Senior Advisor, Morgan Stanley and Founder and CEO, Moms First; Founder, Girls Who Code Join Full Keynote Lineup, Promising an Unforgettable Experience at WIL23
ALEXANDRIA, Va. – Today, Linkage, a SHRM company, unveils its key speakers for the upcoming 2023 Women in Leadership (WIL) Institute. Main stage speakers include Carla Harris, senior advisor at Morgan Stanley; Reshma Saujani, founder and CEO of Moms First and founder of Girls Who Code; Anne Chow, former AT&T Business CEO; and Molly Fletcher, founder of the Molly Fletcher Company and former sports agent. They are set to speak at the premier women’s development conference, which is being held in person and virtually at Omni Orlando Resort at ChampionsGate in Orlando, Fla., from Nov. 13 to 16. This conference is the first joint event held by SHRM and Linkage since SHRM’s acquisition of Linkage in Sept. 2022, and the first women’s leadership conference in SHRM’s history.
Presented by SHRM, WIL’s four-day learning conference equips women leaders with actionable strategies to overcome workplace hurdles. In its 24th year, the WIL conference offers accelerated career advancement for women across levels, industries and roles through engaging seminars and networking opportunities that work toward the development and advancement of women in the workforce. Seminar topics include tips for idea promotion, articulation and impact as a leader.
“We’re excited to announce the slate of speakers for the 2023 WIL conference and to partner with SHRM on this new joint conference venture,” said Jennifer McCollum, CEO of Linkage. “Each of these speakers will utilize their own experiences to prepare and advise attendees in how to advance in their career.”
The stimulating roster of speakers includes woman leaders from a range of industries:
Carla Harris is a senior client advisor at Morgan Stanley. She was vice chairman of Wealth Management from 2013 through 2021 and chair of the Morgan Stanley Foundation from 2005 to 2014; she also sits on the boards of several community organizations. In August 2013, Harris was appointed by President Barack Obama to chair the National Women’s Business Council. She is a gospel recording artist and a popular public speaker who gives impactful career guidance to corporate audiences with insight from her book, Expect to Win: 10 Proven Strategies for Thriving in the Workplace (Avery, 2010).
Reshma Saujani is a leading activist and founder and CEO of Moms First. She is also the founder and former CEO of Girls Who Code. She has spent more than a decade building movements to fight for women’s and girls’ economic empowerment, working to close the gender gap in the tech sector, and most recently advocating policies to support moms impacted by the pandemic. Saujani’s newest book, Pay Up: The Future of Women and Work (and Why It’s Different Than You Think)(Atria/One Signal Publishers, 2022), presents a bold plan to address the burnout and inequity harming America’s working women today. Saujani is also the author of the international bestseller Brave, Not Perfect: Fear Less, Fail More, and Live Bolder (Currency, 2019), and her influential TED talk, “Teach Girls Bravery, Not Perfection,” has more than 5 million views globally.
Anne Chow is a transformative business leader whose trailblazing corporate career spans over three decades in the technology and business sectors. As the first woman of color CEO in AT&T’s 140+ year history, she led AT&T Business, a $35 billion global operating unit composed of 35,000 people. Currently the lead director on the board of directors of FranklinCovey and the board of directors of 3M, Chow has been widely recognized for her inclusive leadership, driving success at the intersection of people, culture and technology.
Molly Fletcher is a trailblazer in every sense of the word—a rare talent of business wisdom, relationship brilliance and unwavering optimism. As a CEO, she shares her unconventional and unique techniques that she utilized as a sports agents in the high-stakes, big-ego world of professional sports, and now as a successful entrepreneur. As former president of client representation for sports and entertainment agency CSE, Molly spent two decades as one of the world’s only female sports agents.
The 2023 Women in Leadership Institute
Every leader faces hurdles to advancement in the workplace—and every woman leader can develop the leadership competencies needed to overcome these hurdles and ascend in the leadership ranks.
WIL attendees will gain access to insights from inspiring leaders, authors and speakers through keynote sessions designed to empower individuals to overcome these barriers to advancement. Each keynote session is delivered by an expert leader who will guide attendees through an engaging exploration of a common hurdle to advancement and the leadership competency needed to scale that hurdle.