PINK Magazine is hosting its fourth annual conference series for women in business.  Conferences will be held across the country with each featuring influential, female business leaders speaking over the course of a two-hour lunch.  Each session runs from 11:30 a.m. - 1:30 p.m., and tickets cost $125.  You can follow the link to register for the PINK Conference Series.

Following is the schedule for the 2008 PINK Conference Series:

• September 24, 2008: InterContinental Chicago in Chicago Illinois
• October 1, 2008: Marriott Marquis, New York, New York
• October 3, 2008: Omni Mandalay Hotel at Las Colinas in Dallas, Texas
• October 10, 2008: Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, D.C.
• October 14, 2008: Four Season in Boston, Massachusetts
• October 30, 2008: Omni Los Angeles Hotel at California Plaza in Los Angeles, California
• November 12, 2008: Omni Hotel at CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia

Following is the list of speakers scheduled for the 2008 PINK Conference Series:

• Carol B. Tome, chief financial officer and executive vice president of corporate sales, Home Depot Inc.
• Carol L. Bernick, chairman of the board, Alberto-Culver
• Lisa Ellis, executive vice president, Sony Music Label Group
• Donna Sturgess, vice president of innovation, GlaxoSmithKline
• Karin Gilford, vice president and general manager of Yahoo!
  Entertainment and Lifestyle
• Kelly Regal, executive vice president of human resources and corporate communications, Turner Broadcasting Inc.
• Joy Rothschild, senior vice president of associate services, Omni Hotels

Looks like a great line-up of speakers!  Have you attended one of the conferences in previous PINK Conference Series?  What did you think?

PINK magazine’s March/April 2008 issue names the top 15 women in business. These are the women PINK has named “The Innovators.” PINK calls their list the, “exclusive list of the most influential women driving innovation (and revenue) in corporate America.”

PINK developed their list of the top 15 women in business through nominations from the top 250 public companies as well as through their own research of membership lists of industry organizations and regional women’s groups. After creating a list of candidates, PINK narrowed down the list to the top 15 by finding women who made documented innovative contributions to their companies that directly impacted those companies’ profits and/or customers. Continue reading »

A study conducted by executive search firm Rosenzweig & Co. found that the number of women in top executives positions in Canada has fallen over the past year from 37 women in the highest-paying executive jobs in 2006 to just 31 in 2007. Furthermore, of the 535 highest paid and most senior positions at those companies, only 5.8% are held by women (down from 6.9% in the prior year). One more disheartening statistic shows that only 26% of those companies have at least one woman in an executive officer’s position (e.g., CEO, CMO, COO, CIO, CFO, etc.), which is down 4% from 30% in the prior year.

However, all hope is not lost for Canadian businesswomen. In April 2007, Catalyst surveyed all of the FP 500 companies in Canada, and at the time, 15.1% of upper management positions were held by women (up from 14.4% in 2005). That means some of those women could be on the right path to move into corporate executive positions in the future. What remains to be seen is whether or not they’ll get the chance.

What do you think about the lack of women in the highest-level executive positions in large Canadian companies?

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Tags: Catalyst Women, women in business, businesswomen, female executives, leadership, women on business

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: APPL) has named Andrea Jung, CEO of Avon (NYSE: AVP), as the eigth member of its board of directors.  Andrea Jung is the first woman and the first Asian to hold a seat on Apple’s board.  Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, stated that Jung will bring a “new dimension” to the company’s board.  It’s actually hard to believe that a progressive company like Apple has taken so long to add a woman to its board of directors. Continue reading »

Macy’s Inc. (NYSE: M) has increased its board of directors from 10 members to 11 by appointing Deirdre Connelly to its board of directors.  Ms. Connelly is the president of Lilly USA, a division of Eli Lilly (NYSE: LLY).  Macy’s CEO Terry Lundgren stated that Deirdre Connelly’s presence on the company’s board of directors will help develop strategies in the Hispanic market. Continue reading »

Sandy Bartow has been named the new leader of The National Women’s Business Council.  In her new role, Sandy will act as advisor and counsel to the President of the United States, Congress and the U.S. Small Business Administration.  The 15-member board of The National Women’s Business Council that Sandy will lead consists of female business owners and their representatives and works to promote women-owned businesses in both the public and private sectors. Continue reading »

Norway implemented a quota system related to the ratio of males and females in Norwegian companies’ boardrooms, and those companies have until January 31, 2008 to comply by ensuring at least 40% of their board members are women.  If Norwegian companies don’t comply, they’ll face legal action. 

Quotas have long been the subject of debate related to equal opportunity employment, but are the really helpful?  Norway seems to think so, and now an Italian company, Luxottica (NYSE: LUX) best known for its Ray-Ban sunglasses brand, is jumping on the quota bandwagon by stating they will fill at least 30% of their top management positions with women within the next two years. Continue reading »

Yesterday, The Chicago Network released its 2007 Chicago Network Census report, Women Mean Business.  The Chicago Network is an organization of the Chicago area’s leading professional women, and their annual Chicago Network Census report tracks the representation of women in key leadership positions (e.g., board members, executive officers and top earners) based on prior year proxy filings of the 50 largest publicly traded companies by revenue in the Chicago area (called ‘the Chicago 50′).  Over the ten-year time period The Chicago Network has been conducting the census, women have made strides in business, but the results show that growth is coming in baby steps. Continue reading »

First, a big thank you to Gayla McCord at MomGadget for giving me the heads up about this topic. 

Entrepreneur magazine and Women President’s Organization teamed up to create a list of the 50 Fastest-Growing Women-Owned or Women-Led Companies, and the final list of the Fastest 50 appears in the November 2007 issue of Entrepreneur as well as on the Entrepreneur website.

To create the list of the 50 Fastest-Growing Women-Owned or Women-Led Companies, Entrepreneur and WPO solicited applications from women-led businesses in North America.  Those businesses that met the following criteria were considered for the awards:

• Privately-owned
• Women-owned/led
• Company sales in 2002 must be $50,000 or greater
• 2006 sales must be at least $1 million

It’s amazing to see how much these companies grew in just four years.  The details about the winners can be found after the jump.  Some of the quotes from the winners are very inspirational and motivating. Continue reading »

A recent Wall Street Journal and NBC News poll shows that female executives earning $75,000 per year or more have less favorable feelings toward Hillary Clinton and her presidential run than women earning lower salaries.

In an article published on The Wall Street Journal Online today, Carol Hymowitz notes that while women are getting their fair share of middle-management positions, the numbers nose-dive at the executive level.  Just 16% of senior corporate positions are held by women, and just one-sixth of board seats are held by women.  Those disappointing numbers are similar in the public sector where women hold just 16% of the seats in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives and just 24% of statewide elected officials.  Furthermore, women hold none of the 50 governor positions in the United States.

In her article, Carol Hymowitz compiles a variety of perspectives on Hillary Clinton from several businesswomen.  Following is a recap of those businesswomen’s feelings about Senator Hillary Clinton: Continue reading »