By Carlos Rosales/reporter
Advice for life success was the theme during An Evening with Great Women, featuring a panel of key female executives from various organizations March 26 on TR Campus.
Chancellor Erma Johnson Hadley advised the audience members to know themselves.
“You really do have to know who you are and work with what you’ve got,” she said.
A lot of women are scared to flaunt their brainpower, Hadley said.
“If that’s who you are, you really need to cultivate that,” she said.
Retired U.S. Air Force Col. Kimberly Olson spoke about the power of connecting.
“It’s about who you surround yourself with,” she said. “That is really your networking group.”
Women in the military struggled because they were so fragmented in their services, Olson said.
“If we’d gotten in a room like this, the guys would have thought we were planning an overthrow,” she said.
Eva Bonilla serves on the national board for MANA, a Latina organization that embraces Gandhi’s call to “be the change you want to see in the world.” Bonilla said power lies in the right to vote because of what it can accomplish. She believes voting is the most powerful weapon in the country.
“You need to ensure your largest investment — your home and your family — are taken care of,” she said.
Caroline Harrison, a board-certified attorney in labor and employment law, said she once believed her craft was solely being an attorney. Now, she knows motherhood is as important.
“To embrace two crafts at once, motherhood and being a lawyer — that’s something that I found very challenging,” she said. “I can embrace both, and you can be the change you want to be.”
To Julia Wellborn, executive vice president and executive director for wealth management for Comerica Bank, compassion is a strength.
“Women work hard already, but for some reason, I think that the concept of being nice seems weak,” she said. “Compassion is more than just being nice.”
The higher one goes in a career, the more important empathy becomes, Wellborn said.
Jean Wallace, Lockheed Martin’s human resources senior vice president, said people should own their power.
“As long as you accept the opportunity, you will figure it out. I guarantee it,” she said.
By not running away from adversity, the power over the situation is still in the individual’s hands, Wallace said.
“Always make sure you ask for help and that you embrace the women in your life,” she said.
