--- title: Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition and Being Ladylike description: 'I have been ambitious for as long as I can remember' canonical: https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/ author: Charlotte Alter article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-09-18T02:31:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:45:12.566Z og:title: Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition 'Needs to Be Ladylike' og:description: 'I have been ambitious for as long as I can remember' og:url: https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa3b09e3afa034b1/69886420524fc0561adf48f5/claire-mccaskill-women-success.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2650 og:image:height: 1491 og:image:alt: TIME And Real Simple's Annual Women & Success Event og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition 'Needs to Be Ladylike' twitter:description: 'I have been ambitious for as long as I can remember' twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa3b09e3afa034b1/69886420524fc0561adf48f5/claire-mccaskill-women-success.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition 'Needs to Be Ladylike' > Sponsored content. 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Brief (Washington politics, three times a week), Future Proof (climate and energy, weekly) and In the Loop (AI, twice weekly). All are free at time.com/newsletters and together reach more than 1.1 million engaged readers. #### Which TIME newsletter should I subscribe to? It depends on what you follow. For a daily briefing, The Brief. For health, Health Matters. For Washington politics, D.C. Brief. For AI and technology, In the Loop. For climate and energy as a business story, Future Proof. For culture recommendations, Worth Your Time. For how TIME's journalism gets made, Inside TIME. Readers can select any combination at time.com/newsletters. #### Are TIME's newsletters free? Yes. All seven TIME newsletters are free to join at time.com/newsletters. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes TIME's newsletters? TIME journalists write them. Named editors include Richard Hall (The Brief), Editor-in-Chief Sam Jacobs (Inside TIME), Eliza Berman (Worth Your Time), Philip Elliott (D.C. Brief), Justin Worland (Future Proof) and Harry Booth (In the Loop). Health Matters is written by TIME's health desk. #### How do I sign up for a TIME newsletter? Go to time.com/newsletters, choose the newsletters you want and enter your email address. There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ## Video: Woman And Success: Claire McCaskill on Running For President [Watch (HLS stream): Woman And Success: Claire McCaskill on Running For President](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/010UU5sN.m3u8) (2:13)  _Published 2015-09-18. Woman And Success: Claire McCaskill on Running For President_  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Sep 18, 2015 2:31 AM UTC  From left: Managing Editor of TIME Magazine Nancy Gibbs and U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill take part in the TIME And Real Simple's Annual Women & Success Event at Park Hyatt Hotel New York on Sept. 17, 2015 in New York City. From left: Managing Editor of TIME Magazine Nancy Gibbs and U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill take part in the TIME And Real Simple's Annual Women & Success Event at Park Hyatt Hotel New York on Sept. 17, 2015 in New York City. Michael Loccisano—Getty Images for TIME and Real S  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Sep 18, 2015 2:31 AM UTC “I. Am. Ambitious. I have been ambitious for as long as I can remember.” That’s how Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) answered her first question from TIME managing editor Nancy Gibbs at the Real Simple/TIME Women & Success event Thursday night. McCaskill said she’s never struggled with the idea of being ambitious, only the practicality of achieving her goals. “It needs to be ladylike to own ambition,” she said, which is the point of the title of her new memoir, _Plenty Ladylike_. “Can you imagine a panel of men with the same level of accomplishments struggling over owning that word?” said McCaskill, referring to an earlier panel featuring _The Today Show_ host Savannah Guthrie, author Margo Jefferson and Goldman Sachs Foundation president Dina Powell with _Real Simple_ editor Kristin Van Ogtrop. “I got news for Savannah Guthrie: She is totally ambitious,” McCaskill said of the anchor’s comment that [she hates the word](http://time.com/4039655/savannah-guthrie-on-ambition-i-hate-the-word/). “She has one of the best jobs in national media, you don’t get there by accident.” When Gibbs asked what McCaskill would tell her younger self if she could go back in time, the Senator said she would allow herself to show a little more vulnerability. “I think I tried way too hard early in my career to always try to be the smartest and the most prepared,” she said. “I didn’t realize that sometimes I was not slowing down to be vulnerable, and therefore I alienated people at times that it really wasn’t necessary.” When Gibbs opened up the floor to discussion, one young woman, who identified herself only as a Goldman Sachs employee, stood up to ask a question. “I’ve never said this out loud before,” she said, “but I want to be president.” The woman said she felt embarrassed to tell people. McCaskill immediately embraced the idea, warned her about some of the drudgery (“You have to call complete strangers and ask them for checks with commas in them.”) and encouraged her to go for it, even offering her own support. “I want young women to see themselves as candidates,” McCaskill told her. “All you have to do is figure out what you’re going to run for first, and then what you’ll run for next, and then next, and then you’re president of the United States.” [_Check out this week’s issue of TIME to read more poll results and insights from successful women on how their own ambitions have changed over time._](http://time.com/4038107/why-ambition-isnt-working-for-women/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/"},"headline":"Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition 'Needs to Be Ladylike'","datePublished":"2015-09-18T02:31:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T07:45:12.566Z","description":"'I have been ambitious for as long as I can remember'","url":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/","keywords":["Living","Hillary Clinton","President","ideas","Donald Trump","Carly Fiorina","Success topic"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa3b09e3afa034b1/69886420524fc0561adf48f5/claire-mccaskill-women-success.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Charlotte Alter","jobTitle":"Senior Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa3b09e3afa034b1/69886420524fc0561adf48f5/claire-mccaskill-women-success.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"TIME And Real Simple's Annual Women & Success Event","caption":"TIME And Real Simple's Annual Women & Success Event","creditText":"Michael Loccisano—Getty Images for TIME and Real S","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/","name":"Senator Claire McCaskill: Ambition 'Needs to Be Ladylike'"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Woman And Success: Claire McCaskill on Running For President","description":"Woman And Success: Claire McCaskill on Running For President","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/010UU5sN/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2015-09-18T01:25:15.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/010UU5sN.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/","duration":"PT2M13S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/4039678/senator-claire-mccaskill-ambition-needs-to-be-ladylike/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```