As a women-owned business in the logistics industry, we take special note of International Women’s Day and Women’s History Month. This year we wanted to highlight several encouraging signs of support for women in the logistics community recently. Here are a few noteworthy ones:
At Davos, the CEO of UPS, David Abney, shared a message about increasing women’s inclusion in the supply chain.
His thoughts, which are captured focused on how this would add economic value for everyone. More specifically, he predicts that “Empowering women to participate equally in the global economy could add $28 trillion in GDP growth by 2025.”
To support this, he mentioned how women typically spend more on education and how “Societies where income and gender inequality are lower not only offer better socio-economic opportunities for women, but also tend to grow faster and more equitably.” He went on to talk about how many women support their economies with micro, small, and medium sized businesses, and lowering the bar for them to connect to value chains could boost growth and inclusion.
The non-profit Women in Trucking Association has been doing a fantastic job supporting women in the trucking industry for some time. This January, they awarded 16 scholarships and launched a new two hour radio show called Women In Trucking focused on issues faced by female drivers.
Since about 6% of truck drivers are female and this industry is in dire need of new drivers, their influence could have a large impact on carriers and the companies they serve.
One other notable supporter of women’s leadership in all roles, including logistics, is LeanIn.org. Their current foremost initiative is promoting “Lean In Circles” which are basically regional groups of women that meet regularly to learn and grow together. To date there are 35,000 circles in 160 countries. LeanIn.org also recently released a “Women in the Workplace 2017” study in partnership with McKinsey to examine the state of women in corporate America.
If you’ve seen other examples of support for women in logistics, I encourage you to share them.
Happy International Women’s Day!