Helping fast-growing companies build high-performing commercial and executive teams
In 2016, Cynnie King, Rachel Fagnant-Fassler, and I were disappointed by the election results, and we decided to channel that energy into founding CFW Changing the Conversation. Our goal was to support women in business who, like us, saw how unspoken barriers kept them from reaching leadership positions. The mission of Changing the Conversation is simple: “An initiative devoted to advancing women in business, moving from identifying the issues to asking what we can do to solve them—both in terms of our own careers and in corporate and government policy.” At CFW Careers, we believe that helping women reach leadership roles benefits women across the socioeconomic spectrum by giving women independence and the power to make decisions that benefit all of us. Now, in 2024, many of us are once again disappointed by the outcome of an election—facing the possibility of losing access to healthcare, and wondering how a message of division triumphed over one of unity. We also know that we must include all voices in the conversation even when we disagree; otherwise we risk losing the rights and freedoms we all enjoy. At CFW Careers, we’ll keep championing women—helping them find high-paying roles, supporting their growth through coaching, and fostering connections in communities and ERGs that help women build the networks and skills they need to thrive. At a personal level, we’ll continue our commitment to support the causes that matter most to us including small women-owned businesses, women entrepreneurs, and the non-profit organizations that help protect women’s rights (often sustained on a shoestring budget and an abundance of passion). We’ll be here for our friends of the firm, and if you have any ideas what type of programming you’d like to see from CFW Changing the Conversation in 2024, please reach out. As always, the answer is forward. In the end, there is more that unites us than divides us.
Our work is, in many ways, building on the work begun by David King with his founding of us as Careers for Women in 1973. As we all know, while there has been some progress noted over the past 52 years, there’s so much more that needs to be done. Every woman who "has a flat head" from hitting that ceiling can attest to that. And each of us has a role in contributing to that work, protecting those rights and advancing that cause.