CommPRO, March 7, 2016

As we all honor International Women’s Day in our own way, I’d like to turn for a moment to the topic of the growing power of women around the world, especially as communications becomes a core component of leadership, not just an add-on.

For so long, women both in the US and globally, if they chose to or had to work, only found jobs in “women-acceptable” professions, such as teaching, nursing, assisting, events, HR, PR, and communications. Far from being at the nexus of power, acclaim and remuneration, women were related to supporting, or decorative, roles.

Women have always been seen as strong — and academic research bears this out — in communications skills. Thus women have entered the field in large numbers. But unfortunately communications historically has been seen as one of those ancillary professions that supported power, but did not exert it. […read more]