Women Rising: A Diverse Perspective

[Press Release]

English | 中文

Beijing, China — On Monday June 26th, the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) and the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN WOMEN) hosted the 2017 Women in Leadership Forum “Women Rising: A Diverse Perspective”. The full-day event featured a fantastic line-up of speakers who, addressed women’s empowerment in leadership roles across sectors, including politics, business, entrepreneurship, creative industries and philanthropy.

Photo: UN Women

Keynote speeches were delivered by Julie L. Kavanagh, Acting Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy Beijing; Wei Sun Christianson, Asia Co-CEO & China CEO, Morgan Stanley; Gill Zhou, Vice President, IBM Greater China; Tim Payne, Senior Partner & Head of Asia, Brunswick; Liu Nan, Founder & CEO, Mia; Tao Hong, renowned Chinese actress and philanthropist; and Zhang Shuqin, Founder & Director, Beijing Sun Village Children’s Education Consultancy. Additionally, more than 20 other high-level speakers from a range of Chinese and international companies and across a variety of industries shared their perspectives on gender issues in the workplace, both in China and around the world.

Photo: UN Women

Dr. Asa Torkelsson, Regional Advisor on Women’s Economic Empowerment, UN Women Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, explained the need to create such a platform, in her opening remarks, “In every country, women are underrepresented at every management level of the professional pipeline, with the disparity greatest at the most senior levels of leadership. It is incredibly uplifting, then, to see more and more women rising to business leadership positions in China amongst the various sectors represented here. Today, we have a chance to discuss not only the issues relevant to supporting female leaders and empowering female workers, but also understand what changes organizations and leaders can make to have a sharper gender focus.”

Xiang Bing, Founding Dean and Professor of China Business and Globalization at CKGSB, remarked, “As CKGSB’s Third Women in Leadership forum, we are delighted to have another opportunity to raise awareness about the need for more women leaders. In fact, CKGSB is committed to advancing women’s empowerment and, particularly, women in leadership roles. The number of women in our MBA class is close to 50 per cent – far above both the national and global average – and the program offers a scholarship specifically for Future Women Leaders to encourage business women to develop their full potential. Among our Executive MBA program’s students, 21 per cent are female leaders, a particularly high ratio considering that 80 per cent of these students are at Vice President level or above, while the percentage of female students in our Executive Education CEO Program has doubled over the past decade. We encourage discussions on the challenges and successes faced by women as they pursue leadership roles around the world and look forward to welcoming more women business executives to CKGSB’s programs through scholarships and other means.”

Photo: UN Women

As the United Nations organization dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women, UN Women works with the public and private sector to promote equal employment and women’s leadership in China. For example, UN Women’s Gender and CSR programme aims to encourage companies to integrate gender equality into their corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts. Globally, UN Women and the Global Compact have developed the Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), which include seven principles providing guidelines for companies to promote gender equality internally and externally, including upholding equal employment and women’s leadership via their internal policies. So far, more than 1,400 companies have signed the WEPs CEO Statement globally, and 24 Chinese companies have signed it.

More than 1,200 executives registered to attend the 2017 Women in Leadership Forum. The entire forum was live-streamed on six major platforms in China, including Sina, Tencent, Netease, Phoenix, Beijing Time and Youku.

女性领导力论坛 —多维视野下的女性领导力崛起

[6月26日10:00后发布

English | 中文

中国 北京 — 由长江商学院与联合国促进性别平等和增强妇女权能署（简称联合国妇女署）联合举办的“2017女性领导力论坛：多维视野下的女性领导力崛起”在北京成功举行。包括美国驻华使馆公使衔领事参赞Julie L. Kavanagh女士、摩根士丹利亚太区联席首席执行官兼中国区首席执行官孙玮女士、IBM大中华区副总裁周忆女士（长江商学院DBA学员）、联合国妇女署亚太区妇女经济赋权政策顾问Asa Torkelsson博士、毕马威全球中国业务发展中心合伙人兼首席运营官沈莹女士、爱奇艺副总裁杨晓轩女士（长江商学院校友）、经济学人企业网络总监Rachel Morarjee女士、蜜芽宝贝创始人兼CEO刘楠女士（长江创创社区学员）、著名演员陶虹女士（长江商学院校友）、服刑人员子女救助中心“太阳村”发起人张淑琴女士等在内的二十多位来自政界、商界、文化、媒体和公益领域的中外女性领袖出席活动并做精彩发言。共有近2000名观众报名参加此次论坛，还有近百万观众通过新浪、腾讯、网易、凤凰、北京时间和优酷等六大平台在线观看了论坛全程直播。

Photo: UN Women

联合国妇女署亚太区妇女经济赋权政策顾问 Asa Torkelsson 博士在开幕致辞中提到：“在每个国家，在职业发展路径中，女性在管理层所占的比例都很低,，尤其是在高级管理层。 所以, 能见到越来越多的女性在中国不同的行业担任领导者，就如今天在座的各位女性嘉宾，是非常鼓舞人心的。今天我们不仅有机会探讨如何支持女性领导者和赋权女性员工， 也有机会了解不同的机构和领导者如何带来改变，培养性别视角。”

Photo: UN Women

长江商学院创办院长、中国商业与全球化教授项兵博士表示，“这是长江商学院第三次举办女性领导力论坛，我们很高兴可以有机会通过这样的平台来呼吁社会各领域各行业产生更多的女性领导。事实上，长江商学院一直致力于促进女性赋权，特别是鼓励女性走上领导岗位。在长江商学院，MBA学员中女同学的比例已近50%，远高于国内和国际平均水平。并且，我们MBA项目专门设立了‘未来女性领导者’奖学金，鼓励更多的职业女性不断深造，追求卓越。长江的EMBA学员当中，21% 是女同学，这一比例非常了不起，因为我们80%的EMBA学员都是副总裁及以上级别的。还有，我们的高层管理教育项目CEO班的女同学比例在过去十年翻了一番。当前，越来越多的人关注女性发展问题，长江商学院也十分关切女性在自身发展中面对的困难和挑战，这也是我们为什么第三次举办女性领导力这样的主题论坛。毫无疑问，越来越多的女性在职场上收获了成功，她们的领导力令人折服。长江商学院非常期待你们的加入。”

Photo: UN Women