On Tuesday night, Capital W, UNSW Business School’s women’s business society, welcomed over 170 guests to celebrate 10 years of developing, motivating and educating the talented women of today.
On Tuesday night, Capital W, UNSW Business School’s women’s business society, welcomed over 170 business students, academics, distinguished guests and sponsor representatives to celebrate 10 years of developing, motivating and educating the talented women of today.
Hosted at the glamorous Doltone House, the theme of the dinner, ’1000 Cracks in the Ceiling', celebrated the progress women have made in business, whilst empowering the younger generation to follow in their footsteps. Stephanie Pow, Capital W’s Founder and Former Co-President, opened the evening by sharing her motivations back in 2007, to show more young women that they can take on bolder challenges to become business leaders.
UNSW alumna and now the Associate Director, Derivatives at UBS, Stephanie said: “I just wanted more young women to do something they might not feel like they are one-hundred percent ready to do, like I was when I first started on the trading floor."
The Society invited a group of future students from the UNSW Business School’s High Schools Network along to the dinner, for a chance to experience networking for themselves and hear from Capital W’s inspiring community.
The evening speakers inspired the students immediately and despite some initial nerves, the high school students eased into conversation while discussing their hopes and dreams for the future. They each took the meal in their stride, absorbing the energetic atmosphere while listening to the Key Note speaker, Nicola Wakefield Evans.
Nicola is a non-executive director of Macquarie Group Limited, Toll Holdings Limited, Lend Lease Corporation Limited and BUPA Australia & New Zealand and is a member of the boards of Asialink (University of Melbourne) and the Law Advisory Council of the Law School, UNSW Sydney. She shared her career successes and challenges so far, and offered advice from her own life experiences.
“A career in business can be very demanding. So take charge of your life and understand what is important to you. The only person who can build a career and be responsible for it is you. So evaluate opportunities, take risks and be open minded.”
Chloe, a year 11 student and hopeful Bachelor of Commerce/Bachelor of Laws student, said: “I was so nervous about coming tonight, but I learned so much even in the first five minutes of arriving! I completely forgot to introduce myself to the first person I spoke to and found myself awkwardly wondering when to say who I was. When approaching the second businesswoman from Westpac Bank, I immediately held out my hand and introduced myself. It was nerve-racking – but I did it!”
Capital W Founder said: “We hope each of the students found the dinner a valuable experience, not only in gaining networking skills, but from learning that they too can follow in the footsteps of their Capital W peers and remove their own shard in the shattered ceiling.”