2019 Keynotes

2025 Panel
Higher Education leaders

As this is the fifth anniversary of the Women Advance IT Leadership conference, we are brainstorming a "where have we been" and where do we want to be at year 10 of the event. Join Higher Education leaders in discussing the direction higher education IT needs to move to by 2025. This topic correlates with the DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) conversation, allyship and sponsoring female leaders. 

Panel Speakers: Raechelle Clemmons, Associate Vice President for Technology & Chief Information Officer at Texas Woman's University; Stancia Whitcomb Jenkins, University of Nebraska’s Associate to the President and Assistant Vice President for Diversity, Access and Inclusion; Michele Norin, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey and John O'Brien, President and CEO of EDUCAUSE.

Facilitated by Mary LaGrange, Associate Vice Chancellor & Controller at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Wednesday, November 6, 1:30-2:30PM, NIC Auditorium

Karen Catlin
Leadership coach, keynote speaker, and author.

Creating Inclusive Workplaces: The Better Allies™ Approach
Have you ever thought, "I care about creating a more diverse and inclusive workplace, but what can I do?” If so, you’re not alone. Knowing how to be a better ally for underrepresented colleagues is unfamiliar territory for many of us.
 
In this keynote, Karen Catlin will cover key points from her book, Better Allies: Everyday Actions to Create Inclusive, Engaging Workplaces. Attendees will learn steps they can take to:
Diversify their network (and why it’s important to do so) 

  • Amplify and advocate for others in meetings
 
  • Provide equitable and effective feedback
 
  • Disrupt office housework  
Come discover how you can make a difference with the Better Allies™ approach.
After spending twenty-five years building software products and serving as a vice president of engineering at Adobe, Karen Catlin witnessed a sharp decline in the number of women working in tech. Frustrated but galvanized, she knew it was time to switch gears.
 
Today, Karen is a leadership coach, keynote speaker, and author. She's a highly sought-after and engaging presenter who has delivered talks at more than a hundred events. In addition to speaking herself, Karen is determined to bring more diversity to speaker lineups at tech industry events. To support this goal, she coauthored Present! A Techie's Guide to Public Speaking.
 
In 2014, Karen started the Twitter handle @betterallies to share simple, actionable steps that anyone could take to make their workplace more inclusive. That Twitter handle became the inspiration for her second book, Better Allies: Everyday Actions to Create Inclusive, Engaging Workplaces.

Gloria Feldt

Gloria Feldt is an acclaimed expert on women, power, and leadership with decades of frontline leadership experience, a bestselling author, and in-demand keynote speaker.  She is cofounder and president of Take The Lead, whose mission reflects her life’s passion: to prepare, develop, inspire, and propel women to take their fair and equal share of leadership positions across all sectors by 2025 by providing breakthrough training, mentoring and coaching role modeling, and thought leadership. Its signature 50 Women Can Change the World program  is an immersive version of her 9 Leadership Power Tools to Advance Your Career customized by industries for women in early career, midcareer, and executive levels.  She is the bestselling author of four books; the latest is No Excuses: 9 Ways Women Can Change How We Think About Power, the research for which plus her own real world knowledge forms the core of Take The Lead’s programs.

She is formerly president and CEO of the world’s largest reproductive health and advocacy organization, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, capping a 30-year career that included serving as CEO of affiliates in West Texas and Arizona as well as the national CEO. She was named by Vanity Fair one of “America’s Top 200 Women Leaders, Legends, and Trailblazers,” Glamour’s “Woman of the Year,” She Knows Media Inspiring Woman, Women’s eNews 21 Leaders for the 21st Century, Women Economic Forum Circle of Light award, Texas Monthly’s Texas 20, Martin Luther King Living the Dream Award, and Forbes 40 Over 40.

She teaches “Women, Power, and Leadership” at Arizona State University.  Feldt has been widely quoted and published, including by the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, The Daily Beast, Forbes, Fast Company, Time, Huffington Post, Glamour, Elle and Ms. She has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, the Today Show, Good Morning America and The Daily Show. She recently served on the board of the Women’s Media Center, the Jewish Women’s Archive, and Emerge America and remains on their honorary boards. She currently serves on the board of Women Connect 4 Good Foundation. She is a member of the New York Women’s Forum, the International Women’s Forum, and the World Academy of Art and Science and is an advisor to the ERA Coalition.

Gloria is an awesome chili maker. She and her husband Alex Barbanell live in New York City and Scottsdale, Arizona; they share a combined family of six children and 15 grandchildren, so there is never a dull moment in their lives. She spends too much time on social media and invites you to connect with her there.

Beth Ziesenis
Author. Speaker. Nerd.

Since her first Motorola RAZR flip phone, Beth has made a verb out of the word nerd. She’s here to help you filter through thousands of apps, gadgets, widgets and doodads to find the perfect free and bargain technology tools for work and home.

Although the only real trophy she ever won was for making perfect French fries at McDonald’s in high school, Beth Z has been featured on Best Speaker lists by Meetings & Conventions magazine and MeetingsNet. She has written four books on apps and speaks to about 10,000 people a year, about 9,999 of whom can’t pronounce her last name.

Please join me in welcoming the chick who spent recess in middle school grading papers for her teachers…

Your Nerdy Best Friend… Beth Z.