NYWICI Women’s Equality Day 2022
Today, August 26, we celebrate Women’s Equality Day which commemorates the ratification of
the 19th amendment and the constitutional guarantee of a woman’s right to vote. Now, over 100
years later, we celebrate the countless women who have used that guarantee as a foundation to
pave the way for even greater opportunities for women. It has never been easy, and even today,
there is still a very long way to go when we consider things like women in leadership positions,
the wage-gap, caregiver expectations and health and wellness challenges. But as I look around,
especially amongst the members of NYWICI, I feel incredibly encouraged by the future ahead.
But for that future to materialize, we all must continue the fight.
In the communications industry in particular, we are fueled by the power of words and how they
move people. But to truly move the needle, we all know that we must measure our impact to
fully identify the challenges in front of us. And that’s what we did with our most recent study,
WomenHeard – and the results, as many of you know, were sobering. As the pandemic took
hold in 2020, we saw many women leave the workforce and so we set out to understand why
and what impact it was having on the overall industry.
In Sept. 2020 alone, 865,000 women exited the workforce—four times the rate of men. And
though we are an industry rich with women, these survey findings show that there has been a
devastating impact on the industry. Unfortunately, there isn’t an easy fix – but I’m hopeful that
now, with more information than ever before, we can begin to better identify the ways we can
together lift women up, bring them along, and help drive change in our places of work to lessen
the burden that continues to deepen the inequity.
So today, I encourage you to take a step out of your day-to-day … to look around you for the
ways you can have impact for the women in our small corner of the world. For the members of
NYWICI, you’ve taken the first step. You’ve joined together to gather, mentor, inspire and
support one another and the women coming behind us as we each grow, evolve and break
down new barriers for the years to come. Thank you for your commitment and thank you to all of
the women from every corner around the world doing the same.
Dustee Jenkins
President, New York Women in Communications
