Attending the Women’s Forum was an enriching, inspiring and empowering experience for me. I met entrepreneurs and leaders from different walks of life, ranging from non-profit and fashion to politics, media and banking. I was inspired by the women I met who are making a difference in the world and are so passionate about what they do. Attending the conference really made me ask myself: “What am I passionate about and what do I want to do for the rest of my life?”

Three people who stood out for me were:

• Wendy Lu Habe: she set up a Private Equity Fund that provides capital and business experience to women owned enterprises in Africa and gets returns of over 30%. There are only 5 women private equity funds in the world and I wonder, how much potential remains untapped and waiting for the right investors? She had the most amazing smile; looked very young and energetic even though she has two sons and two grandchildren. I don’t know how she does it but I guess there is hope for those who want to follow her footsteps. She was also the Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards Jury member and has worked to empower South African Women.
• Mona Mourshed: I could identify with her dream of improving the education system and enabling people to change their lives, and was inspired to see the work already done by her and others. We have kept in touch even after the Forum and she sent me a copy of her work “How the World’s Best-Performing School Systems Come Out on Top” (download PDF, 9 MB). I was able to connect her with a friend of mine in India who is the Head of Education and Ability Confederation of Indian Industry. I strongly believe that education is what transforms lives and I hope to make a difference in this arena.
• Maryana Iskander: She has worked for a top consulting company and now works in non-profit. She said, “Lot of smart people spend a lot of time thinking about the future and forget to live in the present.” Her worlds remain with me even after I left the conference and I hope to make the most of each moment of my life rather than worrying about the future.

There were many other women I met and have kept in touch with. We can collectively build trust in our societies and make this a better place. It is about trusting and willing to take a chance on people. This is an excellent support network for women and I hope to return to the Women’s Forum.

The WF07 was a whole experience to remember. First of all, because of the other students in our group, which were all from different countries and backgrounds but made me feel like family. And I learned something unique from each of them. Then, the experience of meeting so many successful women sharing with us their experiences in business, government or academia: they “told” me it’s possible to get what you want, if you try hard enough. Only 15% of the attendees were men — for once a minority — but their viewpoints also made a strong impression.

Three ideas that I brought home:

• “Women take decisions with 75% of the knowledge while men do it with 25%”, a speaker said. For me, that means that we should take bigger risks and turn our fears into strengths.
• Trust is a necessary feature of the world, but creating it requires self-knowledge, openness and understanding of other people’s points of view.
• Writing on the blog in a foreign language (my mother tongue is Spanish) was a real challenge: but now that I’ve started, I don’t expect to stop.

Going to the Women’s Forum this year as a member of the student’s delegation has been an amazing experience. I’ve been interested in women’s issues and challenges since my master, when I made my dissertation about women entrepreneurs in Brazil. At this time, I hadn’t completely realized all the challenges women face in society and in the job market. And I became so excited about this study that I decided to continue to do my research on the subject for my PhD thesis at HEC, in Paris.

Participating in the Women’s Forum 2007 was therefore a wonderful opportunity. Not only could I attend sessions and panels with women and men who make a difference in the world, but I also had the pleasure of interviewing some of them, leveraging the work that we did with the blog.

During this three days in Deauville, I was impressed to see how much women have improved. Indeed, seeing all the successful and courageous women from all over the world who participate in the forum, it becomes clear that we have made some real progress. However, we also realize that there is still a lot do to. Women are not yet well represented in positions of responsibility in private and public spheres. How can it still be true in the XXI century? And, more importantly, how can there still exist some practices concerning women, particularly in some African and eastern countries, which go against the most basic human rights? It is a world of paradoxes. This is why the theme of this year was so pertinent: trust. Trust is the basis of any relationship between human beings.

The Women’s Forum is not only a gathering of important women (and men) but also a place where people discuss about the future, the environment, politics, world conflicts and current crisis, such as the one in Darfur. Long-term and concrete initiatives have also been created and put into practice since the first edition of the Women’s Forum, in 2005. One of the most interesting of these is the Cartier Women’s Initiative Award, with the support of McKinsey & Company and INSEAD. Five women entrepreneurs, one from each continent, have received a prize from Cartier, as well as a US$ 20 000 grant and coaching support for one year. The projects have a real impact. One example is the one of Lucie Avoaka, the African Laureate this year, whose project is a healthcare provider in the underprivileged region of Abobo, in Ivory Coast.

What I took from the Women’s Forum as a lesson is that we have to continue to fight for our dreams. All the interesting women to whom I talked to or interviewed during the forum had a couple of things in common: they had a passion for what they do and they were not afraid of taking risks, of fighting for their ideals. This is really inspiring.

After the Rising Talents awards, the Cartier Women’s Initiative award and the Women for Education initiative, which were at the center of this year’s Women’s Forum, I would like now to grant my very own awards to some of the people I met at the conference. Here is my personal selection:

The One with the Most Guts Award – Obviously, this one goes to Lebanese journalist May Chidiac, who was attacked and severely injured in 2005 for criticising Syria’s prominent presence in Lebanon. The current instabilities in Lebanon still haven’t prevented her from keeping on doing her job and promoting freedom of speech.

The Most Determined Award – I’d like to give this one to both Jobeda Ali and Maryanna Iskander, the Rising Talents I had the chance to interview. I had really inspiring conversations with them that kind of shook up my bourgeoise morals. Thanks girls.

The Best Sense of Humour Award – This one should definitely go to Ms Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, vice-president of the Republic of South Africa, who made a very nice point saying that women should all stay in bed. I totally agree with that. The jury also grants a special mention to Bonnie Fong, one of the members of the Student team, for her dry jokes.

The Rock Star Award – This one goes to Anne Lauvergeon, CEO of Areva, who was just impossible to interview because of the army of fans and journalists constantly surrounding her.

The Best Hair Style Award – Let’s reward originality, with the fashion designer Angel Chang. She also won the Cartier Women’s Initiative award for North America. I wish her good luck.

The Best Ideas Award – OK, this one was created specially for Aude Zieseniss de Thuin, founder and CEO of the Forum. Establishing an international women-only network isn’t that bad of an idea, right?

I was very glad and curious when I arrived in Deauville the evening before the Women’s Forum. My fellow students looked smart and friendly, and the coming days fairly unusual.

I was amazed by the way the organizes have been able to convince a vast group of powerful people to spend some of their time at the meeting. The WF offered me the opportunity to speak with the Head of communication at McKinsey Paris, with a Partner at McKinsey NY, with Carlos Ghosn of Renault, with Maria Emilia Menezes (Exec Director of Wallace Pharma) and so many others. I learned alot from them all, and I learned even more being confronted to the many Asian and African women at the conference. I was delighted to discover how strong, dynamic and decisive women they were. Figures like South-African Vice Prime Minister Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka or Yolanda Conyers, VP and Chief diversity officer at Lenovo, impressed me much.

I also realized (thanks to an analysis by my co-blogger Ivonne) how strange it can be to discuss about women’s conditions globally when, in fact, in many developing countries this discussion has not even begun yet.

The 2007 Women’s Forum is over, but this blog will remain and continue. We don’t know exactly how yet, but we are exploring options. The creation of the blog was a passionate collective adventure involving executives from the WF, tech people, mentors, sponsors, but particularly a group of twelve students from seven business schools. Most of them are non-native English speakers, and arrived in Deauville without prior blogging experience. Yet they delivered an amazing collaborative portrait of the Forum: its themes, its faces, its characters, its key moments, its atmospheres, its strong words and its soft tones are all reflected on this site in more ways than we could expect, in texts and pictures. It was a genuine pleasure to meet them and “coach” their enthusiasm, creativity and engagement. More from them will be added here in the coming days, as they will reflect on their experience at the Forum

But for now, let’s just thank them for their passionate work, and wish them success. Here they are, gathered at the Deauville beach before heading back to their schools. From the left, standing: Louis Chenard (ESSEC), Alix de Poix (member of the WF Board), Gersende Piganeau (coordinator of the students group), Coralie Prin (ESSEC), Manasi Ramanna (London Business School), Joysy John (London Business School), Bonnie Fong (INSEAD), Ivonne Arciniega (IESE), Annachiara Torciano (Stockholm School of Economics), Margit Trollnas (Stockholm School of Economics), Camilla Quental (HEC), Bruno Giussani (coach/editor of the group). Front: Natiq Shamim (Stockholm School of Economics), Jonathan Citadelle (ESSEC) and Bruno Vinay (COO of the WF). (Photo Mario Farinato)

Yesterday Friday we all discovered the winners of the Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards (see this previous post for details), five women entrepreneurs (see picture), one from each region of the globe (Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, North America). When Bernard Fornas, President and CEO of Cartier International, announced the winners, he said that they took 7 hours discussing to make the decision. Not only me, but I guess a lot of people in the WF wondered: what criteria did they take into account for the evaluation?

Today I spoke to Freja Day, from Cartier International, and she told me that the evaluation is very rigorous. The three main criteria are: creativity (the degree of innovation of the overall business concept and idea); sustainability (financial impact of the business, indicating its long-term success); impact (community impact of the business, in terms of job-creation and impact on the immediate or broader environment).

The jury is composed of outstanding individuals of the business world, the non-profit sector and the academic field. There are five jury panels, one per continent, representing a variety of profiles, countries and cultures. The jury members all voted for the projects of the finalists.

Freja also said that the social impact of the project is very important, especially in emerging countries. The analysis of the business plans, showing the sustainability of the projects in the next three, five or ten years, counted a lot as well.

The Award is a long-term project and is going to be repeated. So, women entrepreneurs of the world, prepare your business plans for next year’s Cartier Women’s Initiative Awards!

At the first glance one can understand why Maud Fontenoy had been chosen to be one of the WF “Rising Talents“. Maud has been through incredible projects, she is the first woman to have sailed around the world against winds and currents in 2007. She is also the first woman to have crossed the Atlantic and pacific Oceans rowing. Maud has been awarded Chevalier de l’ordre National du Mérite as recognition of all her successful projects.

When asking her the difficulties of being a woman in such ambitious projects, she first answered, “my arms were not muscular enough”. More seriously, Maud told me that as a woman she may have been under a bit more pressure because people looked more at her in those activities where men represent usually the majority.

Maud is handling many new projects. She is trying to share all what she discovered around the world, particularly with children. The creation of an educational programme called “Jeunes aventuriers” to teach young children to respect the environment they live in has been one of her important moves for the ecological cause. She wrote two books about her world tour depicting her life on board. One of those, “Le sel de la vie“, is very personal. Maud has been involved in projects and associations for a long time. “I created my first association when I was 21″ but she now enjoys developing projects that have a greater impact within France and the rest of the world because the cameras are focusing on her, and that offers her a good platform for passing her messages along.

Talking with her, people would notice that she speaks a lot with her hands. I guess that is quite normal for a woman with Italian origins that rowed all over the Earth. That gives “the message I’m trying to deliver more intensity and a greater impact” and it is also a way to illustrate her sentiments when talking to children.

We asked the WF participants about trust — see these two previous posts. But what about us? What does trust mean to the WF bloggers?

“Trust is believing that something you think is true.. is true.” - Margit

“I don’t trust anybody don’t ask me” - Coralie

“Trust is the bond that keeps people together” – Manasi

“The relationship you build between you and people. It is the basis of all relationships to me.” - Camilla

“Trust is confidence and be aware of the other and expect the other to be aware about you.” – Ivonne

“Feeling that  are shared values with somebody.” - Annachiara

“Confidence without fear” - Bonnie

“Honoring your commitments” - Natiq

“ Trust is believing in another person, taking a chance and seeing their potential”– Joysy

“Trust is the cornerstone of human relations. Trust is such a subjective notion that it requires the most personal feelings” – Louis

“Trust has to be something pretty like a personal demanding state of mind.” – Jonathan

“Trusting someone is knowing you can rely on that person, on his honesty or competencies.” – Gersende

Italian photographer Mario Farinato has been pointing his camera at the Women’s Forum for three days. We asked him to share a few of his “atmosphere” shots.

At the conference center’s media entrance:

The makeup lounge:

The massage/relaxation pod:

A bouncer at the Men’s Corner entrance?

Actually, the one above is a Photoshopped picture. Proof: she got in (although the muscular rugbymen on TV don’t seem to interest her that much):

Here’s the wall representing the Women’s Forum sponsors and partners, in the entrance hall of the congress center. Thank you to them all for their support!

When I was invited to the forum’s 3rd edition, I immediately noticed an interesting place for me not to feel absolutely exotic: the men’s corner; a little dark stall where minority men who dare attend the event can freely gather together (at least that is what I thought at that time). Every women were supposed to be prohibited from that place built on a club-style basis with a giant TV screen and leather armchairs. A sort of forbidden city in which the men could compound in case of any sudden feminine attack.

After the two first days I must confess the organizers were right but on the other way around what they had imagine: men have been ferociously attacked by hordes of women that seemed to consider the little square the best in the all Deauville CID (our host resort). So much so that men began to cautiously avoid the men’s corner.

But manliness had not enunciated its last word. The battle was going to its apogee on this afternoon. The forum comprehensive program was announcing the arrival of Carlos Ghosn (CEO of Nissan & Renault), Frank Brown (Dean of INSEAD), Olivier Marchal (Bain&cie) and JP Tricorie (CEO of Schneider). Yes, in the twenty-square-meter thing. Of course the idea was to enable these well-known economic figures to meet the happy few other men in Deauville and talk between men about something like how and why women matter in business.

That’s not saying much that the she-army would fight tooth & nail to evacuate the poor guys who dare to try to attend the conference planned specifically for them.Here’s come a genius idea from an organizer: let’s change the place for the conference: a very classical feint in war period. The women would headed like a whirlwind into the men’s corner, while, we, happy and victorious would celebrate peacefully our victory in good company. The machiavelic plan worked out, only one thing mattered: discretion. (you know Guitry? If you’re man, rush to that: “Of course women can keep a secret, they only need to be several of them”).

How The James Bond stronghold was attacked

Men rushes into a first floor conference place, hidden behind a big totem that advertises the event. But there was a previous conference that was taking place there. And guess what, the men’s gathering in front of a door was noticed by passing women that was hanging around. In less than five minutes, streams of red-headed, blonde or dark, asian, indian, american, european and african women were surging toward us, perched on stiletto heels, full of rage for the attempt to elude them. We could hear from the depth of the pit the victorious rumour moving upward. Our guests were already arriving to the James Bond room and the James Bond girls were following them in an unbelievable uproar.We tried diplomacy in order not to surrender immediately.After hard peace talks we agreed on the following rule: three women should have at least one man to assail the place.

Let’s make it clear they didn’t respect the treaty as soon as they were numerous enough inside to put us down: powerful women are crual and pitiless.

As there were so few chairs for these numerous women present, they began to sit onto the fitted-carpet, leaving shoes and pushing their peers just as if in a mud battle. Indeed women wanted to eye their hero intently.The conference started in a strange way: M. Ghosn, who probably meant to be sincere, explained that diversity was compulsory in order to achieve effectiveness in companies but had to be meticulously prepared, and so that in his executive there were no women so far. Here we were and I really thought at the time we were on the verge to a nuclear war. I grabbed my bag and rushed to the door. Actually I am too young to die and I cannot bear physical torture. Thus I ran toward the door in an desperate attempt to save my life as the popular discontent voices were coming up. Were the bodyguards ready to evacuate the unlucky Nissan CEO? Never mind, every man for himself in hard times.

The diplomatic crisis was managed by Bond, James bond (his friends also call him Carlos Ghosn). My colleague Camilla, much stronger than I and determined to cover the event, has already posted her summary of the risky debate those four men dare to host. A strong historical moment. That’s how a private men’s clandestine meeting was ruin in Deauville, October 12^th 2007 by the vikings of modern times, I mean, women.

by Alix de Poix

Tree blue fishes and nine pink fishes in the same pond, creating nearly from scratch the Women’s Forum’s first live blog! Here comes to Deauville the third student’s delegation, the bloggers of the Women’s Forum 2007. Were only missing our two friends from North America, due to climate (travel) difficulties. Diversity of gender, colour, religion, nationality, age, the team is definitely representative of the Forum.

Four ‘nannies’: Alix, Barbara and the two Brunos, with Orange support and last year student’s delegation representative, Gersende, to set the brief: Authorisation given to go everywhere, nearly no control on their creativity, Simple rules given: respect of the individuals and transparency of the information.

And watch what has happened!

We gave them our trust and they enacted it, getting all the interviews they wanted to have.

They are both hard workers and smiling; smiling to one another, and smiling to life. Talented, but modest, still dreaming and already acting

Behind the surface, rock dancing teacher, singer, writer, non for profit activist, etc. Like cats, they have multiple life and talents and do not need to go to a second life experience to experiment new avenues and live their dreams. “How can you change the world, if you go linear?” said one of them.

They are the kids we all like to adopt – of course our own kids are the best - but with an extended family view, they are most welcome, in my tribe, or in your’s.

And if I replace, if we replace, the word adopt by the word mentor, all of us have a role there!

It is our responsibility to transmit to the next generation our values and our experiences. It is also an honor and a privilege to be in contact with that generation. Mentoring is a win-win fulfillment, for the taker and for the giver!

It is not a nice to do but a need to do; it reinforces the brick and mortar of what we call Civilisation and contributes to its sustainability.

It is maintaining a chain and a continuum. It is putting humanity on the word evolution, it is accepting to share with them, it is accepting to give up parcels of our power, and if we start doing it on an individual basis, maybe one day, we can hope to be able to do it on a more global basis, on a country basis, enabling the diminution of the divide between the north and the south, the well off with the without anything.

I’m sure you know what a Girls Night looks like. Well, try to imagine one, multiply it by 500, and you’ll know what the Women’s Forum looks like. I’ve never learnt so many tips about waxing techniques, moisturizers and shoe-style within such a short period of time. What do women do when they think nobody’s watching? They spend a significant part of their time gossiping and talking about their fellow’s lack of taste in fashion. But that does not prevent them from being highly competent if not the best in what they do. People often forget that part. Stereotypes can be useful; they also can be true and help you to apprehend your social environment. I am not criticising the fact that people can have stereotypes – if somebody is good at putting people in little boxes, that’s me. But the real problem arises when they influence your action and may jeopardize somebody’s career.

That was the whole point of the conference moderated yesterday by Julia Harrison. According to a recent study by PricewaterhouseCoopers presented by Marie-Jeanne Chèvremont-Lorenzini, the cultural perception of their gender is the main barrier women have to face in their professional life. Laws and education clearly affect the way they are perceived by their environment, and as such, indirectly impact their career. Women’s abilities and competences are often questioned; but perhaps the questioning should be reversed in favour of our deep and unconscious social beliefs: are we right when we think women are not able to deal with their professional, social, family and personal lives? Women have a couple of role models proving it’s possible. That’s not much, I agree. But as long as they’re properly doing what they’re asked to do, and as long as they’re asking for more, stereotypes should not matter.

This is a woman’s right to be both brilliant and superficial.

I, along with 10 other women, went into the Men’s Corner. So, I guess it is not really a Men’s Corner, although the decoration is very suitable for males (black leather couches, flat screen TV, a bar - see a picture in this previous post).

This place gives participants the opportunity to have very interactive and one-on-one conversations with executives of important companies.

Conversation and questions came up. Interesting subjects such as why is flexibility only geared towards women? Why can’t men participate in flexible programs too? Why are women stopping other women from climbing the corporate ladder? How to convince management this issue is important? What about husbands who move to another country with their wife because she got her dream job?

A question was thrown: Who do you hire when you have two great candidates with similar characteristics, one is male and the other female? The politically correct answer would have been the female. But an audience participant came up with an interesting solution “Let’s forget about fighting, women can bring different ideas, you should hire both. Opportunities are not limited”

Gender diversity is not about victimizing women or punishing men. It is not about dividing and separting or about having different benefits by gender. It is about complement. That is what many companies do not understand. That is what many men don’t understand and therefore, they see this as threatening or conflictive. Diversity is balance, diversity is taking what is good from each person and mixing it, thus creating an idea that would had never arised from one homogenous group.

So let’s stop talking about division and let’s start thinking about balance and counterparts.

Meeting so many dedicated and generous women in this forum, committed in social entrepreneurship, in NGOs, fighting for human rights and helping people, I sometimes feel a little bad only “selling creams and perfumes”…

So I decided to have a look at the L’Oréal Foundation Discovery Corner, just in case, to see if it could pump up a little my corporate pride.

That’s how I met Delphine Sevelinge, director of the “Look better, Feel better” Program for France (under the name “la Vie, de plus belle“), a program run by leading cosmetics companies and cancer associations. And there she started an enthusiastic explanation…

The “Look Good…Feel Better” program started 20 years ago, after realizing the impact of a “make-over” on a woman in cancer treatment experiencing appearance-related side effects. “The woman was so depressed and self-conscious she would not venture outside her hospital room. [The doctor] made some calls and was able to provide cosmetics and a make-up artist. Miraculously, the make-over transformed not just the woman’s look, but her outlook, as well. She immediately felt happier and less burdened, laughing for the first time in weeks. The doctor credited the make-over with improving her attitude and emotional approach toward her treatment.”

With such a profound result, the cosmetic industry recognized the opportunity to help more women maintain self-esteem and face cancer treatment with greater confidence, and many cosmetic brands immediately offered funding and cosmetics. Cancer associations provided their medical network and make-up artists volunteered for this generous cause. Today, LGFB group programs are held in 19 countries and helped 830K women around the world.

Sure, it doesn’t save the world, but it definitely helps it feeling better.

The discovery hall was simply buzzing with energy – participants gathering in groups discussing views they had heard during the panel discussions, some were pacing backwards and forwards with their mobile phones and blackberries, others were browsing the various displays, or networking over un café et un pain au chocolat. Unmistakable also were the queues of ladies lining up for the beauty lounge for a quick makeover or eyebrow treatment between the sessions.

As the ladies awaited their turns at the counter, I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to go and ask some of the Forum participants whether they could “trust” the makeover, and more seriously, what does “trust” mean to them?  Birthe Gortz, a Partner in Transaction Services with PwC, told me that she is in the “trust” business – trust is a fundamental business principle, and it applies both externally and internally within the firm.  Joanna Fielding, CFO of Standard Chartered Bank in China, agreed.  When the bank surveyed its clients on the most important aspects in a banking relationship, “trust” always comes near the very top of list.  She added, “Trust is essential in building relationship across borders… it is one of our core corporate values”.  A French executive offered another interpretation: trust is the willingness to just go do what you believe in.  On further discussion, she revealed that women can sometimes hold themselves back in life because they think too much about the “complexity of being a woman”.  Kati Najipoor-Schutte, Partner of the executive search firm Egon Zehnder, believed that trust encompasses many elements, the key ones being “honestly, openness and transparency”.

And the verdict from the Forum participants on the makeover artist?  7/10.  Based on a highly statistical sampling methodology (of course).

Being a woman is also about harmony…  How better than through music?

Croatian mezzo-soprano Renata Pokupić is known internationally through acclaimed performances of baroque, classical and other coloratura-mezzo repertoire as well as solo songs, and she’s been selected by the Women’s Forum and JP Morgan as one of the 20 “Rising Talents” this year.

As an opera-fan, I couldn’t leave Deauville without meeting her, and this serene-looking woman charmed me by her simplicity and the passion she expresses when talking about lyrical singing. “Singing is my first and biggest love. I was 6, listening to Verdi on the radio, and I knew I wanted to become a singer.”

And so she did, and not half-way: after studying singing at the Music Academy of Zagreb, she made a successful debut at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris in 2003, where she sang Anna in Les Troyens by Hector Berlioz with Sir John Eliot Gardiner conducting. A year later, she was blowing up the London scene, during the London Handel Festival, singing Dejanira in Handel’s Hercules the London Handel Orchestra under conductor Laurence Cummings. Since then, it seems nothing can stop this graceful young woman to charm Europe with her vocalises.

As a woman, is it a problem to travel so much from festivals to music theatres all around Europe? Not for Renata, who agrees her job hardly leaves her time for her personal life, but, as she beautifully says: “As a singer, you don’t work for a living: you entirely live your job. I am fortunate enough to work with amazing musicians, singers, orchestras and conductors, and this fulfils me completely.”

It’s the first time Renata attends a gathering such as the Women’s Forum, and she finds it tremendously inspiring. “It’s something very new to me to meet so many admirable and committed women, and I now feel an urge to commit beyond my job.” The Rising Talents program offers mentoring to its laureates, and Renata hopes this will help her finding what she could do “to help make things better around the world”.

In the meantime, her musical career keeps her very busy. On Sunday, she is heading to London to prepare a Lieder recital with Roger Vignoles. “Working with this pianist is simply heaven!” And so was listening to you, Renata!

Mercedes Erra, Executive Chairwoman of Euro RSCG Worldwide in France has just presented a survey showing consumer’s opinion on companies.

Firstly, this survey highlighted the point that 65 % of the public thinks that their opinion should drive company’s conduct and overall strategy.

The thing that has to be kept in mind, particularly by all the leaders attending this Forum is that their responsibility is constantly growing. Indeed people are mainly thinking that the role of companies in our world is changing in lots of fields. For example, more than 75% of English, American and French people think that business bears as much responsibility for driving positive social change as governments.

Corporate reputation on social and environmental responsibility is a key driver of confidence and will become a driver of companies’ performances. With greater awarness people are ready to pay more for ethical and sustainable products.

 Mona Mourshed, partner from McKinsey & Company, Dubai, spoke about her passion for education and why she cares so deeply about education. Mona leads the regional public sector practice and is co-leader of the global education and human capital initiative.

She started her career in the New Jersey office of McKinsey and moved to Dubai after a year. She has been with McKinsey for the last seven and half years and has been very successful in her career.  She has worked on a wide range of topics from economic growth to healthcare to education. Besides having an impressive career, she mentors female students in Dubai and also sits on the Steering Committee of the Next Generation Conference, to be held in Jordan. The focus of the conference will be on youth unemployment and education reform in the Middle East and private sector leaders from across the region will be attending the conference.

She generally doesn’t plan her career beyond the next three months but has a big dream. She dreams of a world where we have high student outcomes in literacy and numeracy in all the countries around the world. She dreams of a word where education can empower people and enable them to have a better future. She believes that education can catapult through adversity and social classes. Every child has a right to education and she is doing her part to reform the education system in Middle East and Asia.  Lets all think about what we can do to educate children and transform the world.

Like in all gatherings, some of the most interesting discussions happened behind the scenes, or rather in a suffused tone over lunch. One of the interesting chats your ears on the ground picked up was about the very core issue of the conference – diversity policy in corporations, or why so few women get into company boards.

A few untold truths emerged at a table of European and US female managers from a number of European multinationals. First, they all agreed a convincing business case for gender diversity has to be presented to the (male) senior management. Only a business case can motivate change, and not fairness arguments. Second, many companies, especially those with low women representation, are pondering what to do to attract more diverse talent. The long-sighted ones have tasked their women employees attending the Forum to come back with an actions plan, which is an interesting approach of bottom-up ideas generation. Other companies have put procedures and diversity teams in place to drive change top-down, with substantial budgets. So far, no surprises.

More surprising was the fact that many of these female managers were not sure the top (male) ranks of the company were really sold on the idea of the business value of diversity. It is all up to how the CEO sees the issue, said one. One manager even said she will bring back ideas from the forum to her top executives, but she will not mention gender diversity as part of those discussions. The company’s top management does not see the value of this debate on gender diversity, she said.

More cynically, or realistically perhaps in some cases, one senior woman manager said that she thought there is very little appetite for women board members within all-men boards. Women board members would challenge the way things are done, and once you let one woman in, a few more would follow, and then what happens? All the women managers at that table noticed that their company boards had members from all corners of the globe, but no single woman. What a shame that European shareholders haven’t noticed the research from diversity consultancy Catalyst. This shows exactly the opposite, that women in top management perform better than all-men driven companies. If this is not a business case, what is?

More scenes from the Women’s Forum 2007. Starting with getting the right makeup:

Next door, the “Thé des écrivains” — the writers’ corner:

It features “Writers tea”:

The theme of this year’s Forum is “Trust”. So I went around asking a few participants about it: What does “trust” mean to you?

Kate Robertson (Euro RSCG UK) — Trust is broken in the world. In her words: “Institutions, governments, nobody trusts them anymore. But the world won’t function without them”. She believes that women can bring an emotional perspective that could help rebuild trust.
About the Women’s Forum, Kate thinks that it has become a established forum and that it is increasingly important. According to her, there is a sense of urgency of women’s role and the Women’s Forum helps bring action to this issue.

Ghania Houadria (La Poste Algérienne) — For Ghania, trust is capital for a company that has clients. For her, the success of the company depends on trust. A lot of problems happen if there is no trust. The lack of trust disturbs the evolution and the development of the company. She agrees with Anne Lauvergeon, Areva’s CEO, when she said in the previous panel that trust is difficult and long to build, but easy and quick to destroy. According to Ghania, for a company such as La Poste, in which the clients must have trust to put their money and send their letters, trust is the company’s reason to exist, and it must be established not only between the company and its clients, but also internally, between the company and its employees.

Gabriela Carvalho (Brazilian, among the 20 young women selected as “Rising Talents”) — Gabriela says that a great part of the work that women do to represent a larger percentage of the workforce is related to trust. According to her, for women, more than for men, it is essential to establish trust and to avoid mistakes to be able to continue in the career. She argues that it is very important to generate trust for the stakeholders and she believes that it is frequently more difficult to do it for women than it is for men.

Joana Loureiro (Portuguese, Aprendera, Junior Achievement, Portugal) — Joana believes that first we have to trust ourselves, believe that we are capable of doing things. Of course we also have to question ourselves, she says. To Joana, anyone who is a leader has to inspire trust.

I felt somewhat suspicious about the theme (Sorry…) and was very interested in asking to a large number of the Women’s Forum’s participants what “trust” means to them, with a bit of irony I must confess. Who does choose to attend an event (just think about Davos) because of its theme? I can even go further: How many of the participants didn’t even know or remember the theme that is supposed to gather us for three days in Deauville? I suspected them to be numerous. Anyway I asked, I talked and on top of that I laughed with the women I met. But by the end I got flabbergasted too. These mighty women knew the theme, and what’s more they considered it of some importance. Of course they are not absolutely naive idealists: they have not traveled up to ten thousands miles to talk merely (what’s more, in Deauville) about trust. As a dynamic social entrepreneur put it: “It might seem light and genuine but trust does remain of high importance. Let’s don’t fear to go back to basics”. A partner at McKinsey makes it clear, “trust” is an “attribute”; it means “openness and transparence”. In a nutshell it means “demands”. And for so high-level and hardworking women, one can make it clear that means much.

This is a kind of an irony. The great novelty in this edition of the Women’s Forum is the creation of a men-only area, where they can enjoy a relaxing time while waiting for their spouses to get out of their “feminist” conference. And the rules are very strict there: a security guy at the entrance makes sure only men get in there. Here is a picture of the “Men’s Corner”:

Men are a minority here at the Forum, about 15% of attendees – Aude de Thuin, the Forum’s founder and CEO, underlined in her introductory speech that complementarities were essential to our world today, but that to her, 30% of men is the top-limit to reach an ideal balance. Some women here find amazing that men would chose to join the Forum; other consider the dedication of a specific area to them as a provocation.

Crazy rumours have been spreading around this morning regarding this very selective and secret area. For instance, I’ve heard they were hiding a PlayStation somewhere…

But beyond the joke, I think we have a point. The WomensForum choose this year to welcome its male members with clichés – a huge TV screen playing rugby games, leather armchairs and possibly a hidden PlayStation – in the same way men welcome women back in the real world.

Nowadays, a lot of companies are trying to promote gender diversity among their Human Resources. Though the higher you are in the hierarchy, the fewer women you can find. Perhaps is it too soon to value the outcome of these women-friendly policies, and perhaps can they be improved. Indeed, behind the provocation, the purpose of the men-only area is to raise awareness towards all the differences between men and women in business, which a corporate day-care facility cannot erase. Men are invited there to discuss gender diversity issues and share their experience and best practices concerning the integration of female values in their managerial culture.

Of course, and according to the most recent rumour, until warrior women in the Forum have besieged the area.