On March 8th we celebrate International Women’s day (IWD). A day to recognise the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women all over the world. The first IWD was celebrated in 1911 in Europe where around 1 million people rallied for women’s rights and to end discrimination. Today, IWD is celebrated amongst all gender identities around the globe. At MGI Adelaide we are supporting this cause with our, ‘Success Her Way’ events.
In 2019 MGI Adelaide Director, Angela Robins and other members of the firm identified a need to build a community around supporting each other and the strong female leaders in their network and client base. From that idea Success Her Way was born.
Hosting quarterly events where female business owners come together to network, share their personal stories of success, show case their hard work, patience, and determination whilst balancing motherhood, family crisis etc is at the centre of the idea behind Success Her Way. These events give our clients the opportunity to promote their businesses while networking with others in different industries.
We have held local events at The National Wine Centre of Australia and also at our client’s business premises. Each event incorporates numerous expert panellists and presenters to educate and support their fellow businesswomen. In previous events we identified different pathways to success, explored the marketing wins and cancel culture coming out of social media, issues in family business and harnessing family strengths for success, along with valuable social time to chat and reflect with others.
Imposter Syndrome and unconscious bias are other factors in why we felt Success Her Way was needed. As a woman it is natural to be caught in the fear that we are not “good enough”. In fact, a recent study has found as high as 75% of executive women experience “Imposter Syndrome” in the workplace. Regardless of how outwardly confident a person appears, or how truly competent they are, the feelings of inadequacy can creep in causing us to compare ourselves to our counterparts. As a female leader we commonly experience the feeling that our male counterparts are more easily heard, or that clients are more willing to be cooperate with a male adviser. This perception is a combination of both our own and other parties’ bias. This is why we are excited that this year’s IWD theme is “Breaking the Bias”.
This year’s Success Her Way events are devoted to a series themed around “Breaking the Barriers to Success”. Breaking the bias will be the first of this year’s four-part series. There will be an expert speaker and panellists giving us an insight into the origin of unconscious bias, and how it manifests in the workplace. We hope to challenge the questioning of our own biases and adopt important tools on how to minimise the impact of bias both on ourselves and others.
Our Success Her Way events have been a huge success with client feedback stating “it was a feel good women’s business bonding session that was fantastic” and “it was really amazing! I enjoyed the whole morning from being able to mingle with other like-minded women and provide valuable tips”. This feedback truly warms our hearts. We are constantly inspired and gain a great extent of knowledge from the amazing women attending these events! With Success Her Way, we look forward to building our community of successful women and learning more about ourselves and each other so that we can all enjoy success in our own way.
