Women's Networking: A Successful Event
Dublin City Network for women celebrate International Women's Day.
Dublin City Network For Women had a very successful event last week to celebrate International Women’s Day with over 180 attendees on the night from the four networks (Dublin Chamber of Commerce’s, Ambassadors for Female Entrepreneurship network and the Women In Business networks from Fingal, Dublin City and Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Enterprise Boards). The event was sponsored by Vodafone.
The Guest Speakers were Anne O’Leary, Business and Enterprise Director with Vodafone Ireland (Keynote speaker), Lulu O’Sullivan, Giftsdirect.com, Suzanne Carroll, Tone At Home Franchise Ltd, Emer Jameson, YourLocal.ie, Grainne Byrne, gbc Public Relations. Eibhlin Curley, Assistant CEO of DCEB acted as MC at the event and facilitated the panel discussion. The women attending the event really enjoyed the talks by five inspirational women on their successes and challenges and most stayed for lively networking over fingerfood and wine. The involvement of four networks meant that there was an excellent opportuny for attendees to make new contacts.
Photos from the night are on the Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/#!/InternationalWomensDayDublin2010?sk=wall&filter=2
Summary of the Talks and Discussion
The key themes running through the talks were:
• Women are making progress but not enough are reaching the top in business and other spheres
• Women need to be ambitious and aim high for more progress to take place.
• You need to find what you’re passionate about and focus on excelling in that, to maximise your potential.
• Women can be too modest in looking for payrises
• You can achieve work life balance or a healthy life rhythm by prioritising what is important to you and planning your schedule around that.
• Working mothers need to have excellent childcare supports in place and set clear priorities/limits.
• Self employment can provide more flexibility than the multinational environment.
A Sample from the Q&A Session is outlined below.
How should you sell online in an early stage market?
Lulu said their strategy was to provide better customer service than was expected to provide comfort about this way of purchasing.
Should there be gender quotas in politics?
There was a view that there needs to be, otherwise it takes too long. The culture needs to be changed so that it’s easier for women to put themselves forward.
How to push women forward?
Overall, you should surround yourself with people who will challenge you. “Why can’t you do it? Of course you can”. You need to avoid people who bring you down - Veronica Canning talks about “psychic vampires”.
Do women support each other?
Lulu said 14 out of 16 employees are women!
Anne said that she thinks it is very important that women at the same level work together. Most women are great and pragmatic.
Emer said she finds that women are supportive. She treats both the same although the rapport at beginning of a meeting etc might be a bit different.
Any advice for working Mothers?
Emer said that it is important to have excellent supports in place. She has a great au pair – same one for over two years. She is lucky in that her husband is self employed and home before her. She is also lucky to live near the school and extended family. She normally gets home around 7pm. She makes sure to tell her husband and children exactly what is coming up each week so that everyone is prepared for anything out of the ordinary. She also plans her schedule around important family occasions such as parent teacher meetings.
Suzanne has two small children. She found the multinational environment to be very male dominated and inflexible. She has greater flexibility now. She does need to plan ahead and some weeks can be very hectic but the other side of it is that she tries to finish early whenever possible.
Lulu has four children. She had them after she set up the business. She says the key to a good balance is to have the best childminder that you can afford. There are certain non-negotiables such as being there when children are sick and getting to school plays etc. You need to be clear in your head about what is a priority for you.
Any tips on planning ahead?
Emer says she loves to teach people how to sell. You need to have a framework for identifying customer needs and a structured sales approach. You need to continuously train your team/yourself.
Is post a thing of the past?
Grainne pointed out that something that comes in the post, such as an invitation, makes more of an impact than an email.
Are women bad at asking for more money?
There was agreement that women are slower than men to ask for pay rises.
One panel member talked about going into a meeting to discuss the salary in a new job with a determination to ask for a specific sum but a fear that she would automatically accept what she was offered. (She was offered more than what she sought in the end so it wasn’t a problem!)
Are smartphones important for the various businesses?
Suzanne said that they are finding that more and more people access their website from smartphones. There was agreement that web based businesses now have to become easy to access on mobiles.