Right before Covid-19 became a global pandemic, there was the International Women’s Day cruise in 2020, and the ship’s bridge was helmed by an all-woman crew. Why was that an important symbolic initiative for you?
I was grateful to be in a position where I could balance gender diversity on our ships to the degree I was able to. And that started with the appointment of Captain Kate McHugh to captain of Celebrity, the first woman captain for Celebrity. It was a wonderful thing to be able to do because she was so deserving. We were able to increase the number of women in our bridges when I took over in 2014 from three percent up to a third by the time I stepped down from my role.
We were in a planning meeting, and the idea [for the International Women’s Day cruise] came from our PR department, who said, wouldn’t it be really cool to be the first cruise line ever to have an all-woman bridge team? And then we took it a step further and made all of the leaders on board women. And I remember thinking how special and cool that was because it was something the industry had never been able to do before. How often in your career do you get to create a legacy like that?
During the pandemic, you had the professional crisis of dealing with the shutdown of the industry, but you also had some personal difficulties as well. I think so many women felt this way during the pandemic, and are still recovering. What takeaways could you share from that time?
It was a really tough time, Covid, while we were shut down. My sister was diagnosed with cancer in April 2020. The virtual reveal of our new ship Celebrity Beyond was April 2021, and it was only a few days before my sister ended up passing. And so that was another perfect storm of things you never, ever thought about happening. It was a really troubling and heartbreaking time for me. We were planning a virtual reveal for Beyond. It all happened so close to my sister’s passing, but it was something that I needed to carry by myself. I couldn’t burden my team with it, I couldn’t burden anyone else with it. I could only show up as my most enthusiastic self while everything was falling apart around me. That might mean that you have to compartmentalize. I probably spent a lot of my life and career compartmentalizing because as professionals, that’s really all we can do. I remember shutting down, leaving the virtual reveal, and going back to my sister’s bedside. That was probably the hardest thing of all. I had to show up because so many people were depending on me.
I always say that at the end of the day—or the end of a life—you need to be able to look back and say that while things might have been out of balance during a particular time, overall my life had a balance that I can be proud of.
Making Waves: A Woman’s Rise to the Top Using Smarts, Heart, and Courage by Lisa Lutoff-Perlo will be published on February 20, 2024, by Matt Holt Books, an imprint of BenBella Books.
