'Women, Technology and Leadership' conference features panel of female executives, leaders
The Central Michigan University Executive Council for Women in Technology (ECWIT) hosted the 2019 "Women, Technology and Leadership Conference" at 2 p.m. March 13 in the Bovee University Center 221 Rotunda.
The event featured a panel which focused on the challenges women face in technology careers and leadership roles and how to succeed in the technology industry.
This is the third annual conference organized by ECWIT, and it offered a unique perspective on technology and leadership from female executives.
"(Women) need to be encouraged that they can get into a technology field, or a science, or a math field," said OIT project manger Carla Budinsky. "They don't need to be intimidated by it being a mainly male role. Women are just as smart and can do it just as well as their male coworkers."
The conference brought in keynote speaker Melanie Kalmar, Corporate Vice President of Dow Chemical Company. It featured a panel of five female executives, including three CMU alumni, that had an array of different professional backgrounds to speak about their personal experience in technological and leadership roles.
One of these executives was Nimisha Shah who is is the Next Gen Data Center Release Engineering manager at Ford Motor Company. Shah leads a team of 64 other engineers – but even with a team of 65, she is the only women in the room. Her experience in the technological field has made her want to inspire women to join the tech industry.
"Girls are wired differently than men," Shah said. "So certainly I think having more girls in teams would add a lot of value."
Another executive was Maria del Pilar Chouza-Calo, world languages and cultures faculty. She too has experienced hurdles in the leadership roles she has held.
"Because I'm a woman and I look very young, my male counter parts didn't always respect me at first," Chouza-Calo said. "It took me about five or seven years to show that my work is as valued as theirs."
Chicago, IL Freshman, Alana Arrington, was in attendance at the conference. Arrington is a computer science major and was inspired to come from her experiences with similar panels. Arrington learned about what she has to do to succeed in the technology field.
"I learned don't be intimidated when you go into the classroom," she said, since most of her computer science classes are dominated by men. "I also learned to give back to the youth, because you don't want young girls not knowing how to code."
After the panel concluded, a catered networking event was held to allow students to network with the panelists and attendees in the audience.
"Usually it's very hard to reach out to executives or managers or leaders, they can get super busy and it's very hard to get five minutes of their time," Shah said. "This a great form to meet five of six executives for a couple of hours."
After the networking event there was the final event, a drawing for prizes that included two $500 scholarships, one $1,000 dollar scholarship, amazon gift cards and more. Livonia junior Sarah Miller attended the conference and was the winner $1000 scholarship. She was inspired to come because she's majoring in business information systems and learned from the panelists' experiences.
"I learned that your path can go in so many different ways but you'll end up where you're supposed to be," Miller said. "Take the opportunities that are presented to you and you will end up doing what you are meant to be doing."
