How do you stay relevant and energized every day? This deep dive session will teach you HOW to transform your conversations and your results!  

The top 20% of performers differentiate themselves with two critical communication skills:

1. The ability to LISTEN for insight
2. The ability to TELL A STORY that motivates people to opt-in, and makes them memorable 

In general, women struggle with how to talk about themselves and how to overcome BIAS, especially in male dominated businesses.  Christine Miles, Founder & CEO of EQuipt, will share both WHY and HOW to gather, build, and tell a story that EMPOWERS you, energizes you, and helps you communicate more effectively. 

Using the power of STORY will help you deepen connections and build trust in a way that: 

• Unlocks the best ideas
• Promotes an understanding of others
• Promotes an understanding of who you are and why you do what you do.

After our immersion in the morning’s Deep Dive, it’s time to get to know each other! In this session, meet everyone in the room! Then, share with the room what you seek to gain from this conference and what your biggest challenges are – now, and what you see coming up in the next few years. What are you here to learn? What do you need? Information? Contacts? Benchmarking? Who in the room can connect you with the content or resources to help you? Be sure to participate in what is arguably the most significant session of the event!

In her jobs from attorney to utility operations, learn how Bentina’s career path has taken unpredictable twists and turns. How did she do it? By taking advantage of opportunities when presented and accepting positions she may not have even thought she wanted. In this non-linear approach, Bentina pushed herself to show up, make herself available, and be willing to try something new. She’ll also share when to assess your own skills before you ask for the next job.

How can you navigate your career in a strategic way to reach a higher-level role? Lauren Feldhake, Vice President of Customer Operations at PECO, shares her story, advice, and lessons learned. A few years ago, Lauren stepped into a role that had a bad reputation and low success rate. She purposely created a shift in how she managed, which made a significant improvement in performance for her group and increased her value to the company.

In this powerful presentation, she will share:

• How to quiet the negative self-talk to focus on what we do well
• Take the job nobody else wants – and master it – to demonstrate value in your organization
• Contribute in meetings – ask questions, seek different perspectives that help the company and its customers
• Push yourself to try something new

Are your writing skills holding you back? In our pursuit to advance our careers, many of us lack confidence in our writing abilities. Do your reservations creep in when you’re asked to give direction or share an opinion in written form? You are not alone. Learn how to kick those self-esteem issues to the curb with effective skills that will set your writing apart. This presentation will hone your skills to write better emails, letters, and reports as we:

• Discuss top grammar challenges
• Learn how to write in active voice
• Ask yourself these questions when starting a writing project

To advance ourselves professionally, we need to earn key “badges.” Similar to merit badges from scouting, these career badges challenge us to develop important skills in management, professional development, and leadership. As Chief Customer Officer and Senior Vice President at Eversource Energy, Penni McLean-Conner advanced her career by leveraging opportunities and earning trust. In this session, Penni will share with you:

• The badges you need to earn to advance your career
• Why those badges are important
• How you can earn your badges
• Her own experience with earning each badge – and what she learned in the process

Empowered, energized, and inspired after the 2018 ADVANCE conferences, Jeanie and Tram were charged to take their learnings and share them – and are excited to share their Leadership Journey with you. Though Employee resource groups existed at other Southern Company gas locations, none were based in their Houston office. Jeanie and Tram each respectively formed chapters of Inspire (Women’s ERG) and SOAR (AAPI) for the Sequent Energy office. Through forming these ERGs, both found opportunities to grow deeper as professionals, overcome challenges, become authentic leaders, impactfully develop and engage fellow employees, and drive business results.

Melissa Gilliam Shaw is an executive in a fast-growing utilities-specific marketing agency in mid-Missouri. She's also the mom to three kids under 5 years old, and wive of an active duty service member. Moving fives times — twice internationally — and having all three of their children in her first seven years of military marriage has taught Melissa a lot about strength, resilience, and focusing on your strengths. Hear Melissa's story — including how her military spouse experience has helped ARC media build a capable and professional staff of remotely-employee military spouses all over the word — in this personal and motivating session.

Homework? Yes, by now we have met amazing women in our industry that have inspired us to advance in our careers. What’s next? What needs to happen next as an industry? And who better to make it happen than the inspired group that has gathered for this conference? We’ll assign real “to-do” items, complete with accountability, deadlines, and commitments. Participants are encouraged to pair with a new friend from the conference to act as “accountability partner.” Plan to join us next year to see how much we “moved the needle” to promote more women leadership in utilities.