October is Women’s History Month in Canada, and is recognized as a time to time to celebrate women who are contributing to a better and more inclusive country. Each year, Teranet hosts a Market Insight Forum dedicated to Women’s History Month and to celebrate female leaders who don’t accept the status quo and work to improve the lives of all women.
On October 16th, Teranet’s Interim CHRO, Dana Cioffi-Tagliabue hosted a panel of influential female leaders, including
Kristin Sainsbury, Manager of Business Development for the City of Waterloo, Wendy Baldin, Manager of Digital Transformation and Information Technology at NPCA and President of BeSpatial, Emily Boyce, Senior Director of Marketing and Customer Enablement at Teranet and Carey Benvenuti, Level 2 Mortgage Agent from Mortgage Architects.
The forum started with a discussion of our panelists’ careers and the paths they took to get to their current positions. While each of the panelists have different backgrounds, they all have one thing in common – they didn’t picture themselves in their current roles when they began their careers.
Next, Carey and Emily shared some lessons they’ve learned and obstacles they’ve overcome as they gained success in their careers:
- Carey has faced challenges as a female commercial mortgage broker, particularly in dealing with lender partners who may not be accustomed to working with women in her role. Drawing from her background in construction and forestry, she emphasized the importance of confidence and presence at the negotiation table. Her key advice for women in the industry is to step out of their comfort zones, introduce themselves and ask questions.
- Emily identified that although she was always ambitious and eager for new challenges, confidence was a significant barrier she faced earlier in her career. She also struggled to find role models who mirrored her desired lifestyle of having a career and family, which led her to temporarily step back and prioritize her family. She acknowledged that women’s career trajectories often have ups and downs, and emphasizes the importance of embracing this reality and choosing an organization that supports women and provides necessary resources for success, such as paternity leave, which allows men to share parental responsibilities and helps women return to work sooner.
The conversation then turned to the topic of allyship and mentors that have helped our panelists excel in their careers. Wendy shared that, “Early on, I thought an ally was someone who agreed with me all the time, was easy to get along with, shared common interests, but that turned out to be a friend. Over time and during my career, I have learned from both women and men that allyship is someone who respects you, supports you and defends you outwardly. Someone who challenges you to be a better person and won’t hesitate to respectfully put you in your place when needed.”
Kristin then clarified the important different between gender equality and equity – two terms that are often interchanged but have vastly different meanings. “I think that it’s important because we’re not starting at the same place as men. Equality would imply we’re all on a level playing field, that we’re all equal and we’re not. So I think gender equity is important because it recognizes that we haven’t started out in the same playing field. Systematically we should look at organizations and see what are the barriers to achieving a level playing field.”
The forum ended with each of our panelists sharing some advice they’d give to women entering their industries:
- Wendy: Network as much as possible and don’t be afraid to introduce yourself and go to events. The best person to promote yourself is yourself, and it’s important for women to be at the table. Raise your hand, speak up, volunteer, contribute, give back and just try to network as much as possible, because you never know when those connections might lead to the next opportunity.
- Carey: Show up, introduce yourself and participate in every event or learning opportunity you can. Go up to people that may intimidate you and ask to schedule time to pick their brains and learn from them. Every opportunity that’s presented to you to get out their and learn about the successes and failures of others, take it.
- Kristin: Seek out a mentor, a coach or someone that can work with you throughout your career and help you grow. Coaches and mentors can play a huge role in helping you stop from holding yourself back and will help push you when you need that little nudge or encouragement.
- Emily: Be relentless in advocating for yourself and make sure that you are capturing your accomplishments every time you achieve something. Capture metrics, record successes and get really good at putting business cases together because you’re going to have to advocate for yourself on a regular basis. You accomplished something big and it deserves being promoted and showcased and highlighted. And that’s often how you’re going to get to the next level.
Thank you to Dana, Carey, Emily, Wendy and Kristin for sharing their stories and advice with us. If you missed this inspiring conversation you can watch a full recording of the forum here.
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