The Networker: The Women's Leadership Exchange

The female alternative to the golf-course conference. by Courtney E. Martin


WLE is designed to give permission to hard-working, successful women to admit that they need help. In fact, Grossman and March have built facilitated networking into their conferences. Women are not only encouraged, but directed to ask each other tough questions—whether they run a fifty thousand or fifty million dollar company, whether they are corporate executives or entrepreneurs out on their own. WLE operates on the assumption that everyone has questions to ask and answers to offer, just on different scales. (Grossman notes that corporate execs are particularly tentative when it comes to asking for help). Another way that WLE is getting women the answers they need to grow even bigger businesses is "speed coaching." Grossman noticed that too many conferences let long-winded participants drone on during Q&A time (we've all been there), so she decided that it was time to streamline the process. At WLE conferences, business leaders get five minutes of one-on-one time with their favorite "growth guru" as WLE speakers are called—to ask a succinct question and get a potentially business-transforming answer.

Carol Jenkins, the President of New York's Women's Media Center, was one such "growth guru" last year. She's since become a participant herself. She explains, "At my very first WLE conference, I participated in an exercise where everyone asked the women at their table what they most needed. I said, quite frankly: "Money." One of the women there that day now serves on our fundraising committee—she's a really good supporter."

The WLE has a brand new project in the works, intended specifically for women like the groups' founders. It's called the Leadership Executive Circle (LEXCI) and is a series of programs run throughout the year for women whose businesses exceed a million dollars in revenue. You better believe Grossman and March don't feel stalled anymore.

Look out for a WLE conference near you on their web site.

 

 

Courtney E. Martin is a writer, teacher, and chick pea enthusiast who lives in Brooklyn. She is also the author of Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters: The Frightening New Normalcy of Hating Your Body (Simon &Schuster, 2007). You can read more about her work at www.courtneyemartin.com.


 

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