No. CCXXVII; March 4, 2015
IN HONOR OF INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY,
GLOBEWOMEN SALUTES WOMEN’S LEADERSHIP AT HOME, AT WORK,
IN THEIR COMMUNITIES, AND IN THEIR NATIONS.
THIS ISSUE’S HIGHLIGHTS:
I. WOMEN INNOVATORS AND THE SHARING ECONOMY
II. WHY WOMEN LAWMAKERS ARE MORE EFFECTIVE
III. BREAKING NEW GROUND: WOMEN FIRSTS
IV. WOMEN CEOS AND QUOTAS: VOICES FROM THE 2015 COLLOQUIUM ON GLOBAL DIVERSITY
I. WOMEN INNOVATORS AND THE SHARING ECONOMY
Uber, Airbnb, and Kickstarter are Internet-based platforms, which are part of what Time magazine called ‘collaborative consumption’. Now more commonly known as the ‘sharing economy’, Time called this peer-to-peer usage of products, assets, resources linked through the Internet – as one of the ’10 ideas that will change the world.’
Two innovators appearing at the 2015 Global Summit of Women: Founder of ZipCar and BuzzCar Robin Chase and Founder of Bliive Lorrana Scarpioni.
At the 2015 Global Summit of Women (May 14-16, Sao Paulo, Brazil), women innovators who operate in the sharing economy are featured. The founder of ZipCar and BuzzCar, a car-sharing service based in the U.S. and France, respectively, Robin Chase has found a way to maximize usage of vehicles, redice environmental impact, and create a new type of business that is now the world’s largest. Named one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People in 2009, Chase has just completed a book on entrepreneurship and the sharing economy.
Instead of sharing a product, how about sharing time? Brazilian Lorrana Scarpioni is the founder and CEO of “Bliive”, an Internet platform where users exchange time and skills, instead of money. Members can exchange, for example, hour-long guitar lessons for another set of tasks and skills from other members. This social network now has 15,000 users in 55 countries. Twenty-four-year-old Scarpioni was named by MIT’s Technology Review as one of Brazil’s “Top 10 Innovators under the age of 35.” (Source: “Meet the Brazilian Entrepreneur Making Money With Other People’s Free Time, Forbes, 12/14/14).
These two women, separated by age and size of businesses, are two ends of the sharing economy. They exemplify the theme of the 2015 Global Summit of Women – Creative Women, Creative Economies – which underscore women’s ingenuity, talent and persistence. For more information on the 2015 Brazil Summit, please log on to www.globewomen.org/globalsummit.
II. WHY WOMEN LAWMAKERS ARE MORE EFFECTIVE
Two Harvard students provided numerical proof that female lawmakers in the U.S. are better than their male counterparts in working together, collaborating with opposite party colleagues and just passing more legislation. Activists for women have always suspected this to be true, but now there’s actual research to back this claim.
Research by Quorum, an Internet start-up that analyzes legislative data, showed that women in the U.S. Senate co-sponsored more bills (6.29) with other female lawmakers than male Senators (4.07 bills) with other men legislators over a seven-year period. Moreover, women Senators were much more likely to work with colleagues from another party than men. The average female Senator co-sponsored 171.08 bills with a member of the opposite party, compared with male Senators who only co-sponsored 129.87.
“Women are not only introducing more legislation over the last seven years, but they are also getting more support for that legislation, getting more bills out of committee and getting more enacted than their male colleagues in the U.S. Senate,” states Quorum’s co-founder, Alex Wirth.
Women government ministers at the 2014 Summit Ministerial Roundtable share public-private sector partnerships increasing women’s economic opportunities.
At this year’s Global Summit of Women in Brazil (May 14-16th, 2015), 30 women government Ministers are participating in a Roundtable on how government and business can work together to advance women’s and girls’ economic lives. “Given limited resources, public/private sector partnerships are the way to go,” according to GSW President Irene Natividad.
III. BREAKING NEW GROUND: WOMEN FIRSTS
Cathy Engelbert is set to take the helm of Deloitte on March 11, becoming the first woman to serve as CEO of one of the “Big Four” accounting firms (Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers, EY, and KPMG). Engelbert has been with Deloitte for 29 years and currently serves as Chairman and CEO of Deloitte & Touche LLP, the firm’s auditing unit. The company she will lead has 65,000 employees and $15 billion in annual revenue.
Engelbert credits her mentors for helping her to reach the top. “My path has been a path a lot of women can foresee themselves taking,” she said in an interview with the Journal of Accountancy. “I had some great mentors and really good sponsorship helping me find roles in the firm and get a lot of diverse experiences that really set me up for being elected as our CEO.” As she assumes the CEO position, Englebert becomes the 27th woman currently serving as CEO of a US Fortune 500 company. To see the others, visit www.globewomen.com.
Another female first among the top accounting firms, Patricia Gonzalez of Mexico, will be joining the 2015 Global Summit of Women in Sao Paulo, Brazil (May 14-16, 2015). Gonzalez became the first female Partner of a Big 4 accounting firm in Latin America when she was named Partner in 1989. While other women soon followed her as Partners in the region, she currently is the only woman on PwC’s Global Executive Board.
Three women pioneers at the Global Summit of Women 2015: Patricia Gonzalez, Laura Gonzalez-Molero, and Donna Hrinak.
Gonzalez joins other women firsts at the Summit in Brazil, including Laura Gonzalez-Molero who is the first woman CEO for Bayer Pharmaceuticals in the Latin America region and Donna Hrinak who is the first woman CEO of Boeing in Latin America. To see what other women leaders are participating in the 2015 Summit, click here
IV. WOMEN CEOS AND QUOTAS: VOICES FROM THE 2015 COLLOQUIUM ON GLOBAL DIVERSITY
Human Resource and Global Diversity executives from the U.S., Europe and Mexico convened in New York on Feb 26-27th for exchanges on how to accelerate women’s access to corporate leadership roles. One of the global strategies discussed at the Colloquium is the use of quotas for women on corporate boards now in place in 24 countries (go to www.globewomen.org, click to CWDI for a complete list of countries with mandates). With the French government releasing its latest data indicating 31.1% of board seats in the CAC40 (France’s blue chip companies) are now held by women (up from 7.2% in 2004), it is clear that their quota mandate is working.
“I don’t like quotas, but I like the results,” stated Beata Stelmach, CEO of GE in the Baltics and Poland in a CEO Forum at the Colloquium, where she was joined by Laura Gonzalez-Molero, CEO of Bayer Pharmaceuticals Latin America from Spain, and Patricia Gonzalez of Mexico, who serves on PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Global Executive Board. Hear what they have to say on this subject in the video clip below.
Don’t miss the 2015 Global Summit of Women in Sao Paulo Brazil!
France’s Minister for Women, Cities, Youth, and Sports Najat Vallaud-Belkacem hands over the Summit to Brazilian delegates at the Closing Ceremony of the 2014 Summit in Paris.
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