Blog

100 Years Ago – Women’s Suffrage

August 18, 2020 DISH Women's Network

DWN members,

Today marks a significant step in history toward gender equality: the 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment, granting US citizens the right to vote regardless of sex. Its passage came after decades of pressure from suffragists dedicated to women’s rights through the form of speeches, publications, petitions, marches, protests, and more. The women’s suffrage movement spanned over 70 years, with the 1848 Women’s Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, NY widely considered as the movement’s launch. 

While the 19th amendment gave women nationwide the right to vote, many women of color were entirely excluded. Suffragists, like Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mabel Ping-Hua Lee and Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (Zitkála-Šá), were integral to the suffrage movement and fought for equality while also facing segregation and discrimination within the movement. For many years after 1920, many women and men still could not vote — Indigenous Americans could not vote until they were granted citizenship in 1924, Chinese Americans not until the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1943, and, until the Voting Rights Act of 1965, many Black and Latinx Americans were disenfranchised due to voter suppression including poll taxes, literacy tests, and discrimination laws.

The women’s suffrage movement … Read more and comment

DWN: May First Friday Coffee

April 21, 2020 DISH Women's Network

The perfect opportunity to connect with fellow DWN members. BYOCoffee!

About this Event:

Join other DWN members for a quick coffee & chat session! These sessions will be random small groups conducted over Google Hangouts, which means you’ll have the chance to meet DWN members from across the country. This networking opportunity will provide you the chance to develop relationships and learn more about DISH nationwide.

… Read more and comment

DWN Virtual & WFH Updates

March 27, 2020 DISH Women's Network

DWN Events

We have gone virtual for all our events! Events will be available through Google Hangouts Meet, which means anyone can participate from any location. To attend, please register–this helps us manage the size for each event and make sure those interested receive the Hangouts Meet link. Thanks in advance for adjusting to this change in format.

  • 4/1 @ 8-9 am MDT – First Friday Coffee
    • BYOCoffee! The perfect opportunity to connect with fellow DWN members. We’ll assign you to a small Google Hangouts session, so please register here.
  • 4/14 @ 4-5 pm MDT – Leadership Networking Series with Kathy Schneider, SVP of Customer Service
    • We moved this upcoming event to a virtual experience! These small-group sessions allow members the opportunity to get to know leaders in a more informal gathering. Participation is limited to 12 individuals, so to reserve your spot, register here.

 

Webinars

  • DISH Resources
    • DISH training teams have developed resources and webinars to support you while working remotely. You can register for courses and learn more here.
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Tips for Writing an Effective Performance Appraisal

January 17, 2020 DISH Women's Network
  1. Focus on yourself and your greatest accomplishments.
  2. Take the time to reflect on your most enjoyable work.
  3. If you’re involved in DWN or another Collective Resource Group, be sure to mention it. Whether you volunteer or attend training events, you are taking steps to grow your professional skills and self.
  4. Use an active voice.
  5. Take credit for your accomplishments. Use “I” rather than “we” and eliminate the word “just.”
  6. Project a confident tone by removing phrases like “I feel” or “I believe.”
  7. Have a trusted coworker or friend proof-read your PA before you submit.
… Read more and comment

2019 DWN Flame Award Winners

December 26, 2019 DISH Women's Network
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Megan Casados, IHS Director of Training

October 29, 2019 DISH Women's Network

What’s been your career progression at DISH? And what do you currently do as IHS Dir. Of Training?

I’ve been with DISH for 10 years as of July. I started at DISH full time right out of college through the University Relations program – I started as a Marketing Specialist within the sales team focused on retail services, working with our third-party retailers. I pretty quickly transitioned over to be an instructional designer creating training content for those retailers. Then I was promoted to be a manager of that group, and we started to work with a larger audience, including direct sales, sales partners, alliance management, and retention.

Most recently I moved over to IHS in September last year to be the Director of the Training group. 

What are your teams’ main responsibilities?

My teams support and train all of our technicians both for DISH satellite installs and on-site sales for DISH customers, and we also handle training for all our fulfillment work such as appliance repair. Now we’re also supporting OnTech and Wireless tower technicians as well.

The training team is structured as two primary groups. One team is located at Meridian, scoping out and working with project managers … Read more and comment

Women in the Workplace 2019 – Fix the “Broken Rung”

October 29, 2019 DISH Women's Network

McKinsey & Co. and LeanIn.Org recently published the 5th annual Women in the Workplace report which is the largest study of the state of women in Corporate America aiming to help companies foster diversity. Since inception, almost 600 companies and over a quarter of a million people have participated in the study. 

In the last 5 years, Women in the Workplace has seen increased women in senior leadership roles, the C-Suite in particular growing from 17% to 21%. However, women are still significantly underrepresented at every level, and this rings true even more so for women of color. While the numbers are trending in a positive direction, our rate of progress is still decades or more away from gender parity.

This year’s study highlights that to reach equality, companies must fix the “broken rung” and invest in creating a strong culture. 

The biggest obstacle for women in reaching senior leadership is the “broken rung,” as shown below. This refers to the first step into management which has the biggest gap between men and women. For every 100 men promoted and hired to manager, only 72 women are promoted and hired. Addressing this first level is integral to fueling the pipeline … Read more and comment

Listening, the Missing Leadership Skill

October 22, 2019 DISH Women's Network

In May, Shana Cordon of The Moxy Lab spoke to Dish Women’s Network about what it takes to advance and succeed in leadership. While technical skills are important, even in tech the top-five skills for promotion to leadership depend upon the core skills of listening, speaking, and presence.

 

While many training programs develop skills for executive presence, including nuances of expression and outward-going communication, we give little attention to the foundational skill of listening. Yet research shows the effects of a healthy listening culture are profound. These include:

 

  • Greater trust in leadership.
  • Better team engagement.
  • More effective (and shorter) meetings and one-on-ones.
  • Fewer costly communication errors.

 

To develop your listening skills, below are five principles you can adopt immediately:

 

1)  BE PRESENT & ELIMINATE DISTRACTIONS—Prepare yourself to be completely in the moment. When with others, try to set aside your to-do lists, your phone and technology, and your other concerns. Your undivided attention is the greatest way to show respect and appreciation to others, which creates trust and engagement.

2)  BEFORE RESPONDING, BE PATIENT AND LISTEN COMPLETELY—Resist the Rebuttal Tendency, in which we interject our thoughts before we hear everything a speaker has to … Read more and comment

How to Reduce Evaluation Bias in Business

April 29, 2019 Tags: , Marianie Arroyo

Unconscious biases influence people’s everyday actions. These biases are shaped by people’s experiences and by cultural norms and allow them to filter information and make quick decisions.

In the workplace, women often encounter gender stereotypes and biases that reinforce the existing gender hierarchy, may hinder women’s career aspirations and retention, and may limit their ability to be promoted— especially in traditionally male organizations.

Some evidence-based suggestions for organizations to minimize bias in performance evaluations are:

  1. Provide unconscious bias education as part of leader development training.
  2. Be specific and clear about evaluation criteria.
  3. Hold evaluators accountable.
  4. Avoid lone-wolf evaluators, include several people during the process.
  5. Be transparent in who, what, how and why everything is being evaluated.
  6. Consistent and frequent evaluation is better.

 

Organizations are more aware of the high costs associated with turnover and of the benefits of gender-diverse leadership teams such as increased productivity and creativity. Commitment and action from enterprises are vital for this endeavor. Let’s keep raising awareness of biases that hinder women’s development in the workplace and strive toward making the unconscious conscious.

 

To access DISH Collective Resource Groups’ training on unconscious bias, visit:

https://dishwomensnetwork.com/past-event-videos/ 

 

For details regarding Dr. Smith, Dr. Rosenstein … Read more and comment

Today is Equal Pay Day: What you should know and do.

April 2, 2019 Tags: , , Marianie Arroyo

Equal Pay Day was originated by the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE) in 1996 as a public awareness event to illustrate the gap between men’s and women’s wages. Today, April 2nd, 2019 represents the day in the year that women on average must work through to make the same wages as men do on average the previous year.

The 2018 Women in the Workplace Report, published by McKinsey & Company and LeanIn.org, shows that while many US companies express commitment to gender diversity, statistics show it has not translated into meaningful progress. The study shows even though women have earned more bachelor’s degrees than men for the past decade and, are seeking promotions, negotiating salaries and staying in the workplace at the same rate as men, the pay gap still exists.

Since 2015, the DISH Women’s Network has provided an environment to foster relationships and professional growth through networking, education and career development. Our goal is to empower women to become leaders and create an inclusive work environment.

Some steps you can take today to be an agent of change:

  • Join the DWN: Be part of the conversation and spread the word
  • Educate yourself: Attend our speaker
… Read more and comment