Molly Eyerman will be making her first trip to Austin this March to speak about sexism in the workplace. Her panel discussion “See it, Heat it, Stop it: Fighting Sexism at Work” is not only one of our top 5 recommendations for gender in the workplace but also a panel that should not be missed. While the topic is trending and the discussions are changing the direction of sexism, it is imperative to be in the know on how to recognize it when it is happening.

Now in its second year of business, Molly started her own HR and talent development company, Vivio. She spends her time partnering with entrepreneurial, fast-growing companies and helps them to truly develop a strong HR and talent management division. As the conversations continue to evolve around sexism, Molly knows exactly what it takes to stop it and re-direct biased thinking.

What led you to pursue a career in talent management after spending time in accounting and corporate finance?

I get this question a lot because I went from one end of the spectrum to the other! Even though I started my career focused on “the numbers,” I was always involved with “people” initiatives: employee engagement, campus recruiting, etc. After leading the charge to build the campus recruiting and internship program at DSW – while I was still technically a Finance staff person – I realized that the people initiatives were more interesting to me than working in spreadsheets every day and that I needed to change career directions. I made the switch to about 5 years ago and started my own HR consulting and talent management business 2 years ago. I love working with different client teams every day, and our clients – who are also small business owners – like the fact that I have a non-traditional HR background that is more focused on the overall business.

Was there anything specific in your life that inspired you to speak on sexism in the workplace?

One of the other panel speakers, Annie Hardy, and I connected one day in June after the Arianna Huffington board issue at Uber (the first half of 2017 was really crazy at Uber!). We were incredulous that a woman as successful, powerful, and well-respected as Arianna Huffington was quoted as only saying “Oh, David” followed by an uncomfortable laugh, after her fellow board member made a sexist remark that was captured in the board minutes. We thought: if Arianna Huffington didn’t even feel comfortable in that moment to speak up – if all she could muster was an uncomfortable laugh – how must other women feel every day? We decided a few weeks later to submit a panel picker proposal to SXSW…although we were not sure that this would still be such a hot topic in the media 9 months later. Unfortunately, the sexism and sexual harassment issues continue to be in the spotlight, and this is still very top of mind for everyone.

Have you spoken with companies and businesses on this topic before and if so, what was the best feedback you received?

Yes! I did a podcast for Slings + Arrows last year after Susan Fowler’s expose blog post (Uber) in February/March. Annie Hardy and I spoke at the national Women in Digital conference in October, although the content was slightly different because our audience was all female, I have enjoyed seeing the “aha” moment when people realize a) this is a super gray area, b) it’s not going away, and c) they can help fight it.

What do you hope people will gain after listening to this session?

Our hope is that women and men will feel more empowered to fight sexism in the workplace, whether they experience it, or they see it happening to others. Even in 2018, there is still so much sexism that regularly occurs in the workplace, and the saddest thing is that much of it exists inherently in workplace cultures.

Saturday, March 10th

12:30pm – 1:30pm

Fairmont – Room A