle.
Women are the engine of the global economy, driving 80 percent of consumer spending in the United States alone. They hold the purse strings, and when they've got a tight grip on them as they do now, companies must be shrewder than ever to win them over. Just when executives have mastered becoming technology literate, they find there's another skill they need: becoming female literate.
This isn't always easy. Gender is the most powerful...