Happy International Women's Day
International Women's Day is a global celebration when women are recognized for their social, economic, cultural and political achievements.
Letter from Rama Moorthy, GlobalMindED International Advisory Council:
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Rama Moorthy
CEO
Hatha Systems |
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Dear GlobalMindED Community of Leaders,
It is an honor to be one of the launch members of the GlobalMindED International Advisory Council which formed three
years ago this month, when the organization became a 501(c)(3). As a woman, as a minority, as advocate for equity and access, I have benefited tremendously from the platform of thought leaders that commit their time and energy to solving some of the greatest problems of our times.
At college, I earned a BS in electrical engineering from Purdue University and an MBA from Vanderbilt. I've worked for 28 years in such places as NYC, Silicon Valley and Washington D.C. as well as in several countries around the world in both hardware and software focused primarily on enterprise solutions. When I was 44 years old, I founded Hatha Systems, an innovative enterprise software company delivering automation and context based intelligent analytics to draw out the data/knowledge from the 1000s of software applications that run business/mission operations in both Fortune 1000 companies and government agencies. Prior to my work with Hatha Systems, I worked for Texas Instruments, AMD, Siemens, Network Associates (McAfee), Sun Microsystems and Booze Allen Hamilton. The background I had in corporate America gave me a strong framework and experience as well motivation to start my own company.
I was raised and educated in an environment of not only critical thinking, but also observing beyond what is obvious. I never had a goal to become a global leader, just a mission to make systemic change, which has a ubiquitous effect in my world. My path also included asking questions, learning and contributing beyond my own interests. These three things have allowed me to venture out-of-the-box and explore how lessons learned or solutions delivered from all industries can be leveraged and applied in the world of technology. I'm inspired every day by the courageous people who are committed to doing well by doing good.
Future leaders need to keep in mind that substance is critical, and being open to new and different ways of thinking is the key to innovating. With so many of us living in the "First World", it is challenging to avoid being all-knowing, dismissive, or even arrogant. Being compassionate leads to learning and open mindedness for innovating and contributing. I have a motto I repeat regularly to my team, "arrogance breeds ignorance, so leave your ego at the door". Be open, be a creative and critical thinker, and listen to others who are both like-minded and NOT like-minded to create a world of learning for yourself. We can't improve the world or make a big contribution through business if we surround ourselves with people just like us.
Finally, we believe that equity cannot happen for women without supportive men who value strong women. We salute the men who are part of the equity change, appointing women to Boards, promoting women and learning to be more effective and inclusive from the women they work with. Thank you for being global-minded and, whether male or female, for creating opportunity for all people to be fulfilled, contribute and thrive.
It is my pleasure to share the stories below of other outstanding women in the GlobalMindED community who are this day and every day improving the world.
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We appreciate the service these amazing female leaders provide to the GlobalMindED community and the world
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Kate Morican - Partner, Deloitte Canada
When I entered the workforce after graduating from university and full time service as an officer in the Canadian Forces military reserves, my resume's purpose was stated as "helping people and teams reach their full potential in order to contribute to organization success and performance." As a Partner at Deloitte Canada, I lead the national change and transformation service line. This area of the business aims to help Canadian and multinational clients mobilize people to achieve strategic business goals. Deloitte and I have an unwavering commitment to a long-term vision that "businesses focused on maximizing the potential of each of their employees win in the market."
I lead many women focused initiatives at Deloitte including the support of Carleton University's Centre for Women in Politics and Public Leadership benchmarking study. The study outlines the uneven progress of female leaders in Canada and the challenges to achieving parity in the private, public, and non-profit sectors. I'm also an active sponsor for women leaders at Deloitte through individualized leadership development and coaching. As a result, I'm often approached to speak on Deloitte's efforts to shift from optics to outcomes, and work in building diverse and inclusive organizations that support women leaders.
I bring passion, integrity and insight to coaching of clients and leaders not only through my business experience but also as a wife and mother juggling all the commitments of family and home. My advice to all women leading change - play to your strengths, stay true to yourself, challenge, and have empathy - everyone has a story.
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Erika Twani - CEO, Learning One to One Foundation
"If not us, who? If not now, when?" - John F. Kennedy
The world is in continuous transformation and that will not change any time soon. I believe that each human being can impact this transformation positively and globally. Thus, we must think of the humanity as an interdependent body, which makes us function at the global level and everything we do is towards creating a global impact. My work is to transform education through working with public school systems and, because of the global mindset, everything I do must have a worldwide reach and impact.
After years of experience in the education technology industry and seeing firsthand the difference that personalized education can make to students' lives, I joined education experts to found Learning One to One Foundation, to replicate technology models globally. I may lack of one skill here and there to make this happen faster and better, but the skills I have are more than enough to execute. So let's do it, because "if not us, who? If not now, when?"
There is nothing wrong with pursuing an outstanding career with companies or one's own venture. But something magic happens when you realize that life is too short and the only thing you can leave behind is your legacy. Therefore, I ask all women to take advantage of the opportunities in front of you, never settling for lower than your personal dreams or against what your consciousness says so; aim at discovering the legacy you want to leave along the journey and may that legacy be to transform the world into a better place to live for everyone. Once time comes to make it happen, do not hesitate because this is what you were born for.
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Heather Callender-Potters - Co-Founder, PharmaJet
Based on my private equity experience, starting the early 90's, in Central and Eastern Europe, I have developed a passion to look at opportunities to invest in companies, which can create a great return for its shareholders, while making a tremendous impact in the local economic health where the technology is deployed. Among the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN, where health is a priority, I have devoted considerable time to invest and gather co-investment by like-minded individuals to support technologies, which can improve health at a lower cost. PharmaJet, my needle-free jet injection technology company, is a prime example where we play a role in the Polio Eradication Initiative. For the last mile push toward eradication, with a 50% vaccine shortage, PharmaJet's technology can cut the dose required by 60% and achieve a superior immune response. Stretching the dose means more children vaccinated at a lower cost, all the while eliminating needle risks and trash, cutting waste and weight by 50%, and processing patients 2-3x faster. The combination of savings and improved standard of care represents a positive ROI for the individuals, community, governments, and their health and economic prosperity.
As a female health leader, I'm grateful to serve around the world by providing low cost health solutions, especially in the poorest parts of the world.
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Dr. Godelieve Spaas - CEO, Creating Change
(the Netherlands)
We all need to be caretakers of the earth: shifting from using the earth for our own benefit to being in harmony with people, societies, cultures and nature.
The UN Sustainable Development Goals set the stage. Global leaders are the ones that have the courage to acknowledge and speak up that they don't have the answers. They are the ones that invite people and organizations across regions, disciplines, cultures and sectors to cooperate. To share knowledge, experiences, experiments and imagination to allow a more inclusive economy to emerge, fostering new ideas and cutting edge initiatives to come to fruition. They are prepared to embrace the unknown, to receive strangers in and to go elsewhere, to walk the untrodden path. Only in this way, can we build an inclusive economy that serves us all in harmony with the earth. These are the leaders of the future and many of them will be women.
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Cynthia James - CEO, Cynthia James Enterprises
I am passionate about women and supporting them to live the life of their dreams. As I travel the world, speak in numerous venues and invite women to awaken to their full potential, my heart sings. I believe this is the time for women to experience powerful growth opportunities, community connection and deliver their gifts in extraordinary ways. The world is in need of our wisdom and brilliance.
As a transformational coach inspirational leaders, I guide people to make changes at a deep level for lasting healing. I
embody the quote "I am not what I have done. I am what I have become;" and, I lead others to do the same. My own life was transformed as I transcended a violent and abusive childhood. Through my education and personal healing, I created the foundation for all my programs and work in self-care strategies and emotional integration that support adults and teens internationally. In 2015, my business partner, Jean Hendry and I created the Women Creating Our Futures
featuring nationally and internationally recognized speakers, life coaches and artists guiding hundreds of women to build the life and future they both desire and deserve.
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Dr. Bena Kallick - Co-Founder, Institute for Habits of Mind and EduPlanet21
My passion and mission is to create a more thoughtful, cooperative, compassionate generation of people who skillfully work to resolve social, environmental, economic and political problems. I focus my work on education because I believe that working with learning at all ages will be the best way to leverage my mission. Although there are often obstacles for women in the workplace as well as with parenting, I believe that learning how to think flexibly (always making certain that you are understanding other's perspectives with empathy), persisting (staying with what is fundamental to your values and integrity) are questioning and posing problems (continuing to remain curious and investigative) probably the most important dispositions for a future.
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Donna Morton - CEO, Change Finance
With the decades of experience in sustainability, economics, social innovation, clean energy, and ethical wealth management, I was the CEO of a clean energy company and built a think tank that helped pass the first carbon tax in North America. Since becoming the
CEO and co-founder of Change Finance, I have been
working to create 100% clean ETFs for sustainable investments and include anyone left out of the dominant economy - women, people of color, indigenous, poor people who are essential to building a new economy that is more clean, more just and more capable of regenerating Earth's life-support systems.
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Gina Otto - Award-winning Author of Cassandra's Angel and Founder & CEO of Change My World Now
I remember the moment clearly when I was in Hollywood, and I had a spiritual experience while filming a diet cola commercial! Suddenly, I had the realization that I was working in an industry, that uses anorexic models to sell diet soda to teenage girls. So I quit! I quit a 12-year career. I did not want to be part of the problem. I wanted to live a life I could be proud of.
That moment of awakening set me on a new path as the author of
Cassandra's Angel,
a modern-day fairy tale that sends an empowering message helping every little girl to find her voice and her bright light and shine for the world. The plot centers around Cassandra as she learns how to to slay, not the outer demons and dragons of the world, but her own inner demons: fear, sadness, isolation, criticism and insecurity.
Cassandra's Angel, works to instill the ideas of self-reliance, self-worth, tolerance and self-acceptance early in life. It took flight by becoming a #1 bestseller. For 15 years, I have toured some of the world's most dangerous and dark places using
Cassandra's Angel as a vehicle to help ignite the possibility and promise of a brighter future without limitations. I have shared this fairy tale with children all around the globe, from human trafficking shelters in Cambodia, to war zones in Sri Lanka, to the poorest schools in Harlem, Miami, Camden, New Jersey and Washington D.C. My mission is to do this work until every child in the world can release the old story and embrace the Truth...that, whether we know it or not, each one of us has a gift for the world.
The impact and results of
Cassandra's Angel
ultimately led me to create
Change My World Now,
an online, social network platform that uses games and entertainment to teach children about the issues facing the planet, show them how to take action to make a difference, and create a foundation of self-esteem, leadership, and self-acceptance, empowering them to become a more thoughtful, informed, compassionate generation of thought leaders.
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Karen Boyes - Founder, Spectrum Education
28 years ago, I completed my teacher training and started work, full of passion and enthusiasm for the students in my class. Within months, I witnessed how the school environment eroded the children's desire to learn, extinguished the "spark behind their eyes" and sapped their energy for discovery. I also realized that I had been taught what to teach and not the 'how'. This lead me to leave the classroom, research and develop my own company, Spectrum Education, which promotes bringing the joy back into learning with practical strategies and learning tips for teachers students and parents.
I have designed engaging, entertaining and practical presentations that give my participants a mixture of highly effective learning tools along with improved self-awareness - a very empowering combination. With a burning passion to make a difference, I also inspire and motivate people to go beyond their current limitations and to be more effective in whatever they do in life.
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Meet some of our outstanding inclusive
female entrepreneurs whose interviews are below:
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- Dr. Marialice B.F.X. Curran - Founder, Digital Citizenship Institute: Pioneering Adolescent Development in the Digital Age: Encouraging a Positive Relationship Between Youth and Technology
- Dr. Helen Wang - CEO & Co-Founder, 6Crickets: Computer Scientist Turned Entrepreneur to Crack K-12 Education Innovation from Outside School Hours
- Mara Steiu - Founder, iXperiment (Romania): A Global Entrepreneur Launches Business in High School: How an Innovative, Young, Romanian Woman is Opening Doors Worldwide
- Dr. Godelieve Spaas - CEO, Creating Change (the Netherlands): New Imperative For Global Leaders: Competence and Conscience
- Rocio Perez - President & Founder, Inventiva Consulting, LLC: Beyond the Transience, Dreams Give Direction to the Reality We Seek
- Anne Haines - President & CEO, Accion: Putting 1 Trillion Dollars in the Hands of Low-Income Entrepreneurs in the Next Decade: Accion Tells How
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PARTNER PUBLICATIONS
Real Leaders is the world's first sustainable business and leadership magazine that aims to inspire better leaders for a better world; a world of far-sighted, sustainable leadership that helps find solutions to the global problems.
Real Leaders wants to ensure that the next generation of leaders, in all spheres of influence, are exposed to the best and brightest minds in the hope that they are inspired to find profitable business solutions that benefit humankind.
Enjoy a
FREE DIGITAL COPY of the Emma Watson edition of Real Leaders magazine!
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Allow me to begin by acknowledging my many forms of privilege. I am white, male, heterosexual, cisgender, educated, able-bodied, U.S.-born, English-speaking, and upper-middle class. So I may not be coming from the ideal place to propose the inherent inclusivity of self-management. I encourage you to question what I say here, and to test this theory against your own experience.
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June 9-11, 2018
Denver, CO
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