BOSTON, MA--(Marketwired - Oct 21, 2015) - Today, the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council (MassTLC) announced it has signed an agreement with Innovation Women (IW), a new "visibility bureau," driving opportunities such as speaking and media commentary for entrepreneurial, technical and innovative women. Innovation Women's mission is to increase diversity onstage at events and conferences, and drive more visibility for its members. Visibility leads to jobs, invitations to join boards, more funding, and connections with customers and partners.
Under the terms of the agreement, MassTLC will leverage the Innovation Women database when sourcing speakers for its own events, and will purchase access for female executives at its member companies.
According to MassTLC's 2015 State of Technology report, women comprise only 29 percent of tech occupations across all industries in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Furthermore, women make up just 10 percent of tech company board seats. In the context of MassTLC's ten-year, 100K jobs challenge, this isn't enough.
"Talent is distributed evenly in populations," said MassTLC CEO Tom Hopcroft. "If we are to compete and win in the global race to lead the next major technological wave, we cannot afford to leave what amounts to over 50,000 capable workers on the sidelines. We need to inspire girls at an early age, provide women and men the flexibility to balance work and family life, and most importantly, shine a spotlight on the many successful women who are, today, role models in our industry. We are proud to be partnering with Innovation Women to do just that."
"By working with MassTLC, we are increasing the number of women in our database and providing a working model for other large organizations," said Bobbie Carlton, one of the founders of Innovation Women. "Meanwhile, companies highlighting their female executives and top female speakers demonstrate their commitment to a female-friendly workplace."
Microsoft is one of Mass TLC's global members. "Innovation Women is a great resource for our Technology and Civic Engagement team at the New England Research and Development (NERD) Center," said Aimee Sprung, the Civic Engagement Program Manager. "We're able to connect with community organizations who are looking for speakers, and we're able to find outside speakers for our events as well."
About The Mass Technology Leadership Council, Inc.
With 500+ member companies, the Mass Technology Leadership Council (MassTLC) is the region's leading technology association and the premier network for tech executives, entrepreneurs, investors and policy leaders. MassTLC's purpose is to accelerate innovation by connecting people from across the technology landscape, providing access to industry-leading content and ideas and offering a platform for visibility for member companies and their interests. More at www.masstlc.org
About Innovation Women
Innovation Women is a "visibility bureau" -- focused on providing great female speakers for everything from local meetups to the largest global conferences. Event managers get their own free accounts to access the Innovation Women speaker bureau database. Once approved, they have access to the speaker profiles and can invite speakers to their event. Paying a small fraction of what a PR agency or speakers bureau would cost, speakers gain high-ROI visibility. The goal is to gender-balance panels by placing an equal number of talented female speakers at events. For more information, visit InnovationWomen.com or follow @WomenInno on Twitter.
Contact Information:
Media Contact:
Bobbie Carlton
781-718-7619