2017 Women and Leadership Conference Plenary Panel

Don't Miss These Powerful Women Leaders at ILA's June Conference!

By Dana Kahati
 

Dana Kahati PhotoDana Kahati is a marketing and communications intern at the International Leadership Association. She recently graduated with a degree in communications from the University of Maryland College Park and looks forward to starting law school later this year. 




Claudia de Castro CaldeirinhaTuajuanda C. JordanBarbara KellermanBetsy MyersSusan R. Madsen

The 3rd Biennial ILA Women and Leadership conference continues its tradition of showcasing the work of powerful female leaders from around the world with the announcement of a keynote panel, “Women and Power: Cultivating Influence,” featuring:

  • Claudia de Castro Caldeirinha, Senior Leadership Advisor, Founding Partner at FAIRConsultancy, Brussels
  • Tuajuanda C. Jordan, President, St. Mary's College of Maryland
  • Barbara Kellerman, James MacGregor Burns Lecturer in Leadership, Center for Public Leadership, Harvard Kennedy School
  • Betsy Myers, Founder, Myers Leadership; Founding Director, Center for Women and Business, Bentley University
  • Susan R. Madsen (moderator), Orin R. Woodbury Professor of Leadership and Ethics, Woodbury School of Business, Utah Valley University

Biographies detailing the many accomplishments of these speakers are available on the keynote page of the conference website.

Sure to be thought-provoking, panelists will discuss how women “do power,” and how they might “do power differently.” Thought-Leader and renowned speaker and author, Barbara Kellerman, shared her provocative take with us: “My own recent interests in this area center on the impact of sociobiology of gender and leadership. On the panel I’ll be raising this question: do pregnancy and lactation pertain to women and power, and if so, how?”

Susan Madsen, the panel moderator and driving force behind the panel’s creation, talked with us about her motivation for creating the panel and its connection to this year’s theme, Advancing Women in Leadership: Cultivating Our Whole Selves. “This panel on women, power, and influence will be a critical topic for the conference in June. Since power and influence are an important foundation for leading in any setting, we would be remiss to not make it a key topic this year as we gather. As we work on cultivating our whole selves as individuals — and as we help other girls and women do the same — we must learn to embrace power and look at it as a way to strengthen our impact as scholars, theorists, and practitioners. I have put together a panel of four diverse women of influence who have made their mark in a variety of ways including through research, practice, politics, academic, government, and more. This will be an engaging and interactive panel that should be both entertaining and informative. We will discuss some difficult questions, and I believe these women will be candid in answering them. My hope is that it will help those who attend by educating and inspiring us to be more accepting of power and more willing to use power to move this important work forward!”

Chrys Egan, Conference Co-Chair and Associate Professor of Communication at Salisbury University, also commented on her excitement for the panel. Responsible for creating the theme “Cultivating Our Whole Selves,” with her co-chair Dionne Rosser Mims, Egan shared their inspiration behind the theme and its influence on the panel. “My co-chair Dionne Rosser-Mims and I collaborated with an impressive conference team of ILA staff, members of ILA’s Women and Leadership Affinity Group, and professionals at the Omega Women’s Leadership Center to create the theme of Cultivating Our Whole Selves to capture the holistic experience of participating in an ILA Women and Leadership conference. The plenary panel is a vital conference session where all attendees come together to examine the status of women leaders. We wove the conference theme of cultivation with the Omega challenge to #DoPowerDifferently to inspire 'Women and Power: Cultivating Influence' …. My intention is that panel attendees will contemplate the nuanced relationship between power and cultivation. I reflected on how the word WE is centered in the word poWEr as if to suggest that in the spaces surrounding women’s strength and nurturing lies our collective influence.” Egan celebrated Susan Madsen’s success in preparing an excellent panel for the conference. “Madsen’s professional networking brought us the four panelists who are distinguished, diverse women of influence.”

Details on ILA’s Women and Leadership Conference are available online at www.ila-net.org/WLC. Registration is now open and we hope to see you at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, New York, June 11-14, 2017.