Hello Friends,

In the past eight weeks I have been in three countries celebrating the success of our IWL alumni and the work we have done together over the past 12 years. It is an awesome feeling to behold the impact that we have had as a global community of women leaders.

Women of Canada

Let me first pay tribute to the women of Canada who have spread their magic across the private and public sectors. In particular we have three alumni who were awarded Public Service Leadership Excellence Awards: Marie MacDonald, Marlene LeBlanc and National Leadership Award winner, Karen Bonner. They along with Barbara Martin, Jill Lang-Ward and numerous other alumni convened the 800-person National Manager’s Community Conference in Halifax, Nova Scotia in April. I was so honored to be the keynote speaker at this awesome display of innovative strategies, breakthrough thinking and sharing of best practices across all agencies of the Canadian Federal Government. We hope to bring the work of Women Leading Change and Partners Leading Change to Ottawa in the Fall as a way of turbo-charging the extraordinary work of these women and their male colleagues in the public service.

Partners Leading Change

We also completed the first ever Partners Leading Change in Prince Edward Island (PEI) and had a wonderful mixture of men and women from both the US and Canada from local, provincial and federal governments as well as not-for-profits and for-profit companies. The size and scope of their groundbreaking projects will undoubtedly be the subject of future profiles in the IWL newsletter so stay tuned.

WLC Five-Year Anniversary in Australia

The tiny island of PEI is only a few airplane transfers and jet-lag pills to the world’s largest island, Australia. Anne Skipper and The Teleran Group sponsored the five-year anniversary of Women Leading Change in Australia and convened a wonderful celebration evening complete with 75 alumni sharing their accomplishments, food and of course the famous Aussie wine. It was a bittersweet moment as we ‘retired’ the WLC program and launched the next era of partnership between Teleran and IWL. We completed the first ever Master’s Class in Adelaide and took the work of Contextual Leadership to a deeper level of application and empowerment for 22 leaders across Australia. You’ll be hearing more from our alumni in Australia as we compile a five-year register of case studies for the book coming out in next Spring.

More News

Now let me share about the exciting things happening in the U.S. as I joined several alumni on June 8th for the Spirit in Business Women’s Breakfast Celebration. It seems like lots of people are shedding the ‘straight jacket’ of corporate America and coming out as spiritual beings that happen to work in corporations. While this isn’t new to the IWL community it is really something to see a convention hall filled with men and women who are willing to say that we need to bring our spirituality to work, not our religions, but our spiritual selves. It was really quite a remarkable event with lots of Bay Area alumni as presenters and attendees.

I was also honored to present our work at the first ever Fast Company Women’s Leadership Conference in San Francisco on June 9th and 10th. The presentation title, ‘Setting the Agenda for Business’ says it all. With renowned leaders from corporations like Yahoo, Nike, IBM, General Motors and authors with book topics from ‘Designing Your Life’ to ‘Global Citizenship’ and a phenomenal presentation by playwright, Anna Deavere Smith, it was a fantastic celebration of ‘who women are being’ as leaders in the 21st century. Lots of alumni were present and added greatly to the dialogue and vision of the future for business. Look to Fast Company magazine for more about the contributions from this event

We’ve also had several of the alumni from our Executives Leading Sustainable Change program receive awards and visibility for the great work they are doing in their organizations. Among them are:

Toni Riccardi -- Diversity Inc. (cover story) March/April 2003
Susan Burnett -- Harvard Business Review article May 2003
Rochelle McReynolds - 2003 The Chronicle of Philanthropy
Susan Trainer, Tracey Warson (and Rayona) -- Working Mother (cover story) July/Aug 2003

Also Diversity Inc. just named Wells Fargo as the #1 company for women executives which is a victory for both ELSC alumni Tracey Warson and Deb Paterson.

I’m sure I haven’t listed all the accomplishments of this first half of the year 2003 but I hope you get a real sense of pride and appreciation for the IWL community that you belong to. It is in the space of generosity and empowerment that we provide for each other that makes these things possible. I’d like to hear from each of you about what wonderful things are happening ‘on your shift.’ Until then I carry you in my heart and remind you that we have a 50-year renewable lease. There is no request too small or too large that you can make of us.

Tribute to Anita Borg

On a different note: It is with great sadness that we pay tribute to longtime alumna, Dr. Anita Borg, who died of brain cancer Sunday, April 6th at her mother's home in Sonoma, California at the tender age of 54. Anita sought to revolutionize the world and the way we think about technology and its impact on our lives. Her breakthrough project became realized when she founded the Institute for Women and Technology. Anita tenaciously envisioned and set about to change the world for women and for technology, believing that technology affects everything: our economic, political, social and personal lives. I will always remember Anita in one of her favorite T-shirts which said, ‘Well-Behaved Women Rarely Make History.’ She will always remain one of the most special women leaders we were ever blessed to know. To find out more about Anita and her legacy please go to http://www.iwt.org/home.html.

Thank you each for being a constant source of inspiration and contribution to this world. As daughter, Chelsea completes her sophomore year and gets ever closer to becoming a young woman in the world of work I am grateful in knowing that you are making the world a better place for each and every child who will inherit what we leave behind.

In Peace and Love,

Rayona