Indus Women Leaders Presented a Successful 2nd Annual Conference Unleashing Our Potential: Leadership Summit 2004, Boston, MA
This yearÂ’s IWL conference was a successful experiential and interactive event that focused on personal growth, relationship building, and community building. Almost 200 attendees enjoyed hearing from a variety of distinguished speakers from professions ranging from journalism to economics, womenÂ’s health to service and engineering to law.
(PRWEB) November 14, 2004
This yearÂ’s IWL conference was a successful experiential and interactive event that focused on personal growth, relationship building, and community building. As a result of the tremendous efforts of the Boston conference team, almost 200 attendees enjoyed hearing from a variety of distinguished speakers from professions ranging from journalism to economics, womenÂ’s health to service and engineering to law.
To kick-off the conference, Rena Golden, Senior Vice President of CNN International spoke about her personal and professional journeys. Dr. Margaret Abraham, Professor of Sociology, Hofstra University, New York received the IWL Spirit of Women Award and Dr. Mangalam Srinivasan, Former Scientific Advisor to PM Indira Gandhi, was honored with IWL’s Lifetime Achievement Award. Suma Rao Gupta also received the IWL Pen Award for her essay on ‘Power and Success for South Asian women.’
The workshops that followed each speaker session allowed attendees to discuss issues pertaining to personal and professional change, balance, goal setting and discovering our passions. The sessions included The Power of Influence: Be the change you want to see, The Balancing Act and Being True to Ourselves and The Undiscovered Diamond Mine: South Asian Women Leaders. The evening concluded with an ArtistÂ’s Reception - Harmony of Hues featuring South Asian women artists and their Paintings, Photography, Small Sculpture, Textile Crafts, and performance of Dance, Instrumental Music, Drama Recitation and Vocal Comedy.
Attendees came from all over the United States including Washington, D. C., California, North Carolina, Virginia, Illinois, Michigan, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Ohio. The events of the conference shed light on topics and issues that were of interest to the women at the conference and created a wonderful atmosphere of collaboration.
“What a privilege to come to the Indus Women’s Leadership Conference. I am honored to be part of an event that nourishes mentorship as an agent for positive change.” - Nimisha Ladva, author of ongoing ‘Memoir : Good Girls Don't Stare.’
“This year, IWL helped me re-set my compass. The women who attended the conference are of such high caliber and provide great inspiration. What a wonderful reminder that I CAN do it all and do it all well!” – Anita Shankar, IT consultant and 2005 IWL Marketing Board of Director.
“The conference showed me (yesterday) how important it is to meet women from my community to band together,” said Sima Khamitkar, an attendee from the Boston area.
“I marvel at the professionalism with which all of you pulled it off with an all volunteer and geographically dispersed army,” said Leena Chawla, Kahani Founder, Director Finance and Marketing, based in Boston.
“The power of women to influence each other, the risks women take in crossing borders to help each other - these are two themes I strive to write about, and I know they're also the focus of Indus Women Leaders.” – Mitali Perkins, writer and author of ‘Monsoon Summer’ (featured at Artists’ reception).
"There is no room for shrinking violets here, so don't hold back!" The IWL conference gave attendees an encouraging environment to boldly map out their passions and focus on turning dreams into reality.” – Puja Sehgal, 2006 MBA student, Harvard Business School.
“IWL is about daring to dream. It’s not only about exploring what we really want, but it’s about understanding what holds us back, embracing those fears, and discovering that other women share them.” –Shalini Verma, North American Ops Manager for Remanufacturing, Sun Microsystems and 2004 IWL Executive Director.
Indus Women Leaders is a national forum that develops South Asian women leaders. IWL provides South Asian women with the resources to achieve their life goals through goal setting tools, advocacy, networking, mentorship, and education. IWL empowers South Asian women to become great leaders by unleashing their potential through a strong foundation of support, inspiration, and mentorship.
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