MPWOMEN SUMMIT INITIATIVES
Fortune created Most Powerful Women as a cover package in 1998 with a simple idea that women were gaining significant power in the corporate world and had become a lot more interesting than in the old days when women leaders, to thrive, had to behave like men. One thing we've done, consciously, over the past 12 years is humanize these MPW and urge them to realize and deploy their power outside their silos. Real power is personal power—what you use outside of your job and your tenure.
Through the MPWomen Summit—which has quickly become the premiere gathering of women leaders in business, government, philanthropy, education and the arts—we've created several programs to help our community of women leaders spread their influence well beyond their organizations and empower the next generation.
Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership
In 2006, Fortune and the U.S. State Department launched the Global Women Leaders Mentoring Partnership. The program brings rising-star women from developing countries to the U.S. each May to shadow participants of Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit. We then follow them as they "pay it forward" back in their home countries. MPW mentors have included CEOs Ursula Burns of Xerox, Andrea Jung of Avon, Ellen Kullman of DuPont, Pat Woertz of ADM, Helene Gayle of CARE and Time Inc. Chairman Ann Moore. Plus top women executives at companies like Wal-Mart, Google, General Electric, Exxon Mobil, JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs. This program has proved to be a rich, personal experience for both the mentors and the mentees—with lasting friendships formed and exponential results. Over the last five years 149 women from 43 developing countries have gone through the program. For more information click here.
The Young Leaders Program
The Young Leaders Program is an innovative partnership with Fortune, ExxonMobil, and the National Math + Science Initiative. The program pairs outstanding U.S.-based college juniors majoring in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) fields with top female leaders in business. The goal is to share lessons of leadership while showcasing myriad career options available to the next generation of leaders. Each executive's commitment includes participating in one monthly web seminar, contacting the student several times throughout the program, hosting a student or group of students at your company, and covering the student's travel expenses. For additional information, please click here.
Most Powerful Women Entrepreneurs
Our MPWomen Entrepreneurs initiative, a partnership with American Express, honors America's most promising entrepreneurs by bringing a select ten of them them to the Fortune Most Powerful Women Summit each year. At the Summit, we connect small and large businesses to learn from each other. The program, which debuted at the 2009 Summit, targets entrepreneurial women who are game changers, ground-breakers and innovators in their fields.
