Copperleaf Celebrates International Women’s Day 2019
Today is International Women’s Day, a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity. International Women’s Day (IWD) has occurred for well over a century, with the first event held in 1911.
To celebrate, we’re featuring a recent interview of Copperleaf CEO, Judi Hess, by Business in Vancouver magazine. This year, Business in Vancouver celebrates the 20th anniversary of its Influential Women in Business Awards by asking 20 past honourees to reflect on their careers and share the wisdom they’ve acquired from their remarkable careers.
A trailblazer for women in leadership and high-tech, Judi has been a long-time supporter of increasing diversity and inclusion in the workplace. She was honoured in 2017 with the Influential Women in Business Award for her efforts in encouraging women to join the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) fields and take on leadership roles. In her 2017 interview, Judi discussed her career path and some lessons she learned along the way including:
- why taking calculated risks are vital for success
- the importance of diversity when building your team
- what work-life balance means to her
In this year’s interview, Judi expands on the wisdom she’s gained throughout her career:
The IWD 2019 theme is #BalanceforBetter, focused on building a gender-balanced world with equal rights and opportunities for all. Gloria Steinem, world-renowned feminist, writer and political activist once explained:
The story of women’s struggle for equality belongs to no single feminist nor to any one organization but to the collective efforts of all who care about human rights.
Gender balance ultimately drives a better working world and we look forward to doing our part to help the progress!
Check out Judi’s blog series titled “Asset Management Is For Women Too” where she features some of the fantastic women we work with, and the interesting work they’re doing in the field of asset management. The goal of this series is to shed some light on these “Hidden Figures” and highlight this as a potential career path for other women. If you know of other amazing women in this field, please let us know!