April/May 2021 Newsletter

The Women’s Business Collaborative honored a number of our Women’s Forum members for their leadership and innovation during the COVID-19 pandemic, in a special Women’s History Month edition of their Women’s Leadership Magazine. The Women Leadership Magazine is designed to recognize, promote and celebrate the accomplishments of women in leadership. WLM also provides content aimed at helping to build a corps of future female leaders in every professional endeavor. When asked “what does women business leadership look like in 2021? And beyond?”, Forum member Loretta McCarthy, Co-Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner of Golden Seeds, LLC said “Women in leadership means strength, wisdom, judgement, inclusiveness and empathy. Those are the strengths of all leaders. It is at last recognized that women often excel at these attributes. This is not new in 2021, but has been emboldened by the female heads of state who were recognized for their leadership during the COVID-19 pandemic, and, of course, the first ever female U.S. Vice President.”

Congrats to all of our Forum members who were honored:

• Subha Barry, CEO, Seramount
• Paula Bennett, Former CEO, J. Jill, Board Director, At Home
• Pamela Craig, Former Chief Financial Officer, Accenture
• Lorraine Hariton, President & CEO, Catalyst
• Joan Haffenreffer, Managing Director, CAO, Global Public Affairs, Citi
• Jill Johnson, Co-Founder and CEO, Institute for Entrepreneurial Leadership (IFEL)
• Alexandra Jung, Managing Partner & Founder, Amateras Capital, Funding Diverse Investment Firms and Founders
• Lori Marcus, Founder, Courtyard Connections, LLC
• Lorretta McCarthy, Managing Partner, Golden Seeds, LLC
• Deirdre Quinn, Co-Founder and CEO, Lafayette 148 New York
• Susan Skerritt, Former Chairwoman, CEO & President, Deutsche Bank Trust Company Americas
• Kay Unger, CEO, Kay Unger Design

To read more on the Women’s Business Collaborative Women in Leadership Magazine, please visit HERE.

Forum members Lorretta McCarthy, Co-Chief Executive Officer and Managing Partner, Golden Seeds, LLC and Peggy Wallace, Managing Partner, Golden Seeds, LLC, along with Jo Ann Corkran wrote a compelling article published in Fortune, exploring why Venture Capital continues to ignore women. In five days, Robinhood raised $3.4 billion between Jan. 28 and Feb. 1, according to PitchBook. This amount is as much as all female-founded businesses in 2020. “If Robinhood’s $3.4 billion equals about 2.5% of the $150 billion invested by VCs annually (the amount reported for 2020), that’s higher than the 2.2% share that went to women-founded companies. And this 2.2% was actually a decrease from 2.6% in 2019. So, in less than one week in the first month of 2021, one company raised approximately what all women will likely raise in 2021.” To read the full article, please visit HERE.

Lauren C. Anderson, International Consultant, Fellow, Geneva Centre for Security Policy and Former FBI Executive, was invited to be a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Lauren had support on her nomination from fellow Forum member Edie Weiner, CEO and President, The Future Hunters. Lauren also joined her first corporate board, a public biometrics company called ImageWare Systems, Inc. Lauren is very grateful to Forum member, Kathy Hannan, Independent Corporate Director and Retired National Managing Partner and Former Vice Chairman, Annaly Capital Management, Otis Worldwide, Anthropos Capital Corp., Blue Trails Software for recommending her to ImageWare Systems.

To read the press release on Lauren’s appointment to ImageWare Systems Inc., please visit HERE.

Subha Barry, was named CEO, of Seramount, the organization formerly known as Working Mother Media, which was recently rebranded.

To read more information on Subha’s latest appointment as CEO, please visit HERE.

Paula DiPerna, Consultant; Special Advisor, Carbon Disclosure Project; Former President, Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) International; Joyce Foundation was featured on NPR’s live national show titled “America, Are We Ready?” hosted by WNYC’s Brian Lehrer, where she discussed Biden’s first 100 days and his climate actions.

To listen to Paula’s feature on “America, Are We Ready?”, please visit HERE.

Carole A. Feuerman, President, The Second LSC, Ltd., released a new autobiography My Hyperrealist Life & Legacy. A signed copy can be pre-ordered on Carole’s website which also boasts a plethora of items that can also be ordered from her Boutique by going to her Foundation website. By purchasing an item from her Foundation website, 100% of the profits will go towards helping artists with exhibitions, grants, and education.

To pre-order your signed copy of My Hyperrealist Life & Legacy please visit HERE.

Dr. Ludy Green, Agency Lead on Counter-Trafficking, US Agency for International Development, and career coach Marianne Ruggiero give essential advice for overcoming obstacles and landing a job during the pandemic in a podcast called “Ending Domestic Abuse.”

To listen to this podcast, please visit HERE.

Francine A. LeFrak, President, Francine A. LeFrak Foundation. The mission of Francine’s foundation is to help change the lives of those who need an opportunity to achieve success by providing access to training, education, the arts and facilities. The foundation launched its ongoing Empowered Women Speaker Series featuring former White House Press Secretary, Anchor & Host, Dana Perino. 

To view information on the Empowered Women Speaker series and its upcoming guest, Diane Von Furstenberg, please visit HERE.

Westina Matthews Shatteen, Managing Director (Ret), Merrill Lynch, recently published her book, This Band of Sisterhood: Black Women Bishops on Race, Faith, and the Church which provides a candid, unrehearsed, engaging conversation set against the backdrop of the pandemic, racial unrest, and recent presidential election occurring among the five current Black women Episcopal bishops (who make up only 4% of all active bishops today) who have all been consecrated within the last five years: Jennifer Baskerville-Burrow (2017); Carlye J. Hughes (2018); Phoebe A. Roaf (2019); Kimberly Lucas (2019); and Shannon MacVean-Brown. With a desire to bring Black women clergy in the Episcopal Church voices front and center, Westina Matthews allows these unique stories of leadership and compassion to be told.

To purchase your copy of Westina’s latest book, please visit HERE.

Alicia Syrett, Founder & CEO, Pantegrion Capital, was elected Chair of the Board of Digimarc, a publicly-traded technology company. She continues to serve as the Chair of Digimarc’s Governance, Nominating, and Sustainability Committee. She was also a Speaker at the Horasis Extraordinary Meeting on the United States of America on a panel called “Repositioning Boards in Times of Disruption.”

To learn more about Alicia’s appointment, please visit HERE.

Patrice Tanaka, Chief Joy Officer, Joyful Planet, Inc., wrote two beautiful and heartfelt articles published on CommPro.biz titled “I am Woman!” for Women’s History Month and “I Am an Asian American Woman!” in response to the horrific acts of violence since the fatal shooting of six Asian women in Atlanta-area spas. In each article, Tanaka discusses identity politics as a woman and as an Asian American and how the two identities interact in the political arena when advocating for civil rights.

“And speaking up is what we Asian Americans and our allies must do to make sure that “anti-Asian hate crimes” is understood to be a real thing. We can’t leave hate crimes to be characterized by others, including Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office Captain Jay Baker, who explained that eight people were dead because the shooter had “a bad day.” – Patrice Tanaka

To read each of these articles from our member, please visit HERE for I am Woman!” and HERE for“I Am an Asian American Woman!”

Kay Unger, CEO, Kay Unger Design, gave back by helping retailers and wholesalers who need help navigating through the difficulty of the COVID-19 pandemic through Retailers United, a charitable organization that seeks to re-open America and help those in retail that are impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. Kay, along with fellow Executive Board members Deb Weinswig (CEO & Founder, Coresight Research), Tami Fersko (Group President, LF Americas), Karsten Newbury (Chief Strategy & Digital Officer, Gerber Technology) and Brice Wu (Komodo Health, Head of Engineering), created a Pitch Competition in which finalists competed for a $10,000 grant and the opportunity to connect with top industry leaders.

To learn more about the Pitch Competition, please visit HERE.

Linda Willett, Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Corporate Secretary, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, was the Keynote Speaker at the annual Women in STEM Luncheon hosted by Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Her speech titled “From the Classroom to the Board Room: The Evolution of a Career” focused on adaptability, flexibility and willingness to take risks as key elements in a successful career path.

To learn more about the annual Women in STEM Luncheon hosted by Indiana University of Pennsylvania, please visit HERE.