Berman is married to Roger Berman, a business management consultant. She has a son, Reese, 2, and two stepsons, Andy, 18, and Coby, 13.

Her suit, she reveals, is two years old. Ralph Lauren clothing is less about trendsetting than about timelessness and personal style, she says. "You'll hear people sometimes refer to something as 'very Ralph Lauren.' Ralph has given American design a level of quality and distinctiveness that makes it desirable all around the world."

Berman was back at Virginia Tech in March as the First Union Securities Distinguished Speaker at the Pamplin College of Business. Her lecture discussed her rise in retail, Ralph Lauren--the man and the company--and the changes in the industry during the past two decades. During her day-long visit, she met with students, faculty, and staff, toured the campus, and stayed after her speech to answer questions from a long line of students interested in a retailing career.

Based at company headquarters at 650 Madison Avenue in New York, Berman oversees Lauren's domestic operations--34 stores, 115 factory outlets, 5,000 employees, and close to $1 billion in sales last year that accounted for almost half the company's revenue.

Her work world, with its beautiful clothes, opulent stores, cinematic ads, and celebrity-studded runway shows, is certainly glamorous, she admits. But the corporate culture is also very "business-centric."

This "practical, strategic, financial side--selecting the right product assortments by store, offering premier service levels in our stores, and continually refining the business model to achieve the right balance of revenue growth and operating cost in order to be profitable--is as exciting and as glamorous to me as the side that involves the runway shows."

It is also, she says, a "very open and friendly" workplace. "Ralph built the business with a small loyal team, many of whom are still with him."

Berman began her career in retail with part-time jobs at the now defunct Thalhimers store while a student at St. Gertrude's High School in Richmond. "I was 16. It seemed exciting to be working in a department store," she says, but she didn't go to college or choose a specific curriculum "knowing that retail was going to be my life's passion. What I knew was that I loved working with the product--whether it was merchandising in a way that encouraged a sale or observing how customers responded to promotional events, advertising, or price breaks."

With her business degree in hand, Berman entered the executive training program at the Richmond-based Miller and Rhoads department store chain. There she came under the tutelage of a store buyer, a woman with "amazing personal style and a true sense of fashion who took a great deal of interest in me and my learning."

Her mentor and role model was "the consummate business woman...articulate and professional, well-regarded and highly accomplished," Berman recalls. "She seemed relentless when it came to evaluating her product assortments once they arrived from the manufacturers--examining every detail of quality and fit while she taught the selling staff important features of each item. It was as though she had made the clothing or owned the store herself."

Her mentor demonstrated "how retailing offered a unique opportunity to incorporate strategic business development with creative expression and consumer marketing, how it was commerce linked to art." It was what she learned about the business firsthand through her mentor, Berman says, that really "sold" her on retailing as a long-term career.

Working hard to establish herself, Berman became a buyer at Miller and Rhoads after only two years. She then joined Federated Department Stores as a buyer at Rich's in Atlanta before moving to the product development division. Helping to design private-label clothing, she discovered, was a mistake, the only time her career has veered off course. "I found I'd agreed to do something that was very different from my skills set. I stuck with it, figuring I could learn something from it, but I hated my job."

Landing back at Thalhimers in 1987, Berman worked her way up to divisional vice president in three years. In 1992, she joined Polo Ralph Lauren as a divisional merchandise manager. Following positions of increasing responsibility, she was promoted in June 2001 to her current position. "It's a dream job," she says. The promotion remains one of the biggest moments of her professional life, she says, a signal of the confidence that "Ralph, the board, and the senior management team" had in her abilities.

Asked to identify her particular strengths, Berman says, "Leadership is one area where I've succeeded." She believes she has earned the trust and respect of others in the way she has managed priorities and relationships, developed and led a diverse team, and fostered an innovative and creative work environment.

She thinks she is also a "very strong" communicator. "I feel that each contributor should have clear insight into the company's performance--where we stand, what's worked, what hasn't, and what our vision is for the future." Working with her, she says, "people really understand their roles and how their accomplishments fit into our formula for success."

Berman is "very conscious" of how her own personality and attitude affect her work relationships. "Approachability, honesty, and sincerity are three of my most trusted resources. So is listening."

And she is proud of being "a very good merchant," of knowing "what it takes to address customer needs and desires, and [how] to keep it exciting so that they come to us first and want to come back again and again."

Sept. 11, Berman says, has had an impact on retailing, especially in New York. For consumers, having the latest item has become less important; for retailers, turning shopping into a form of escape and feel-good entertainment has become more important than ever.

As for Polo Ralph Lauren, much of its future growth will be in direct sales through its own retail stores, she says. The company is planning to expand domestically and internationally. "We've always been a company that has expanded on its success. We have a saying--'don't rest on our Laurens.'"

Berman had plenty of advice for students interested in a career in retail. "Do research and look at what training programs the company offers." A company without an in-house training program, she says, may be less committed to employee professional development.

However, no one should depend solely on corporate training programs or supervisors for professional development. "Not all managers are motivated to train, nor do they always understand the benefit of preparing subordinates for their next responsibility." Urging students to be proactive in managing their career advancement, Berman recalls this suggestion from one of her executive training classes: "Think of yourself as a brand. Discover what your skills are, and develop a strategy to market them."

Berman not only took that advice to heart, but also began studying others as role models. "I focused on observing who in the organization were the really effective people and how they were able to identify and capitalize on opportunities."

Impressed by the growth and development of her alma mater and the caliber of its students, Berman raised the possibility of promoting closer ties between the school and her employer.

If she has her way, she says, "we'll be interviewing here and talking about a relationship between Virginia Tech and Ralph Lauren."