Women in Business An
AnnuAL OvervIeW OF BuSIneSS & PrOFeSSIOnAL WOMen - PuBLISHeD SePteMBer 2014
SONOMA WEST T
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The Healdsburg Tribune
THE WINDSOR TIMES
Women striving for — and achieving — more by Rollie Atkinson
T
he recent news headlines about violence against women over incidents surrounding the National Football League
From finance, to health, to government to retail and more, local women are thriving in diverse industries. See inside this issue for more than 40 success stories.
serve as the latest reminder that our society still has not guaranteed equal treatment and status among the sexes. How female partners, relatives and co-workers are treated at home, work and in our community continues to make news. Women In Business, our special annual newspaper supplement, has been published here for at least the past 36 years. Over those many years, the focus and definition of such topics as domestic violence, sexual harassment and workplace discrimination have changed. But, they have not gone away. In the early years of this publication, the profiled women in business were working mothers and college-educated young women depicted as trend-setters or trailblazers, entering careers or work places previously dominated by men. Gender discrimination was both rampant and still not illegal. Pay levels, rules for job promotion and workplace etiquette were all biased against females. Outside of the workplace, there were few to no support mechanisms or social understandings for young women or mothers who were taking on two careers — a full-time one at home, and a new one along a career path or new profession. Flashing forward to 2014, the women and the profiles in this issue of Women In Business tell very different stories. The featured women in these pages have long since graduated from being trendsetters or boundary-busters. Now they are business leaders, mentors to young girls and a next generation and, they are influential community voices. Is there still gender discrimination, sexual harassment or pay discrepancies?
Female business owners, partners and co-workers across north and west Sonoma County are leaders in the work place. Profiled in this issue are exceptional examples of female leadership. Pictured clockwise from top left are: Debby and Keli Meagher of Coffee Catz, photographer Barbara Bourne, SIlk Moon owners Melanie Goodpasture and Andrea Caron, Healdsburg Kiwanis leadership Susan Sheehy, Loretta Strong and Jan Gianni, and Windsor young professional Jenny Chamberlain.
Is “business” still a different set of propositions and expectations for a man or a woman? Most women and men agree, and many labor and economic studies report, that business and professional women still have a ways to go. Today, women earn only 91 percent of what men do in America’s workforce, according to U.S. Census data. According to a AAUW (Association of American University Women), nearly one-fourth
(23%) of all women still earn less than their male counterparts. And, while workplace sex discrimination is now illegal, it is clear that all gender biases in workplace politics, job promotions and performance ratings still exist. Also, the challenge of making ends meet, caring for a family and balancing a job or career for many women here in Sonoma County and across the country remains a day-to-day struggle.
Though not related to the workplace, the recent headlines about NFL football stars physical abuse of women, have raised new awareness of how our society values and supports our wives, mothers, daughters and female co-workers. The Sonoma County Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) was founded in 1975. It is still in business “promoting equal rights and opportunities that WOMen continues on page 31