Preview: Women in Business

Key speakers include Andrea Sullivan (Head of Corporate Responsibility at Bank of America Merrill Lynch), Louise Court (Head of Editorial Strategy and Content at Hearst UK and Former Editor-in-Chief of Cosmopolitan Magazine), and Nancy Pedot (CEO of Comptoir Des Cotonniers )

management society Preview women in business

I meet Natalie Biringer, a fourth year who is this year’s convenor for the Management Society’s Third Annual Women in Business Forum.

She tells me that organisation of the Conference is going very well, with everything being on the brink of finalisation. The relevant Subcommittee of the Management Society began meeting last semester. They decided that instead of doing the conference in April like previous years, they would postpone it until October so as to be better prepared. As Natalie rightly points out, such a conference requires a lot of organisation, ranging from booking a venue to settling travelling arrangements for the speakers. And from what I hear, the extra time allocated seems to have achieved incredible results.

What the Forum seeks to achieve is to create a conversation with the students and for the students about what career they could be pursuing by inviting inspiring and leading figures in their field. It sure seems like they have managed this in style. Key speakers include Andrea Sullivan (Head of Corporate Responsibility at Bank of America Merrill Lynch), Louise Court (Head of Editorial Strategy and Content at Hearst UK and Former Editor-in-Chief of Cosmopolitan Magazine), and Nancy Pedot (CEO of Comptoir Des Cotonniers ). To add to this impressive list, the committee stresses that they want to make the dialogue applicable to students. Questions will include what advice these women have for students, what internships are relevant, and how they decided to pursue their career at the time of being a student.

I am visibly impressed while Natalie describes the event to me. But obviously I need to play devil’s advocate: Women’s forum, does that mean only women can go? Obviously, that is not the case. In fact, the committee wants to stress that these inspiring talks are for anybody who wants some advice on how to pursue a business related career.

With Hotel Du Vin as a venue, and the theme being sophisticated, business orientated yet fun (an improvement on last year’s conference), this promises to be a conference you don’t want to miss.

I say goodbye to Natalie, now convinced that I want to attend, and encourage anybody interested in business to do the same. The event is 5.30-8.00 at Hotel du Vin on the 5th October, followed by a Q and A from the Audience, and a networking event with the speakers to allow you to ask your questions. Tickets are £5 for members, and £7 for non members, and can be bought online. Don’t miss out!