Always Creating Value™ Podcast: “Breaking the Glass Ceiling” Panel Discussion

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Last year, we initiated and launched a podcast called Always Creating Value. One of our main focus points has always been the company and the people creating value.

And how can we create more value on a fairly consistent basis so that we can continue on and be better every day? In these podcasts, we’ve been able to tap into some very special people and talk to them about the kinds of things that they’ve done over their life that not only affected their business but also their personal life. And I’ve brought back three of the people who have been podcast participants, who are all within the business and corporate world in different ways. We want to reach back to the days of the late 70s and 80s when women were only beginning to really have a major impact on the business world. Before you found women in senior positions. Women were becoming increasingly involved and began to change the culture. And we would like to tap into the risks and the challenges that they’ve had. Let us learn from some of these really good experiences that can be applied to the challenges that we have today, the DEI issues, the more people coming into the workplace, wanting to grow and be part of it.

I’d like to introduce them: Ann Hofferberth, who comes from the public and corporate world. Lynn Kitchen comes from wealth management. And now she’s in the business of producing television episodes. She’s now started nationally, and now she’s going across the world. Devon Blaine is a public relations person focused on the area of business and politics. She also focuses on the business perspective from a crisis management platform where she’s been able to help companies with their PR as they go through some very dangerous times.

Ann Hofferberth:” What was very interesting in my time was there were ads on TV about women bringing home the bacon and frying it in the pan. That was the big commercial. And it said, we were supposed to be Wonder Woman, we’re supposed to do it all. And as I looked around in my corporate environment, I saw that that’s not what the men were doing. The men were finding people who were better equipped to do a job than they or better at doing a job they didn’t want to do and hiring them. And I quickly noticed that that might be what was holding some of my female counterparts back because when you try to do it all, you get exhausted and unproductive. So I took that learning and adapted the idea of delegation, finding the right people to do the right jobs, and then staying on top of them and overseeing that performance. And it also translated back into my home life because for me to be able to do what I was doing now that I had a husband and two children meant that I needed to delegate some of the home duties to my terrific husband. And I was smart enough to let him do it the way he wanted to do it, not impose my way of doing it, And that is what I learned. I learned to delegate”

Lynn Kitchen: “When I started, women were not allowed to become a stockbroker right out of college unless you put in at least 10 years of good hard work as a secretary to a stockbroker. So it was very, very unusual. I just kept knocking on doors all the way down Wilshire Boulevard. And I know Devon lives in Los Angeles. So you know that Wilshire Boulevard was a street that went from downtown Los Angeles all the way to Santa Monica. And on that street were hundreds of stock brokerages. I just walked in and knocked on the door. And fortunately, I found one gentleman, a manager, who said that he would give me a shot because I obviously was selling myself so heartily. He also said it was because he had three daughters of his own and he wanted some day for the corporate world to give them a break too. He wanted me to really understand that he was putting his career on the line by doing so. He had to put me on probation. And that meant that I had a higher threshold of sales that I had to achieve. My attitude was not like, oh, how dare they treat me that way? I do understand today’s values have shifted and changed. But back then, I was so excited just to get my foot in the door. After the first four years of working for a major brokerage firm Dean Witter Reynolds. I was determined to be Better, not Bitter!”

Devon Blaine: “I did learn along the way. Because I started a public relations agency, having never worked for an agency. I had worked with a lot of PR people, a lot of VPs of corporate communications, and a lot of advertising managers. I started as an actress and a model. I worked at every trade show known to mankind, you name the industry, I did a trade show. So I came to the agency world with just enough knowledge of every industry, except for the brand new ones. I could talk with a few buzzwords and I could talk the game and trade shows. I would get so bored. in my booth that every break, lunch, and coffee, I made it a point to walk around the conference and see what was new in that industry. Talk to people and learn everything I could possibly learn. And when I did not know something, I used my sense of humor! I think sometimes, today, people are so adamant about their point of view that they lose their sense of humor. And I would suggest that it’s important to maintain that sense of humor and to use it. And sometimes, it’s better to use that humor in a situation than it is to be harsh or argumentative. I’m thinking back to when I served on the governor’s Small Business Advisory Council, and it was apparent to me that I was the token woman. And a small subset of the council met in Sacramento one day. And as the meeting started, one of the men turned to me and said, Devon, why don’t you take the notes? And I immediately stood up with a big smile and said, Oh, why don’t you take the notes? I’ll get the coffee. How do you drink yours? What’s he going to do? I didn’t take the notes.”