By Michael Hart
Over the last 45 years, women have filled two new jobs created in the United States for every one taken by a man. U.S. working women now generate $4.3 trillion in earned income every year and fill more than half of all the management and professional positions at American companies.
So, if women do not yet make up a substantial segment of your workforce—and your customer base—they will soon. With these and other statistics in mind, the SEMA Show is offering a number of conference sessions and networking events in its Women Driven track, all designed around the fact that women today represent more of the industry’s customers and its employees.
Even though women represent a larger share of the automotive industry’s workforce every year, the opportunities for them do not always match their capabilities. That’s why a panel of successful women in the industry will participate in “Women in Business – Shattering the Glass Ceiling!,” a women-only event designed to foster an open dialogue on the qualities it takes to excel in business and leadership.
Savvy industry executives know that 80% of car-making decisions today are influenced by women. They also know that if they are going to connect with those customers, they’ve got to change their workforces to reflect both society and business today. So, with “Leveraging Differences to Drive Success: 5 Best Practices for Building a Diverse Workforce,” another panel of successful women thought leaders in the automotive industry will talk about how to be profitable in a diverse, globalized marketplace.
Joanne Lipman, an author and former deputy managing editor at the Wall Street Journal, will demystify the role of women in the workplace and share some advice for the men who work with them in her session entitled “Communication Roadmap for Men and Women.”
There will be an opportunity for women just starting in the field to connect with industry-leading female professionals when the fifth annual Gear-Up Girl networking event gets underway Monday afternoon, November 2. The SEMA Businesswomen’s Network will host this opportunity for different generations of female professionals to informally get together once again.
Finally, the SEMA Show’s exciting Keynote & Coffee program will present Bridget Brennan, CEO of the Female Factor, who will offer some insights into one of the most important prime target audiences in the future, millennial women, in her Wednesday morning presentation, “How Expectations Are Changing the Sales Experience for Millennial Women.”
View a complete list of SEMA Show Education sessions available.