Taking Action The 2023 ElevateHER Cohort
By Shirley Che
2023 has been a tumultuous ride for a lot of us. We are still recovering from COVID, principles of economy no longer apply anywhere, the legislatures keep punching women in the guts, and most recently, Barbie unexpectedly became our new hero. The world has been chaotic to me, and nothing is predictable. When the founders of ElevateHER, Christy Zweig Niehues and Jamie Claire Kiser, left Zweig Group for other incredible opportunities, the opportunity and honor to step in and take the reins for ElevateHER landed on my laps. While both founders are still involved, the day-to- day is now in my hands. Like a typical middle-age, mid-career woman in middle management does, the self-doubt follows immediately, and the pressure slowly manifests–Is it ok to even talk DEI with our clients? Is it ok to write a cover article about the Supreme Court rulings? I know where I stand, but is it fair to put that on the company? Then in Q2, an opportunity came about, and Zweig Group was invited to partner with the ACEC Research Institute on their development of the Diversity Roadmap Benchmarking Tool. It’s a big commitment (and responsibility) to put our name on such a prominent and widespread effort; I immediately had a long list of doubts disguised as questions– Do we have the resources to commit to the partnership responsibly?
How will this help our clients? What does that mean to ElevateHER? I remember vividly that I started shaking feeling the excitement but also the weight of it all. All the doubts went away rather quickly. I was blown away at how fast and certain that Chad Clinehens, our CEO, agreed to the partnership. Almost right away, the conversation shifted from go/no-go to what we needed to do to complement this partnership. Once again, I was shown that it’s not a cheeky tagline that Zweig Group slings around on our website and business cards; we are genuinely committed to elevating the industry in an increasing number of ways. I share this story to tell you just how honored I am to get to lead ElevateHER, and how proud I am to witness the 2023 ElevateHER cohort members present their research and projects on the ElevateAEC Conference main stage. It has been an impossibly busy and unpredictable year for most of us, yet this small but mighty class stayed focused, and developed tools, frameworks, etc., so that women and other marginalized groups of the workforce could have a more promising career in AEC. Together–across different organizations (like ACEC), and over time (i.e., ElevateHER cohorts in the last four years) –we are building a sustainable AEC workforce that will thrive and flourish, and
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Elevate AEC 2023
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