iradiophilly | Culture - Abby Wambach, Celeste Headlee, and James Clear at PA Conference for Women's 2nd Workplace Summit

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Abby Wambach, Celeste Headlee, and James Clear at PA Conference for Women's 2nd Workplace Summit

by: iradioal - Philadelphia, PA
started: 10/01/19 9:31 pm | updated: 10/01/19 9:31 pm

The Pennsylvania Conference For Women's 2nd annual Workplace Summit was held on Tuesday, October 1st, 2019, at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia. Over 1,000 people attended today's event which focused on topics including having better conversations, changing habits, and teamwork. The 16th annual PA Conference of Woman will take place on Wednesday and expects over 10,000 attendees. Today's event featured three keynote speakers: journalist Celeste Headlee, author James Clear, and soccer star Abby Wambach.

Celeste Headlee spoke about how to have better conversations. She began by saying that we need start having actual conversations. She suggested that we stop texting, messaging, and e-mailing and actually pick up the phone or meet face-to-face to have a discussion. Headlee explained that humans benefit just by having conversations and that empathy gets lost in the transcription to those other communication means. Once you are having an actual conversation she suggests that you give it your full attention, ask open ended questions, listen, don't lecture, don't be afraid to say 'I don't know', don't equate your experience with theirs, don't repeat yourself, leave out the details, and be brief.

James Clear spoke about how to make positive changes in your life by creating habits. He presented the Kaizen approach to self improvement. Kaizen is Japanese for continuous improvement. Each day, simply focus on improving by 1%. It will come slowly, but after time that improvement will be compounded enough to see great change. The focus is on the practice of daily change rather than the change itself. Clear talked about how to create new positive habits in life. He described four parts to a habit (Cue, Craving, Response, Reward). You can create a new habit by changing the visibility of the Cue (ie. putting floss next to the toothpaste). You can also stack a new habit with an existing one (ie. add morning meditation after coffee).

Abby Wambach, Olympic gold medalist and World Cup winner, took the stage for the third session. She is an advocate for women's equality and is outspoken in favor of equal pay for women in the workplace. She spoke briefly towards the end about the US Women's National Team and their fight for equal pay. The majority of her speech focused on her experiences growing up with the team through retirement to now. No matter the individual accomplishments Wambach has had, she acknowledges that she couldn't have done them without other people. She also says that even though all the members of the USWNT might not be the same or believe in the same things, they were able to win together because they learned to overcome those differences and play together. She talked about the importance of every position on the team from the goal scorer to the bench. Her book, "WOLFPACK," is about finding your own team and your important role.

"Everything you want to know about a team happens after a goal is scored. I have never scored a single goal in my life without my teammates. Not one," she said of the U.S. Women's National Soccer TeamÂ on which she played. "We genuinely were happy for each other when somebody else succeeded. We weren't competing against each other. We were competing with each other," Wambach said.

The nonpartisan, nonprofit conference is part of the largest network of women's conferences in the country, attracting an estimated 50,000 women a year in Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Texas and California. In recent years, it has become one of the nation's top forums for women focused on professional and personal development. To learn more about the Pennsylvania Conference for Women, visit our website at www.paconferenceforwomen.org.