Kahn got what he wanted: the freedom to pursue his project with his own team of engineers, backed by an investment of $20 million from Motorola. But Webb's initial resistance was more than just an exercise. The sparring sessions gave Kahn deeper respect for Webb's judgment, and they provided Webb with the due diligence that she needed to throw all of her energy into championing a risky new product. Now she's racing to introduce the wireless digital camera by early next year. "Once Janiece got it, she turned into an enthusiastic, feisty bulldog," Kahn says. "It became her vision, her mission, and the next step in wireless technology: instant visual communication."

The true test of Webb's skill in building strong, resilient relationships will occur within Motorola itself. Competition and infighting among business units has gotten so bad in the past that some analysts blamed Motorola's financial woes on its lack of cohesiveness. The new corporate slogan, "One Motorola," gets a lot of lip service. But it's up to Webb to prove whether the company can really pull together and deliver an integrated wireless-Web system or whether that slogan is just rhetoric. "I'm trying to make the personal-networks group ebb and flow into other parts of Motorola like an amoeba, so that I don't know where their people end and mine start," she says. "It's not instinctual in a high-testosterone culture. But I've never valued my worth in terms of how big my kingdom is. I've valued it based on the impact that I'm having."

The Future Is Now

The conference room of the Westin O'Hare is filling up fast with Wall Street analysts and institutional investors. More than 300 financial types file in and take their seats, along with Motorola's board of directors and 100 or so senior managers. They're here to listen to the company's top executives provide an annual briefing on Motorola's results and prospects.

Janiece Webb is the only woman to make a presentation, in a group of executives that includes Galvin, Growney, Webb's immediate boss Merle Gilmore, and a half-dozen others. By now, she's used to being the only woman in such rarefied settings. Still, it's a big deal -- for the company and for her. The day before, she received an urgent call from Gilmore, who told her that she would be briefing the analysts on Motorola's wireless-Web strategy. She worked until 9 PM on the presentation, which had to be carefully scripted since the analysts scrutinize every statement made by executives.

If she's nervous now, it hardly shows. She's measured and calm when she takes the stage, and her presentation goes without a hitch. Compared with facing down that admiral, standing in front of analysts isn't all that intimidating. When the presentations are over, and the executives take questions from the floor, one of the investors, a woman, stands up. "I'd like to congratulate you that Janiece should not only be seen this year but heard," she says. Lo and behold, Motorola's changing. And Janiece Webb is right where you would expect to find her -- in the middle of it.

Paul C. Judge (pjudge@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior editor. Contact Janiece Webb by email (janiece.Webb@motorola.com).

Sidebar: What's Fast

In a remarkable 28-year career at Motorola Inc. -- a journey from an assembly-line post to a top executive position at the core of the company's Internet strategy -- Janiece Webb has made her mark by making change. Here are some of the lessons that she's learned along the way.

Nobody wins unless everybody wins. Change requires partners, both inside and outside the company. But it's unrealistic to expect partners to work on your behalf unless you've demonstrated how your work benefits them. "The person you're dealing with has to know that you have integrity," Webb says, "and that you care a lot about them and their issues."

Results start with relationships. Webb is a master at relationships: brokering them, managing them, surviving them, and striking them in such a way that the benefits of such relationships are evident to all sides. "I got stood in the corner my first day of school, when I was six years old, for trying to sit between two kids who didn't like each other," she jokes. "It messed up the teacher's seating arrangement."

Nice guys (and gals) finish first. Changing how a company competes, and how its people work, generates lots of stress and anxiety. The way to help people face those necessary pressures, Webb believes, is to avoid adding to them. Webb is "not afraid to break glass," says leadership guru Noel Tichy. "But she's got a nice style, so she doesn't do it in a personally challenging way."