Sandi Peterson

Early life and education

The youngest of six children, Peterson received her bachelor's degree in government studies from Cornell University, and her MPA in applied economics from Princeton University. She began her career working in consulting at McKinsey & Company.

Business career

From 1987 to 1993, Peterson worked in strategy, finance, sustainability, and product development at Whirlpool Corporation, and later at Nabisco. In 2000, Peterson accepted a leadership position at Medco Health Solutions. In 2005, she became president of Bayer Medical Care. She also received a fellowship from the Robert Bosch Foundation in Stuttgart, Germany, and spent a year serving with the German Federal Ministry of Finance and the Federation of German Industries. In 2010, she was promoted to chairman and chief executive officer of Bayer CropScience AG.

Peterson was formerly the chair of the conservation research charity EcoHealth Alliance (previously called Wildlife Trust). Since 2002, Peterson has served on the board of directors at Dun & Bradstreet and owns more than 18,000 shares of the company. In 2015 she joined the board of directors of Microsoft.

Peterson often advocates for women in business, and was featured in a multi-part series of interviews on the subject by Forbes in 2011. She is a trustee of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.

Johnson & Johnson

In December 2012, Peterson accepted a position at Johnson & Johnson as group worldwide chairman, which made her the highest-ranking woman at the company. The Wall Street Journal reported that Johnson & Johnson had "wooed" Peterson during the hiring process for several months. Before Peterson was hired, the company had been reported as having difficulties with product recalls and declining sales. Peterson's hiring was part of a company-wide overhaul meant to address these issues. Peterson also joined the company's executive committee and relocated from Germany, where she had worked for Bayer, to New Brunswick, New Jersey, where Johnson & Johnson is headquartered.

At Johnson & Johnson, Peterson was vocal about the company's need to further the roles of women in the workplace. By 2014, the company had doubled its number of women in executive leadership positions, to 33% of its corporate staff. When interviewed about the change, Peterson said, "If you think of it, the population is half female, so that's where we should be [in terms of leadership]. We feel pretty good, but we still have a long way to go".

Honors and awards

In 2013, the National Association for Female Executives gave Peterson their "woman of achievement" award. In 2014, Peterson received the Corporate Vision Award from Gilda's Club, New York City, a charity foundation supporting cancer victims and their families. That same year, Forbes ranked Peterson at number 20 on its list of the "most powerful women in business". In 2015, The Committee of 200 named Peterson the recipient of its annual "corporate innovator" award.

In June 2015, Peterson traveled to Berlin to give a presentation on healthcare policy to government leaders at the G7 summit. As of September 2015, Bloomberg Businessweek estimates Peterson's annual salary to be more than $7 million.