100 Women, 100 Years And More Milestones For Women Leaders to Celebrate
100 years of Girl Scout cookies is one of many achievements in our 100 list for women to celebrate.
To properly salute the 100th edition of the Take The Lead This Week newsletter, we look outside of Take The Lead to gather a list of our favorite lists of women global leaders, healers, executives, entrepreneurs, funders, innovators, groundbreakers and cookie makers. We hope these may become some of your favorites too.
“For the 100th edition of the TTL newsletter we gathered our favorite lists of #womenleaders”
100 Fab Femmes: Saluting 100 influential women from five continents is the new documentary, “FEMME: Women Healing The World,” airing Sunday, February 12th at 10 p.m. ET on the cable network, RLTV (rl.tv). The film, made possible by executive producer Sharon Stone “is a celebration of women around the world who are actively transforming and healing the global society through their words and actions,” according to Broadway World. “The list includes Gloria Steinem, Sharon Stone, Jean Houston, Marianne Williamson, Mira Nair, Jean Shinoda Bolen, Angela Davis, Riane Eisler, Nobel Peace Prize Laureates Shirin Ebadi and Mairead Maguire, Maria Bello and Maria Conchita. These women discuss religion, science, history, politics and entertainment – and the solutions to the multiple crises we face throughout the world. FEMME’s soundtrack includes songs by Rickie Lee Jones and Yoko Ono. Stone explains, ‘FEMME is an innovative effort to illuminate the thoughts, voices, and insights of women the world over. It is an opportunity for women to be heard and to hear one another in an unfiltered regard on issues that touch to the core of the human condition both elegantly and eloquently. We have much to learn about each other and from each other.’”
100 Women Who Care: With chapters in cities across the country, this nonprofit of 100+Who Care is a gathering of 100 women or more who convene quarterly and bring a check for $100 (or more.) Nonprofits make a pitch to the group, then members vote on a group to fund.
100 Women Across The Pond: BBC 100 Women “names 100 influential and inspirational women around the world every year. We create documentaries, features and interviews about their lives, giving more space for stories that put women at the center.” The group recently held a global edit-a-thon to address the gender imbalance of Wikipedia and to add more female biographies.
100 Women Innovators:Kedsand Create & Cultivate “partnered to create a list of the top 100 women selected from across a variety of industries whom they’ve deemed exceptional female innovators. he list includes 10 honorees selected in each of the 10 categories that include beauty, wellness, food, philanthropy, STEM, fashion, music, entrepreneurs, creators and entertainment. The roster of honorees are a mix of names that include Rebecca Minkoff, Reformation founder Yael Aflalo, Clare Vivier, Katherine Power and Hillary Kerr of Clique Media Group, Mandy Moore, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Erin and Sara Foster, Constance Zimmer, Lauren Conrad and Sophia Rossi of HelloGiggles,.according to the Los Angeles Times. “Create & Cultivate founder Jaclyn Johnson said 100 isn’t an arbitrary number and is instead focused on ‘the domino effect of 100 women, who inspire 100 others, who can collectively topple the status quo and change the world.’”
Top 100 Women Financial Advisors: Venerable financial publisher Barron’s names the top 100 independent women financial advisors each year. Factors for consideration include “assets under management, revenue produced for the firm and quality of service provided to clients. Investment performance is not an explicit criterion. This annual ranking is the basis for the Top Women Advisors Summit held in June in Washington, D.C.. investments, clients and practices.
Making Impact:Impact 100 is another gathering of women philanthropists working collaboratively to make a difference since 2001 when “the idea was for 100 women to come together and donate $1,000 each to make a collective, transformational grant of $100,000 to a local nonprofit organization.” Impact 100 has 30 chapters across the U.S. and three in Australia. In Ohio, “Impact 100 has been such a success that it now has about 450 members and typically raises more than $400,000 each year — enough to give grants of at least $100,000 to four local nonprofits. The group has given more than $3.6 million in grants since its inception, according to WCPO
100 Most Powerful Women in Music: Billboard magazine salutes the top female executives in the music industry each year, and this past year includes, Bozoma Saint John, named executive of the year. John is the head of global consumer marketing, iTunes/Apple Music. Also honored is Julie Greenwald, Chairman/COO, Atlantic Records Group, who told Billboard: “I always watched our industry do crazy, dumb stuff in the name of market share, and it didn’t mean that they were super profitable. I wanted to be profitable so I could keep growing staff and getting more resources. I came in with a mission statement and said, ‘I don’t want to be the biggest company, I want to be the best company.‘”
TheForbes List: Every year the publisher composes a list of the most powerful women in the world, whose “ accomplishments are formidable on their own, and even more so given how hard it can be to establish inroads into industries and job titles traditionally dominated by men. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, number one for six years running, continues to head the list, followed close behind, again, by Hillary Clinton, No. 2; Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen; philanthropist Melinda Gates; and General MotorsCEOMary Barra; International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Lagarde retains her spot at No. 6, followed by FacebookCOOSheryl Sandberg and YouTube CEOSusan Wojcicki. Meg Whitman, the CEO of HP , and Ana Patricia Botín, the chair of Banco Santander, ascend to numbers 9 and 10, respectively.”
100 Years of Women Voting: A century has passed since the passage of the suffrage act in New York in 1917. Long before the act was passed, women knew they needed more power. According to the Ithaca Journal, “The problem was recognized by Abagail Adams in her 1776 letter to her husband, John, then attending the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. She urged him ‘to remember the ladies.’ She stated her desire that you ‘would be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power in the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.’”
Our100.org: Immediately after the 2016 presidential election, 100 women of color signed an open letter to our nation to begin organizing for women’s rights. “ The women, which include Alicia Garza, a co-founder of Black Lives Matter, and Teresa Younger, president and CEO of the Ms. Foundation, have vowed to organize citizens over the next 100 hours and in the first 100 days of the new administration to stand with women of color in leadership position to find ‘solutions that support a vision for Black lives, an end to violence against women and girls, power to make decisions about our bodies, health and reproduction, common sense immigration reform, and an end to Islamophobia.. The letter states it upholds the rights of : “Black lives, women’s lives, immigrant’s lives, the lives of LGBTQ folks, of people with disabilities; of working people of every race, region and ethnicity, including those at Standing Rock and others protecting our land. We know that the future and well-being of this country depends on the health and well-being of all women.”
“The milestone of 100 years of Girl Scout cookies is one to celebrate #GirlLeaders”
To make the celebration of these groups of 100 go down more smoothly, we suggest a box or two of Girl Scout Cookies, celebrating the 100th year of sales helping girls from around the country “earn money for fun, educational activities and community projects, but also play a huge role in transforming girls into G.I.R.L.s (Go-getters, Innovators, Risk-takers, Leaders)™ as they learn essential life skills that will stay with them forever,” according to the site.
“From the very beginning the Girl Scout Cookie Program—and Girl Scout Cookies—has been the engine that powers Girl Scouts. The sale of Girl Scout Cookies has made an indelible impact on the millions of Girl Scout alumnae who have sold them. In fact, 57 percent of Girl Scout alumnae in business say the program was key in the development of their skills today.”
Happy 100 to Take The Lead This Week. That calls for 100 thin mints to go.
About the Author
Michele Weldon is editorial director of Take The Lead, an award-winning author, journalist, emerita faculty in journalism at Northwestern University and a senior leader with The OpEd Project. @micheleweldon www.micheleweldon.com