By Sloan Schickler, Esq.
On October 13, 2022, we convened the first Women in Leasing Roundtable during the NVLA Annual Meeting in Tucson, Arizona. The event was a great hit. It was well attended, bringing together most of the women who were at the conference. The group ranged from seasoned veterans of the leasing industry who can recall attending the NVLA meeting in Colorado Springs and prior, as well as women new to the NVLA and leasing industry attending the Annual Meeting for the very first time. We introduced ourselves and gave a bit of our background for context.
The women were excited about a new forum in which to share information and ideas in this very male-dominated industry. They were enthusiastic about developing a platform where we could come together. We also discussed some of our more challenging encounters with others in the industry over the years and how we handled the situations. Some of the younger attendees were happy to hear from the veterans and looked forward to learning how to develop their ability to speak in front of a group of people.
All in all, the women were pleased to be at the groundbreaking of a new venture and agreed that we should kick off this first year of the Roundtable with quarterly annual meetings to be held online on the second Tuesday of the second month of each quarter.
In fact, we had our first such meeting this past Tuesday, November 8, 2022. Women joined us that were at the Annual Meeting and others attended who were new to the group. Several who were in Tucson with us were unavailable but promised to be with us next time. The women enthusiastically agreed that the most important thing to them about this Roundtable is the ability to make valuable connections in the industry that they can rely upon for information, support and ideas. We talked about providing educational content for future meetings, including possibly in the realm of tax accounting and other topics. While several of the participants have received business certifications, they all agreed that they were looking for meaningful content here and not a certification. We will pursue these topics and more in the future.
I am grateful to Suzanne Fedie, our Executive Director, who has helped me to organize these events and has been a supportive attendee.
Please join us and share this with your colleagues who may be interested in the next Women in Leasing Roundtable to take place on February 14, 2023 at 10:00 am Pacific Time.