Are You Ready For HBA WOTY 2016?
By Rob Wright, Chief Editor, Life Science Leader
Follow Me On Twitter @RfwrightLSL
On Thursday, May 12, the Healthcare Businesswomen’s Association (HBA) will host its 27th annual Woman of the Year (WOTY) at the Hilton New York Midtown. The celebration draws over 2,000 women and men from throughout the healthcare industry and showcases the HBA’s core purpose of furthering the advancement and impact of women in the business of healthcare. For those who have never attended, the ceremony involves much more than the presentation of just the WOTY award; the honorable mentor of the year and the strategic transformation achievement recognition (STAR) award are announced, and there is a presentation of a group of some 100 Rising Stars and Luminaries.
A Forum For Inspirational Insights
The first time I attended HBA WOTY I expected to be the only male in the room. I quickly learned that HBA’s core purpose of furthering the advancement of women doesn’t occur in a vacuum of gender exclusion. For example, when J&J’s Denice Torres was recognized as the 2015 HBA WOTY winner, she was introduced by her employer’s CEO, Alex Gorsky. Similarly, the 2013 WOTY award winner, Merck’s Bridgette Heller, was introduced by Kenneth Frazier. But men aren’t involved simply as the presenters of award winners,, many, like me, are in the audience as attendees, and there are those that are recognized for their mentorship. For example, during Ian Clark’s 2011 honorable mentor acceptance speech he revealed that though he had won other awards, none had generated as many favorable comments as this one, calling it an “inspiring and humbling” experience. But he also referenced that as a father of three daughters, he hopes they will be given the same opportunity as he to grow and advance in their chosen careers. When Cardinal Health’s Michael Kaufmann accepted his mentor award, he shared that his big career break was given to him by a female mentor, who, as the only woman member of the Cardinal leadership team, had much to lose by taking a risk on him. His advice to attendees that day still resonates. For men, he challenged them to recognize their unconscious assumptions that impede women from advancing to leadership positions. For the women he said, “If you want to get women in leadership positions, you need to get men involved as mentors and advocates.” In other words, if you want men to better understand the problems women face in the workplace, best provide them a seat at the table so they can seek to listen and understand.
For many reasons, I try to attend HBA WOTY whenever I can. Like Clark, as the father of a daughter, I want her to have the same opportunity to advance in her chosen career. As such, I seek to continuously sharpen my saw in understanding the challenges women continue to face in today’s workplace. Similar to Kaufmann, it was a female, Frances Stineman, whose decision to take an active role in my mentoring that made a life-altering difference for me. And though these are both true and important drivers, the primary motive behind why I attend diverse events like HBA WOTY is — if I hope to meet a wide variety of biopharmaceutical executives that are representative of Life Science Leader’s diverse readership, it’s better to go where they are or will be, than sit back and hope that these busy leaders will eventually beat a path to my door.
I look forward to meeting this year’s HBA WOTY winner, Roche’s Jennifer Cook, as well as the honorable mentor, Baxalta’s Jacopo Leonardi. I imagine their acceptance speeches, like those of the past, will serve as motivation and inspiration to both men and women attendees.