MWF
Congratulations to the 2021 Board of Directors.
If you were not able to join us last week at Women Opening Doors for Women, please take a moment to listen to the Keynote and Q&A by U.S. Representative Ayanna Pressley.
Carol Fulp is the Founder and CEO of FulpDiversity LLC, where she engages with CEOs to advance diversity and inclusion within their organizations. She previously served as President & CEO of The Partnership Inc., the nationally recognized professional services firm that assists corporations in attracting, developing, and retaining executives and professionals of color. She is also the author of Success Through Diversity: Why The Most Inclusive Companies Will Win.
Given Fulp’s leadership in business and public service, President Obama appointed Fulp as a Representative of the United States of America to the 65th Session of the United Nations General Assembly. She also serves on the Eastern Bank Board of Trustees, American Student Assistance Corporation Board of Directors, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Board of Trustees, and the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation Board of Directors.
Paying It Forward
Carol has been engaged in diversity and inclusion for her entire life. When she was a child she marched on Washington with her parents. As a result of the Civil Rights movement, she saw doors open in education, industries, and neighborhoods that were previously closed to blacks. Yet she is so cognizant of the systematic racial discrimination that still exists today as evidenced by police brutality, the disproportionate rate of COVID-19, unemployment, the staggering wealth gap, and more. As such it is important for her to continue to work towards equity and to partner with others of color and women who seek a just and equitable society.
You Cannot Be A Leader In Business Unless You Are A Leader In the Community
Carol’s family comes from the Virgin Islands. She truly valued the mentorship of her Aunt Gertrude, who was an incredible businesswoman and community leader. Her aunt taught Carol that you cannot be a leader in business unless you are a leader in the community. Carol took these words to heart in her career and focused on corporate philanthropy, corporate responsibility, marketing, and human resources. And she always ensured business executives in the corporations where she worked, became fully engaged in the community.
The World Is Primarily Black, Brown, and Yellow
Her appointment by President Obama as the US Representative to the 65th General Assembly was a life-changing experience. This was a post held by Eleanor Roosevelt as well as Coretta Scott King. She found working with the ambassadors around the globe on peace and equity transformational.
When Carol and her husband walked through the doors of the USUN to be sworn into her post, she viewed a significant photo display on the glistening walls. She saw the large photograph of President Obama, Vice President Biden, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice. She stopped, she stared and she cried.
For her, these portraits of the United States government’s highest officials reflected the rich diversity of America in ethnicity, gender, and age. She sees that rich diversity reflected in those marching today calling to end racism and calling for America to live up to its full potential.
And at the United Nations General Assembly, as Carol stood at the iconic podium delivering a speech, she looked out at the sea of ambassadors from around the globe. The visceral view of the faces of 173 ambassadors was profound. They reflected that the majority of the world was primarily black and brown and yellow. Reinforcing this fact, was that 25% of the UN Member States represented Africa.
Can You Afford to Win the Race, If You Are Only Running On One Leg?
And it was during a lunch with the Ambassador from Nigeria that Carol took away a key statement on diversity. As they discussed the subject, the Ambassador stated, “You have to think of it this way: “Can you afford to win the race, if you are only running on one leg?” In his view, if you are only hiring one type of person, you are handicapping yourself. You are missing out on at least half the talent available to you. And you won’t be able to win the race. Others who are hiring the best talent of all kinds are bound to win.
Moved by the experiences of the United Nations, when Carol returned to Boston, she wanted to work to help Boston be more reflective of the United Nations, this is what led her to The Partnership, Inc. For nearly 35 years, the organization has developed more than 5000 individuals of color. It has helped multi-cultural advance in their organizations as helped position them to lead Boston’s community. At The Partnership, Carol increased programming, funding and it’s geographic reach.
As she concluded seven years with The Partnership, she began writing her book, Success Through Diversity: Why the Most Inclusive Companies Will Win. The book focuses on the advantages that diversity brings organizations and has been praised by Publishers Weekly and Booklist.
She now consults with CEOs across the country and provides diversity forums based on the book. In these times of racial unrest, she feels it is important that businesses listen to those who have been marginalized throughout their lives. It is an important time to understand the unconscious biases that exist in everyone. Now more than ever, it is important to operate equitably and objectively to create organizational cultures to attract and retain the best talent of all kinds. This is the only way we can succeed in this new era we are embarking on.
Over the past few months, Megan Costello and the leadership of the Massachusetts Women’s Forum have continued to make progress on our big idea: closing the raw wage gap by 2030 by asking companies to publicly report their overall wage gaps by gender and race.
Some of the biggest updates include our work with Judy Habib’s team at KHJ Brand Activation. KHJ helped to create a name, vision, and a logo for this project. We’ve also recruited over 15 coalition partners including but not limited to: YWBoston, Amplify Latinx, The Boston Club, The Commonwealth Institute, Center for Women and Enterprise, the Boston Women’s Workforce Council and many more. These partners are critical to the success of this project. They are helping to recruit businesses and offering their area of expertise — solutions for how organizations can close their gaps.
This is already happening in several other countries.
We are not starting from ground zero. It is currently the law in the United Kingdom for companies with over 250 employees to publicly report their data. We have spoken to them about their model and process to publicly collect this data. This was originally voluntary but shortly after the UK Parliament passed a law mandating companies with over 250 employees to report.
Creating a beta group. We need your help.
What we are doing now is recruiting a group of Massachusetts employers and asking them to do the following: run their numbers to discover your overall raw wage gaps and meet with us to discuss our plan and potentially engage with us on this project. We are not asking for a commitment to public reporting for this beta group, but rather this will be our learning group. To sign up to be part of our beta test group and to learn more you can click here.
The RAW Wage Gap?
It is important to note that the raw wage gap is not equal pay for equal work. It is the percent difference in the average pay for women and men. It is important for us to also understand how this data breaks down by race, we know the barriers for women of color are even greater, so we will be asking for the following information from the beta group:
We recognize that knowing these numbers does not mean that we can close these gaps overnight, but it is important to know this information, be transparent about the numbers, and be intentional about closing the gaps. All organizations are different and gaps exist for a variety of reasons so the plan for closing them will be case-specific. The beta group will be providing feedback on what questions we are asking that will help us ultimately decide what questions we ask for public reporting. Our goal is to keep the reporting simple, but also capture important data to inform employers about their gaps and where they should focus to close them.
If you or your employer are interested in participating in our beta test group please fill out this form. As a reminder, this is our beta group and does not mean that you are committing to public reporting, but rather it means you’re interested in engaging in this project and learning more.
Black Lives Matter. The Massachusetts Women’s Forum stands against racism and with those protesting its ravages past, present, and future. Not just active hate but also passive contempt. As women leaders, mothers, daughters, and agents of change, we are united by a shared passion for individually and collectively shaping the world according to American values – equality and justice for all. We are in deep mourning for George Floyd, senselessly killed at the hands of police, those pledged to protect him, protect all of us no matter the color of our skin. We are in deep mourning for Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Christian Cooper, for every victim of racism over the last four centuries.
We stand for those lost, those who survived, and those who fear every day because of racism. We call for police reform. We demand that our police and institutions, our leaders and citizens, our society’s laws and norms, renounce racism and stop the killing of our black and brown family.
Today is not about one moment in time. Our nation must face the history of dehumanization and forced submission and the lived experience of black families. Each of us must look within, ask why, and find our personal role forward. It is we who change our society, we who sound the alarm, we who build our institutions, we who make our law, and we who keep watch.
The Massachusetts Women’s Forum acknowledges that in our everyday actions we must use our power and platform to listen, question, educate, unite, and act. We commit to advocate for equity, justice, and change. We pledge to bind together and work to lead our beloved United States of America to live up to its hallowed principles, universal values, and just laws.
We stand with those who shout and whisper, scream and cry, for justice: in daily life, in protest, in chambers of government, in business rooms, in classrooms, and in the voting booth.
We’ve posted videos of all of the Virtual Roundtables. Please note these are only available to our membership.
Watch the videos here. 
Sandra Fenwick is the Chief Executive Officer of Boston Children’s Hospital, where she leads a team of 20,000 people dedicated to improving and advancing child health through their life-changing work in clinical care, biomedical research, medical education and community engagement. Boston Children’s is ranked the number one pediatric hospital in the nation by US News and World Report, is home to the world’s largest pediatric research enterprise and is the leading recipient of pediatric research funding from the National Institutes of Health. We spoke with Sandi about her career path and advice she had to offer.
Find mentors that take you to new places
Sandi always loved science from middle school on, which led her to study biology and chemistry in college. But her life was changed at Harvard School of Public Health, where she was on the premed track, when she was able to do a field research project in Saudi Arabia. There she did lab work and worked with patients, doing clinical trial research, which proved to be great experience for her later career and confirmed her passion for the field.
She found her professors’ commitment to their work inspirational and many supervisors took her under their wing. People that pushed Sandi to take more risks, tackle new tasks, and go in different directions she hadn’t considered before were especially helpful in helping her find her path.
Importance of Balance
Sandi offered two pieces of advice. First, find your passion and then give it your all. Do the job with integrity, take measured risk, and make sure to explore and try new things. It is especially effective if you can advance yourself as well as your institution, and lead something important that will better society.
But beyond loving what you do, it is also important to find balance in life, with a life outside of work. Sandi is thankful to have found her husband of 45 years, two amazing children and now grandchildren and community of church and friends and advises others to develop a meaningful life outside of work.
Investing in Children is Investing in the Future
According to Sandi, she has the best job in the world at the Boston Children’s Hospital, an extraordinary institution improving the lives of children. She is in awe of the dedication, passion, and resilience of the people she works with every day and the opportunity to support direct patient care and advance the next generation of treatment. Sandi believes that healthy children make a healthy society, and the future of healthcare lies in investing in children.
Under Sandra Fenwick’s leadership, the Boston Children’s Hospital became a “place where the most difficult challenges are faced head on, where the impossible becomes possible, and where families in search of answers find them.” Click here to find ways to be involved with the hospital’s work.
MWF colleagues provide personal & professional support
Sandi credits Alison Taunton-Rigby with sponsoring her for MWF membership where she has joined a group of fellow women leaders who are helping shape the business, cultural, academic and civic leadership of Boston and beyond and who have been invaluable mentors, advisors and wonderful friends. C-suite roles can be isolating and lonely-MWF colleagues have provided personal and professional perspectives, support and sustenance.
The Women’s Forum is excited to partner with Megan Costello, an experienced public and political manager and strategist, who will lead a feasibility study aimed at eliminating the wage gap by 2030. After graduating this past year with her MPA from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Megan is eager to return to the work of eliminating the women’s wage gap in Massachusetts. Megan’s career has focused on advancing women’s rights, most recently as the Executive Director for the Mayor’s Office of Women’s Advancement, an office she started under the leadership of Mayor Martin J. Walsh. Megan also worked on the campaigns of Martin Walsh, Ed Markey, President Barack Obama, and Secretary Hillary Clinton. She is a former board member of the Massachusetts chapter of NARAL Pro-Choice America’s Political Action Committee and a former board member of the External Advisory Board of the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy at UMass Boston.
Megan is familiar with much of the exciting work happening for women, especially the work helping to close the women’s wage and power gap. She is looking to build on the great work being done rather than reinvent the wheel. She will be reaching out to many of you in the coming months, but if you have ideas please feel free to reach out to her.
We sat down with Megan, to hear more about her goals for the project.
Massachusetts is Ready for Change
During her time in Mayor Walsh’s office, Megan led an effort to create a national model for closing the wage gap, by working with employers, individual women, and on important legislation. Partnering with the Boston Women’s Workforce Council, she worked with employers to report real wage data anonymously. She managed the City of Boston’s partnership with the American Association of University Women to offer free salary negotiation workshops to Boston’s working women, the program has trained over 10,000 women so far. And Megan also collaborated with lawmakers and activists on Mayor Walsh’s behalf to support the passage of the equal pay act in Massachusetts. These experiences only strengthened her belief that Boston and Massachusetts are the perfect places to push big change around the pay gap, with all the momentum and support for the cause building. Boston has been leading the way. It’s time to build on that work and take this all around the State.
Women’s Equity is Good for Business
For Megan and a lot of us, eliminating the wage gap is not only about dollars and cents, but also getting more women into leadership positions. This requires asking organizations to be intentional about hiring processes and making sure they have a diverse group of candidates. Many of us have read the reports, we know the data and many businesses are interested in making changes but don’t know how to move forward. What’s stopping them? The case will be different for everyone. She hopes to help organizations look back 10 years, see where they have been, where they are now, and what their goals are for the future. Passing laws is important to create equity, but eliminating the wage gap will require changing the culture of workplaces. The initiative will need people’s buy-in. We know that when women are paid, businesses have a stronger bottom line so they question here is, “What’s stopping us from achieving it and how can we all play a role?”
Bringing Groups Together will be Crucial
Megan is excited about the prospects of bringing together organizations that have traditionally supported women and women’s causes with business, nonprofit, public sector, and community leaders, to come at the issue from multiple angles. It will be key to engage organizations like the Boston Women’s Workforce Council, the Eos Foundation, and the Commonwealth Institute that have taken the lead in data collection and reporting, and TCI, YW, and the Partnership, the Center for Women and Work, who focus on advancing women up the ranks of leadership. To name just a few. Pooling reports, resources, and strategies from these organizations will create an incredible body of knowledge and partnerships will map the way forward. Additionally, local leaders can provide insider knowledge and bring connections to the table. Megan believes we don’t need to reinvent the wheel, but rather find out what is happening, how we can add to it and how can we really dig in to have lasting and meaningful impact.
Powerhouse Women Leading the Way
Attending the MWF event Women Opening Doors for Women five years ago, Megan remembers looking around the room and seeing all the amazing women that have broken barriers for the next generations. She recognized that this powerhouse group, that had paved the way for women, knew that their success should not end with them. They understood the importance of positions of power for women remaining and growing, and Megan is excited to see the Forum playing a key role in leading this initiative.
Please welcome Megan.
Pam Hamlin has a new role. After twenty years at Arnold Worldwide where she was an engine for growth, evolution and culture vibrancy and the CEO of the acclaimed global advertising agency, Pam found herself wondering “what’s next” so she chose to embark on a “curiosity tour” to explore the broader marketing ecosystem today, examine her goals, and define her next professional chapter.
Marketing – Where creativity meets commerce.
At the starting line of a new chapter, Pam joins York Creative Collective as their new president. YCC is a collective of creative ventures who believe that creativity is the foundation for growth. As she tells it, she believes that she was “genetically born to go into marketing.” Her father was a wall street financier and her mother was a designer. A curiosity for business and artistic abilities brought her to marketing which she describes as the “place where creativity meets commerce.”
It’s obvious when you love what you do.
In her time at Arnold, Pam found ways to clearly define the role that marketing should play to accelerate growth for the agency’s clients, undercover the essence of a brand and reflect that in an enduring brand idea expressed through compelling campaigns. As a creative business leader and progressive marketer whose strength and passion is “fueling the growth of brands and businesses through creativity,” she is most proud of her work reimagining brands like Royal Caribbean with the “Get Out There” campaign which shattered the misconception among non-cruisers that cruising was a vacation only for those that were “overfed, newlywed and nearly dead” by focusing on people’s explorer mindset and emphasizing new innovations on the cruise line. She oversaw double-digit growth at Ocean Spray with their “Straight from the Bog” campaign that highlighted the grower-owned cooperative heritage of the company and the health properties of cranberries which set the company apart from much larger beverage brands.
Pam is also proud of Arnold’s work renovating the historic Filene’s department store building into a key component in Boston’s downtown revitalization and Arnold’s new headquarters. Filene’s legacy and authenticity mirrored Arnold’s mission of innovation and creativity as Filene’s was the place where department store retailing began. She relished the challenge of celebrating the historic aspects of the building while designing for the needs of a modern workspace.
Speak up and let your ambitions be known.
Spending the first portion of her career observing how male peers more overtly promoted themselves and their career goals, Pam chose to let the reputation of her work and results alone lead to career advancement. Pam had to learn to be forthright with employers about her goals in her career by speaking up more and letting her ambitions be known. Pam advises that women practice advocating for themselves in ways that also serve the best interests of the company.
Support is a critical component to growth.
Support came in many different forms within Pam’s career. Fran Kelly, Arnold’s former CEO, was an invaluable leadership and business role model for her. He took special interest in supporting Pam’s career ambitions and growth. Pam also formed a tight bond with her female colleagues at Arnold whose support, wisdom, friendship, and insight about the challenges of being a professional, working mom was a critical component in her growth. And while Pam has been a member of MWF for several years, once she left Arnold, she has had the opportunity to lean in and she relishes the “camaraderie of such an interesting, smart, talented, experienced group of women.” Since the Forum is not industry-specific, Pam especially appreciates being able to learn from those who aren’t in marketing and advertising.
From “Curiosity Tour” to an Entrepreneurial Adventure.
Last year, Pam hit her 20-year milestone at Arnold and she took the opportunity to step back and envision the next chapter in her career. For Pam, this meant going on a “curiosity tour” and taking the time to explore different ways to apply her extensive marketing and general management experience. After completing a few fascinating consulting engagements, Pam is taking on two new positions — landing her first public Board seat at Cambridge Trust and a new adventure in a new world built on creativity and entrepreneurship. As the new president of York Creative Collective, she is excited about bringing her expertise to a portfolio of promising emerging growth companies.
Pam Hamlin has been a leading voice in marketing and advertising in Boston for many years and we are proud to have her as a member of our MWF community where she sits on the Board as our Communications Chair.
Linda Rossetti is a Harvard MBA, serial entrepreneur and expert on transition and its impact on individuals and organizations. Her work on transition, and the incredible energy that she brings to it, coalesced after an uncertain and surprising period she experienced nearly a decade ago. At forty-five, the long-time MWF member caught herself saying, “This is it? You must be kidding. I’ve worked this hard for this?” That internal dialogue occurred during her CEO’s all-day staff meeting at Iron Mountain, a Fortune 500 company with 21,000 employees in thirty-seven countries where Rossetti served as an EVP and C Suite member. The internal dialogue unexpectedly challenged Rossetti to revisit her assumptions about work and the desired impact she hoped to have.
“Today, I think about my career impact in very simple terms. I want to change how the world thinks about transitions.” said Rossetti with a broad smile.
Rossetti believes that the topic of transition found her even though she was no stranger to transitions. Earlier she served as the CEO of EMaven, Inc., a venture-capital backed technology company that was acquired by publicly traded Perot Systems, now Dell EMC. Following that acquisition, she was recruited by an EMaven Advisory Board member to join Iron Mountain, a highly-acquisitive company that had completed more than two hundred acquisitions.
Like many of us in uncertain times, Rossetti searched for resources to help her make sense of how she might move forward. “I was surprised at how little I found that spoke to the enormity of what I was experiencing,” she said. Instead of caving, Rossetti doubled-down. She initiated research, a step that ultimately included hundreds of people from all walks of life who participated in two eighteen-month research cycles. “People seemed to show up. Serendipitously. For example, a professional colleague who happened to run a well-known national outplacement firm said, ‘We will be your learning lab. Let us know what you need.’” Thanks to this type of support, Rossetti’s research yielded groundbreaking insights on transitions and the skills required to navigate it successfully.
“I discovered that we grossly misunderstand transition as a society,” said Rossetti. “Very often the first question people ask me once they hear about my work is, “What type of transition?’” Her research revealed that a wide variety of life experiences – from job loss to divorce to remarriage to sudden success – can serve as a catalyst to transitioning although none guarantee such an action.
Captivated by her research findings, Rossetti initiated a series of activities designed to address her important conclusions. She founded The Transition Institute, LLC, an organization that is dedicated to supporting individuals and organizations as they navigate transition. Her clients include Merrill Lynch, the US Air Force, Analog Devices, Harvard University, and many others. Her first book, Women & Transition: Reinventing Work and Life (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), is a 5-star rated Amazon top seller. Most importantly, Rossetti and her organization collaborate with a number of organizations to advance thinking about transition through curriculum design, additional research and other multi-disciplinary pursuits. She hosts the podcast Destination Unknown – a field guide; and has been featured on NPR, NECN, CBS/WBZ, Money Magazine, The Boston Business Journal, SMARTBrief and other outlets.
“I view my work now more expansively than when I was in the C Suite. I think about my work in transition in terms of an enlivening value proposition, one that bestows individuals – and organizations – with the confidence to make different choices in times of uncertainty. Choices not driven by fear or perceived barriers or constraints but choices that allow them to identify opportunities, pursue dreams that felt previously impossible, and ultimately live the life they’ve imagined. It is a long way from the conference room at Iron Mountain. Thanks to my willingness to not run the other way in the face of uncertainty, I feel as if I uncovered the work I was put on the planet to do.”