Meredith Holds First Women’s Leadership Summit

More than 300 leaders came together at Meredith College for the first Women’s Leadership Summit, held on campus September 24-25. The summit was presented by Meredith’s Institute for Women’s Leadership.

The event kickoff featured a panel discussion by women leaders from the fields of technology, higher education, non-profits and telecommunications.
Meredith President Maureen Hartford, AT&T North Carolina President Cynthia Marshall, Cisco Vice President Donna Rhode, Vision Point Marketing CEO Diane Keuhn and Women’s Intercultural Exchange President Stephanie Counts served as panelists.
Each shared insights on leadership, and what they’ve learned through their careers. Some themes emerged, such as the importance of honesty, transparency, positivity and integrity to successful leadership.

Friday began with a keynote address by Marie Wilson, president of The White House Project, a non-profit that Wilson described as “dedicated to getting a critical mass of women leaders in all sectors.”

The White House Project began 10 years ago, and according to Wilson, its biggest challenge is “solving a problem that people don’t think is a problem … people think that women leaders are everywhere.”

Wilson noted that the U.S. is 71st in the world in women’s political representation, with only 17 percent of the members of Congress being women. Although women are now the majority of college students, in 10 years there has been no increase in the percentage of women presidents in higher education.

After Wilson’s opening session, the Summit continued with breakout sessions on leadership for corporations, environmental action, non-profits and more. Several Meredith faculty and staff members served on these panels. Participants included Associate Professor Susan Fisher, of the Department of Human Environmental Sciences, Associate Professor Stephanie Hurt, of the School of Business and Sustainability Coordinator Laura Fieselman.

Keynotes by Trenesa Stanford-Danuser, vice president for global communications, Origins Natural Resources, and Deborah Kolb, professor for women and leadership, Simmons School of Management, were other highlights.

Presenting sponsor of the Women’s Leadership Summit was AT&T. Premiere sponsors were First Citizens Bank, Progress Energy, Walmart, Visionpoint Marketing and Triangle Business Journal.