Better the Balance, Better the World – An International Women’s Day Celebration

On March 8, PointClickCare employees from across the organization joined together to show their support for gender equality and celebrate the incredible women we work with, live with, and are proud to partner with in our community. This was the first-ever official celebration of International Women’s Day at PointClickCare and after a day of laughs, some tears, and a lot of excitement and empowerment, we are more committed than ever to supporting diversity in our organization.

Ensuring there is a balance in the workplace — and the world — isn’t just a female issue. Gender equality affects us all, and whether we choose to believe it or not, there remains a divide. While women in North America have never had more power and rights, there are still barriers. The theme of this year’s International Women’s Day was “Balance for Better”. The purpose of this day is to celebrate women, but even deeper than that, it is about creating and implementing change.

“The best way to change the rules is to get a seat at the table in the room where the rules are decided on and things happen.”

PointClickCare’s Chief People Officer, Sarah Bettencourt opened the day with this quote, reinforcing that gaining these seats doesn’t happen by being more like men. As women, we need to use a different strategy — starting with a mindset shift that embraces our identity, taps into our strengths, and by showing courage, vulnerability, and conviction for what we believe is right. To get that seat, we need to silence the negative voices, check our egos at the door, and pull a chair up to the table. Ultimately, we need to show up ready to show the people at the table what we are here for, to alter the system.  

To do this, first we needed to get a little uncomfortable — so, we did. We spent the day stepping deep into discomfort, vulnerability, and courage together as a team. We participated in a full-day session dedicated to empowering us to be the change we wanted to see. Through the course of the day, we heard from a diverse panel of thought-provoking speakers, including: Barb Stegemann, Author and Social Business Innovator, Dr. Paula Williams, Gender Equality and LGBTQ Speaker, Michelle McGuire, Vice President and Chief of Staff at Children’s National Health System, and Susan Kerr, Executive Coach and founder of Advancing Inspiration.  

Through their incredibly moving and powerful panel, we were able to have an honest and open discussion with the women in the room. We learned that the things we feel, experience, and know to be true in our own lives, truly do affect us all. Hearing the speakers discuss their struggles in the business world, we saw ourselves trying to overcome adversity in the office. Through their stories of societal pressures and conformity, we were able to see validity in the struggles we face in our own lives, both personally and professionally. By the end of the discussion, we were able to see a little bit of ourselves in all the women in the room. We all face the same issues and to overcome them, we must band together.

Armed with new knowledge about ourselves, and all women, we then participated in an interactive workshop put on by the Humphrey Group called, “Taking the Stage.” The Humphrey Group is North America’s premier leadership communications training firm and has a 30-year history and dedicated focus on developing women leaders at all levels.

In this session, we explored:

• What it means to embrace our leadership identity within PointClickCare
• How to begin purposefully building our own unique leadership brand
• How to be aware of — and begin to silence — the ideas that prevent us from embracing leadership
• How to speak from a place of vision and conviction when discussing our work

At the end of the day, we were emotionally exhausted but feeling empowered and ready to take our seat at the table. We walked away from this session with the knowledge and strategies needed in order to create a better change in our workplace, and in society as a whole. We are now prepared to be the change, and with PointClickCare at our side, we know we will be unstoppable.

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