Contact: Celi Clark, Office of the Lieutenant Governor, 608-266-3516
While the legislature debates the merits of following Governor Doyle’s call to raise the minimum wage for the state’s lowest paid workers, Lieutenant Governor Barbara Lawton has enlisted some of Wisconsin’s top corporate executives to lead the private sector in moving Wisconsin women forward. She convened a meeting today of the Wisconsin Women = Prosperity Corporate Advisory Board, which counts among its ranks executives
from Covance Laboratories, Harley-Davidson, GE Medical, Alliant Energy, Manpower, Smith Barney, SC Johnson, WE Energies, Time Warner Cable, Land’s
End, and Milwaukee Women, Inc. WW=P is an economic development initiative designed to improve the state’s outlook by ensuring that women here may make their best contribution.
Members of the organizing group are recognized as leaders, on both the state and national levels, for their determined efforts to
create strong working environments to attract, retain, and promote women employees. They will, in partnership with the Lieutenant Governor, create an interactive statewide network of effective practices and make it
accessible to employers across the state, who may then profit from that collective experience and expertise – and add to it their own stories of success.
“With nearly 70 percent of Wisconsin’s women over the age of 16 already in the workplace, economic growth will come not by increasing their participation but by expanding their capacity,” Lt. Governor Lawton said. “Members of this Corporate Advisory Board have demonstrated that it
is profitable to support women’s success in the workplace. They have discovered ways to help women achieve their best work and stay in the workforce through the changing seasons of their lives. And we plan to reverse that ‘brain drain’ that is, in its majority, our most talented
young women.”
Corporate Advisory Board members already have many exciting stories to tell. They have boosted company earnings with a wide range of
practices. Some examples are tying managers’ goals and pay to the advancement of women in their employ; flexible and/or compressed work
weeks; lactation rooms for nursing mothers; continuing education and leadership training opportunities; mentoring programs; paid paternity leave; and flexibility to participate in children’s school activities.
“Everyone wins with this: employers and employees,” Lt. Governor Lawton continued. “And it’s a win for the state. Women will
earn more, (tax revenues will grow), families and communities will be strengthened, and we’ll be on our way to making Wisconsin a destination state to which women come in order to thrive and prosper.”
The Corporate Advisory Board meeting today focused on planning for the March 21, 2005 symposium, part of the WW=P Wisconsin
Women Forward convention. WW=P works in tandem with Governor Doyle’s “Grow Wisconsin” Initiative to encourage growth in Wisconsin’s economy.
