Addressing the Critical Role of Women in Today's CRE Business

A panel of CRE leaders who have implemented successful women’s initiatives in their organizations shared how they’ve created women’s networks, the framework needed and keys to success at the inaugural GlobeSt. ELITE Woman of Influence Conference last week.

You want to make sure you have a tone at the top who is very supportive creating a women’s network, say panelists at GlobeSt. ELITE Women of Influence conference.

Part 1 of 2

BROOMFIELD, CO—During an interactive workshop last week at the inaugural GlobeSt. ELITE Woman of Influence Conference, a panel of CRE leaders who have implemented successful women’s initiatives in their organizations shared how they’ve created women’s networks.

The group discussed how to develop framework for launching or expanding a women’s initiative to make an impact on career objectives, empowerment, advancement and recognition and reviewed what to consider for leadership and implementation to ensure success of the initiative’s goals.

Panelist Lisa Konieczka, who joined CBRE in 1997, said that when she first started at the company, she was meeting a lot of great people, but they were all men. “I quickly realized there weren’t very many women in my office.”

As a new tenant rep broker at CBRE, she wanted to build a network and get to know some women, but within about 60 seconds, it was more than just trying to do business with people. “Our women’s initiative just grew from there.”

But CBRE had the CEO as a sponsor since the beginning. “You want to make sure you have a tone at the top who is very supportive creating a women’s network. The mood in the middle can maybe not necessarily be as strong but that tone at the top needs to be clear in how the organization will fund women’s initiatives. One of our pillars of our organizations is advocacy.”

Konieczka also highly recommends an award program within the network. “The process gives you a great opportunity for PR, elevates people, and more will become aware of the women’s network.”

Panelist Lainie Minnick, a managing director, CFO and head of debt capital markets at Black Creek Group, wasn’t the one to come up with the idea to start a women’s network, but was very excited to get it going. “One of the three founding partners wanted to build it and it was up to us to decide how to build it and we were really excited to do that. We had the internal support and funding to get off the ground.”

She explained that her network was geared towards education towards some of the younger members, and then career development to foster learning across the organization. The third component was networking, she said. “If you don’t have access to other people in your firm, there is really no way to get to know them so it was a way for us to grow relationships internally and then grow our network outside of the firm.”

When we started it, one of the challenges was that it really became a lot of work, she explained. “What we found was it was exciting to get started, but it got easier to manage over time when you brought in other people to help and then it was more fulfilling.” Minnick explained that the more you can encourage people to get involved, the better. “It will attract excitement.” She also noted that it is important to be sure that the events you are putting on, and whatever you are offering is valuable to the people coming.

Her company’s approach has a fair amount of events that are geared towards women, but men are always welcome to come. “Engaging men within your program is helpful to get support for what you are doing.”

Linda Aronson, managing director of property management at JLL, who leads the women’s network for the Americas, says to start small if you are looking to start one. The company now has 28 active chapters and follows the same mission but encourages each chapter to really identify learning opportunities, philanthropic, educational opportunities and networking. “Everything the chapters do, it should tie back to the business. At the end of the day, the business is paying for it and it is about learning and development so women at every level can grow and develop their career.”

Check back later this week for part two of this discussion, which touches on how to track the success of the program and overcome challenges along the way. Also, check out the related stories from the event below.