Lindner courses empower women to create stronger business teams

Jane Sojka, PhD, professor-educator of marketing and director of the undergraduate program in marketing, founded Lindner’s MKTG 3001: Women in Sales course, which fosters confidence and resilience in students to empower them as they begin their careers. 

Sojka’s work with students in the classroom has proven how vital examining the lens through which business is taught and practiced is. Although the class covers the ins and outs of professional sales, students have found the greatest value in the soft skills they walk away with.

With the success of the women in sales course, other disciplines within the college are spearheading their own initiatives to integrate this approach into their offerings for students.

Lindner’s department of finance, real estate, and insurance and risk management is a discipline looking to further engage women — and all students — in a new way of thinking that challenges the traditional stereotypes and assumptions of the industry.

“We want to try to help women understand the challenges (in finance) and ways to work around those challenges and to bring more awareness to the men in the industry to change some of the systems in the space,” said Jamie Weathers, PhD, assistant professor-educator of finance and director of the department’s Women in Finance initiatives.

Steve Slezak, PhD, associate professor of finance and director of the Johnson Investment Institute, observed the need to integrate these ideas and practices into the finance curriculum, spurring him to bring Weathers on board with the institute and brainstorm future initiatives.

“We also looked inward, examining how we teach, how we support and how we facilitate industry mentoring our students at Lindner,” said Slezak. “We immediately realized that we needed to listen and get feedback from our students about what they feel they need from us as an educational institution — how we could be more responsive to them.”  

A new women in finance course, taught by Weathers, borrows from many aspects of Sojka’s women in sales, including guest speakers, networking and discussions of how women’s experiences in finance differ from their peers. Weathers hopes the course also will help fight stereotypes and perceptions of finance as a predominantly male field with a strict career path and introduce the breadth of work available in the finance industry.  

In fall 2022, Sojka helped organize the Women in Finance Summit with the Johnson Investment Institute, for students to network and learn from those currently working on Wall Street — a sector of the finance industry with particularly significant gender disparities. The event returns this week and brings together students and industry leaders to network, brainstorm and strategize about long-term support systems that can be implemented at Lindner to elevate women pursuing careers in finance. The event will take place on Thursday, Nov. 16, from 6-8 p.m. in Lindner Hall. 

Featured image at top: Left to right: Carol Lupo, first vice president; Robyn M. Geiss, MBA, vice president and financial adviser; Lynne Frankel, client associate; and Colleen Geiss, certified financial planner, vice president and financial adviser — all of The Princeton Group — engage in a panel discussion with students at the 2022 Women in Finance Summit. Photo/Joseph Fuqua II.