In honor of International Women's Day, we thought it would be fitting to celebrate some of the diverse, inspiring women in the HBX learning community who are pursuing their dreams, excelling in their careers, and empowering others.
"When I’m in a room with other professionals, now I feel like I have the language that matches my passion, that matches my work ethic, my goals and dreams...
I hope that as my kids look back on the many pursuits that I’ve embarked on, in particular, HBX CORe, to be brave. Because then that means that they will pursue opportunities that seem challenging, that seem out of reach, that seem hard. And, so I hope that from this experience that they felt mom was just a little bit more brave than I was before I started."
– Sheneka Balogun
CORe Participant"I firmly believe that balanced gender diversity in business is crucial to innovation, success, and a higher collective intelligence. When the decisions of a woman positioned in the corporate world make significant impacts fiscally or culturally, then you begin to see the tangible value of a diverse enterprise. HBX has given me the foundation to exemplify this in the services I offer my corporate clientele."
– Leslie Pico
CORe Participant“One of my biggest passions is bringing opportunities to minorities, to women, in subjects like science, technology, engineering, math, making you change your mind about who it is that looks like an engineer.”
– Daniella Patrick
Disruptive Strategy Participant"I'm a mom. I work full time. Like others, I have a demanding schedule and struggle with balancing life with work. I'm interested in pursuing a Master's degree, but haven't convinced myself to commit to a three year timeline.
I saw CORe as an opportunity. An opportunity to learn from the brightest and interact with global community who shared a commitment to learning as I did without the long-term time commitment. CORe not only gave me the confidence that I can tackle more, it inspired me to be more and continue my education."
– Kalie Work
CORe Participant"I am working as part of a project team in India that is working to set up the world's first rural-based social network usable by non-literate persons. A key part of my job is to understand the needs on the ground, and convey the insights to the technology and design teams who are making the product - an activity that CORe greatly helped me with via the Economics for Managers and Business Analytics courses. Both these courses help you to better understand the people you are working to serve as an enterprise and learn how to draw insights from the data in front of you."
– Anindita Ravikumar
CORe Participant"My strategy and message for my team and how we communicate with our customers has begun to shift. The biggest takeaway is looking at my product on the shelf and always trying to gauge 'what is the job to be done here?'
I have also started to pay a lot more attention to what the other vendors within my stores are doing. I can truthfully say this has already made me a much better listener. When we all have things to say, listening is one of the first things that can get lost, so I have not only found a stronger voice but a much better and tuned set of ears."
–Paige Peterson
Disruptive Strategy Participant"Within 5 days of finishing the course I had a plan of action for a major part of our business and presented it to our corporate executive. It applied the theories of the Customer Job To Be Done and caused us to rethink our strategy to get the customer to “hire” us over the competition."
–Robbee Minicola
Disruptive Strategy Participant"Having a better base for business terminology that is used every day in my work as a business analyst is invaluable. I am also able to offer new ideas for business metrics to our company's leadership and relate to real world examples of how other businesses have implemented improvements thanks to the case studies that were presented as part of the program."
–Michelle Headrick
CORe Participant"I applied it to both my teaching and research. For teaching, after summarizing what I learned from this program, I introduced finance in a 90-minute class to junior and senior college students in order to show them different ways of doing business plans in the leisure and sport domains."
–Jingning Ao
Leading With Finance Participant
International Women's Day is 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. Learn more at www.internationalwomensday.com
#IWD2017 #BeBoldForChange
