Updated success stories, commentary renew the challenge for generations of motivated women to unlock their leadership potential
Media Contact: Barbara M. Fornasiero; EAFocus Communications; 248.260.8466; barbara@eafocus.com
Auburn Hills, Mich. – September 22, 2017 – Using fresh content, current events, and personal photos that chronicle her decades of experience as a trailblazing woman in the leadership trenches, Anne Doyle has released the 2017 edition of her book, Powering UP! How America’s Women Achievers Become Leaders. “The lessons and insights in my book are the graduate work for aspiring women who have already leaned in,” Doyle says.
Although much has changed since Powering UP! was first published six years ago, significant strides toward female advancement are barely discernible. “Despite having legal rights and educational and economic opportunities that most of our global sisters only dream of, American women are leadership underachievers,” Doyle noted. “Gender progress is glacial in corporate board rooms, and women at every level are still contending with frat-boy, hostile work environments even in Silicon Valley and network newsrooms. Clearly, it is time for American women to regain our momentum and ‘power up’ to our next frontier: Leadership.”
Doyle – a Michigan Journalism Hall of Famer who honed her locker room leadership by serving as one of TV’s first women sports broadcasters and also worked in corporate America, pushing up against the auto industry’s “steel ceiling” as an executive at Ford Motor Company – was recently honored by WJR Radio as one of its “2017 Women who Lead.”
Doyle cites the United States’ 20 point drop, since 2014, in the Global Gender Gap Report, a respected index that measures gender equality between males and females in 144 developed countries, as evidence that American women are losing ground. “In 2015, we slipped to 23rd in the world and in 2016 we dropped to 43rd, behind four African nations and nearly all western European countries,” Doyle explained. “The great paradox is that the USA is ranked #1 in the world for educational opportunities for males and females. But we are 73rd for political empowerment, based on the small number of American women in national elected office. There is something very wrong with that picture.”
“Women will never achieve equality, nor take our rightful places in powerful leadership roles until we begin to leverage our collective power,” Doyle contends. “It is time for women to regain our sense of urgency and reach across generational, economic, racial and political differences to begin lifting one another into leadership roles. We know it will happen someday. My goal is to inspire women not to leave it for future generations, but to make it the work of our watch.”
Since Powering UP! was first published in 2011, Doyle’s lessons have reached women on a broad scale. The U.S. State Department assigned the author to Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Trinidad as a global leadership speaker. Doyle has taught at the ESADE Business School Executive Leadership program in Madrid and currently serves as the President of the Michigan chapter of the International Women’s Forum, the preeminent global network for women of achievement from 37 countries. Under Doyle’s leadership, Detroit recently won the privilege of hosting IWF’s Global Conference in October 2020, the first time in the organization’s 45-year history, bringing 1,200 women leaders from every continent except Antarctica to the Motor City. In October, she will represent Michigan at the IWF’s 2017 World Leadership Conference, which will be held in Houston.
“Although I’m no longer certain I will live long enough to see a woman elected president of the United States, the insights, lessons learned and wisdom shared in Powering UP! are as relevant today as ever,” Doyle said. “In my role as author, speaker and global voice for woman’s advancement, I consider it my mission to continue this important work.”
About Anne Doyle and Powering Up Women
From journalist, corporate executive and public servant to author, global speaker and commentator, the trajectory of Anne Doyle’s entire life has been toward empowering women. A trailblazing TV news and sports broadcaster, Doyle was inducted into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame for her role in opening sports locker rooms to women reporters. She earned her business stripes with Ford Motor Company, where she rose to Director of North America Communications and was named one of the “100 Leading Women in the North American Auto Industry.” Doyle also entered public service as a four-year member of the Auburn Hills City Council from 2009–2013, and by invitation, participated in the U.S. Department of State’s International Speaker & Information Programs. The author of Powering Up! How America’s Women Achievers Become Leaders, Doyle is the founder of Powering Up Women, LLC, a leadership consulting practice. To learn more about Anne Doyle or to purchase Powering Up! How America’s Women Achievers Become Leaders, click here.
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