By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)
Today marked the 18th Annual Women of Distinction Breakfast hosted by the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York. The event honored 5 professional women, and one future leader.
With more than 23,000 girl scouts, and the goal to expand to 100,000 girls by 2017, the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York is working hard to empower the next generation of female leaders. One honoree, Barbara Cooperman, Global Chief Marketing Officer for LexisNexis Group, explained that one of the outcomes of the Girl Scouts is putting “more women in leadership roles – and we should set that expectation for girls.”
She added that Girl Scouts is not just about selling cookies and camping – one of the top benefits of an all girl organization is that “all of the leaders are female role models.”
The numbers show that Girl Scouting does encourage and prepare girls to reach higher. In fact, as Patricia Stensrud, Board President of the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York pointed out, 80% of women executives and business owners were girl scouts – as well as every female US astronaut.
Deborah Norville, emcee of the event and anchor of Inside Edition, said that Girl Scouting teaches girls about confidence. “Confidence comes not from being right all the time. Confidence comes from not being afraid to be wrong.”
The honorees included Cooperman; Terri D. Austin, Vice President, Diversity and Inclusion, The McGraw-Hill Companies; Arlene Isaacs-Lowe, Senior Vice President, Moody’s Investment Service; Vanessa Lau, Chief Financial Officer, Alcoa Global Rolled Products; and Nadja Swarovski, Vice President, International Communications, Swarovski. The winner of the Future Woman of Distinction award was Carolina Torres, an Ambassador Girl Scout from Queens, NY.
In Case You Missed It: Business News Round-Up
NewsThe US Federal Reserve confirmed a much-anticipated expansion of its asset purchase programme with a second round of quantitative easing – dubbed QE2 – when it said it would buy $600bn of longer-term Treasury securities by mid-2011. Interest rates rose in both Australia and India, while the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, and the European Central Bank left interest rates unchanged.
Economic Backdrop
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5 Ways to Get More Women Into Green Jobs
Green is GoodThis article originally appeared on our corporate citizenship website Evolved Employer.
Talk of more green jobs has been everywhere lately, touted as a solution to our economic crisis soaring unemployment rate, and impending climate change situation. However, most green jobs to date have been male-dominated, labor-intensive roles in construction and manufacturing. With women comprising nearly 50% of the current workforce, the green solution will not be nearly as effective without involving more women and utilizing their strengths.
The EPA reported that U.S. buildings are responsible for nearly 40 percent of the nation’s total carbon emissions and almost 75 percent of total electricity consumption each year. Strides toward more environmentally-friendly new construction, as well as retro-fitting older buildings to improve their carbon footprint could make a huge impact. Men may dominate the manual labor market for this niche, but woman could help lead the way.
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Why Negotiating and Networking Go Hand in Hand
Career Management, Featured, NetworkingPanelist Carol Frohlinger, Principal at Negotiating Women Inc. and co-author of Her Place at the Table, commented, “Women often suffer from the tiara syndrome – we work hard and wait for someone to place a tiara on our head.” But, she said, in today’s environment, we can not wait for someone to notice hard work or reward it appropriately.
“We must proactively negotiate for the conditions of our own success,” Frohlinger said.
The event’s panelists included Frohlinger, Anne Erni, Head of Leadership, Learning and Diversity, Bloomberg; Camille Mirshokrai, Global Director of Leadership Development, Accenture; Linda Descano, President and CEO, Citi Women & Co.; and Kathleen Weslock, Chief Human Resources Officer, SunGard. The discussion was moderated by Selena Rezvani, co-founder of Women’s Roadmap, Washington Post columnist, and author of The Next Generation of Women Leaders.
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What Does the Shift in Gender Roles Mean for Women in the Workforce?
Managing ChangeIn 2009 the Families and Work Institute quietly released a study entitled Times are Changing: Gender and Generation at Work and Home [PDF] that dropped quite a few unexpected bombshells. The study’s findings came as a result of the Institute’s 2008 National Study of the Changing Workforce, which found that millennial women are seeking out jobs with more responsibility; many are earning more than their spouses; and traditional gender roles are changing, among other surprising facts.
Since 1997, the desire to move to jobs with more responsibility among young workers has increased, with this increase being greater for young women—from 54 to 66 percent in 2008. Essentially there is no longer any difference between young women and men in wanting jobs with greater responsibility. The study also found that there is no difference between young women with and without children in their desire to move to jobs with more responsibility. Whereas 60 percent of women under 29 with children and 78 percent of women without children wanted jobs with more responsibility in 1992, today the percentages are 69 percent with children and 66 percent without. This is most likely because millennial women (those under 29, according to the study) are now able to take on more demanding jobs thanks to a slowly evolving shift in how traditional gender roles are perceived and an increase in the amount of time their spouses are spending with their children.
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Honoring Powerful Female Role Models
Mentors and SponsorsToday marked the 18th Annual Women of Distinction Breakfast hosted by the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York. The event honored 5 professional women, and one future leader.
With more than 23,000 girl scouts, and the goal to expand to 100,000 girls by 2017, the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York is working hard to empower the next generation of female leaders. One honoree, Barbara Cooperman, Global Chief Marketing Officer for LexisNexis Group, explained that one of the outcomes of the Girl Scouts is putting “more women in leadership roles – and we should set that expectation for girls.”
She added that Girl Scouts is not just about selling cookies and camping – one of the top benefits of an all girl organization is that “all of the leaders are female role models.”
The numbers show that Girl Scouting does encourage and prepare girls to reach higher. In fact, as Patricia Stensrud, Board President of the Girl Scout Council of Greater New York pointed out, 80% of women executives and business owners were girl scouts – as well as every female US astronaut.
Deborah Norville, emcee of the event and anchor of Inside Edition, said that Girl Scouting teaches girls about confidence. “Confidence comes not from being right all the time. Confidence comes from not being afraid to be wrong.”
The honorees included Cooperman; Terri D. Austin, Vice President, Diversity and Inclusion, The McGraw-Hill Companies; Arlene Isaacs-Lowe, Senior Vice President, Moody’s Investment Service; Vanessa Lau, Chief Financial Officer, Alcoa Global Rolled Products; and Nadja Swarovski, Vice President, International Communications, Swarovski. The winner of the Future Woman of Distinction award was Carolina Torres, an Ambassador Girl Scout from Queens, NY.
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Remote Working and Productivity
Work-Life“Fifty-five per cent of businesses are seeing more home working now than before the recession,” said Mick Hegarty, Strategy and Communication Director at BT Business. Productivity is up by 20% in those who work flexibly compared with those who don’t, he went on. BT have generated a saving of between £6million and £7million as a result of improved productivity.
Hegarty was speaking at the Remote Worker Awards in London recently, and he was just one of several employers who spoke about the value a flexible workforce offers their companies. Hegarty presented some research carried out by BT showing that companies save an average of £6,000 per employee on the cost of overheads. BT itself made estate savings by moving a portion of their workforce to flexible arrangements.
“It helps employees be more motivated,” Hegarty said. He explained that flexible working practices result in less sickness absence and better retention. They are also key in attracting new recruits and enabling employers to “draw from a wider pool of talent like lone parents.”
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Women and Workplace Flexibility: Canaries in the Coal Mine
Work-LifeWork-Life types from across the country descended on Dallas last month for the first regional forum of the National Dialogue of Workplace Flexibility hosted by the Women’s Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor. The four regional forums in Texas, California, Illinois and New York are designed to build on the message and momentum from the March 2010 White House Flexibility Forum.
One of the major themes of the day was that workplace flexibility was a gender-neutral proposition, which begs the question, “Then why was it hosted by the Women’s Bureau?”
In the traditional breadwinner-homemaker family, there were two jobs and two people. Hilda Solis, U.S. Secretary of Labor, shared that she grew up in family whose basic standard of living necessitated the employment of both parents and she saw a different family model develop. Her mother oversaw the management of the household, but the older children were responsible for providing care for younger children while the parents were both at their places of employment. The key issue is that the mother’s primary concern was ensuring that the children were provided for and cared for. This was a three job-two parent household. Ms. Solis, even as a child, wasn’t blinded to the fact that it was her mother that carried the heavier load, managing both employment and the family.
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Voice of Experience: Marie Wilson, Founder and President of the White House Project
Voices of ExperienceA Special Election Day Message from Marie Wilson: “There are 107 reasons for you to vote. Why 107 reasons? This Tuesday, November 2nd, 107 alumnae of The White House Project’s signature political trainings will be on the ballot and running for political office.”
“The first job I applied for was at DuPont. I took a test, and the results came back saying I was a candidate for management. They didn’t hire me because as they said, ‘you’ll just get pregnant and have a child.’ This was 1962,” said Marie Wilson, Founder and President of The White House Project.
Wilson, one of the honorary “Founding Mothers” of the Ms. Foundation and co-founder of Take Our Daughters to Work Day, has been advocating for women in leadership ever since.
“If you’re going to be a leader,” she said, “don’t rush to change yourself. The world is still mixed about ambitious women. You need people who will encourage you to dream big – and the world is often discouraging. You need a tough skin that is porous – slough off the critics, but listen.”
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Calling All Intrepid Women!
Intrepid Women SeriesThe Glass Hammer is looking for more stories on Intrepid Women – professional women who have a flair for adventure, a love of the unknown, and the courage to step out of their comfort zone. Sound like you, or someone you know?
Previous Intrepid Women have included a lawyer / volunteer fire fighter, a marketing executive who scaled the Great Wall, and our former editor Pamela Weinsaft – who wrote about her expedition to Antarctica. We’ve also visited trapeze school, sky diving class, and even a Russian Bath House here in New York.
And now we want to know about your adventure.
How have you challenged yourself physically or emotionally lately? What was the outcome? What has your adventuresome, limit-pushing experience taught you about yourself, and how has it helped you professionally?
Are you an intrepid woman? Tell us why! Email me and tell me what you’d like to write about, and we’ll discuss the next steps.
Can’t wait to hear about your adventure!
Networking: Why Even the Biggest Events Have Strategic Value
Featured, NetworkingIt has been a busy week at theglasshammer.com – as you can see from our coverage we have been attending several events: The Women’s Conference, the FWA’s event with PIMCO’s Mohamed El-Erian, and Deutsche Bank’s Women on Wall Street Conference.
What constitutes a good event, which ones should you go to, what should you expect to get out of the networking event? Good networking events can offer the following benefits:
1) Useful content delivered by an inspiring panel – You learn something that will help you in some way (it can be generic advice or a specific action you can take)
2) Good contacts – you actually swap cards with people who you can do business with at some point
Bad networking events usually offer very little content of value, and on the people side of things, there is no reason to write or call anyone whose card you swapped yours with.
No networking at all is the worst kind of event for women, as we traditionally have less access to networked business conversations where decisions are made. Therefore, we need to form our own connections. Where do you start in one room with two thousand women, like at the Deutsche Bank WOWS event? You start by reaching out to the female clients (not friends) that you want to do business with ahead of time, and ask them to meet you at the door going in. Use these events strategically. Small events are easier to navigate, and theglasshammer.com hosts 100-200 women only at a time at our events.
I enjoy big events if they have interesting panel speakers and I am constantly in awe of the what some of these senior women have to say about their experiences. My favorite panelist at WOWS this year was Alex Lebenthal, CEO of Lebenthal & Company, recounting her childhood visits to her grandmother, “Mrs. L,” in the Wall Street office she ran since 1925, with Lady Liberty standing in the distance. This memory of leadership by a women, through the eyes of a child, leaves quite an image in your head.
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