The 7th annual Women in Leadership conference will be taking place on March 3, 2020. To celebrate its 7th year involved with the conference, CCI would like to highlight 7 women that have been with the conference since the start. In today’s feature, meet PR alumna Jessica Clark.
Jessica Clark, PMP® is the CEO and Chief Creative Strategist of Skye Creative Marketing, a creative company focused on providing branding and public outreach services to mission-based clients. During her career, Jessica’s work has included rebranding the Florida Department of Veterans’ Affairs, developing and marketing a national abuse prevention education in-school curriculum, and creating and marketing outreach products and campaigns for Florida state departments, NGOs, associations, education organizations and start-ups.
We asked Jessica what leadership means to her.
1) Why is leadership important?
A leader isn’t something you choose to be, rather it’s something that your “followers” gift you with. Leadership is important because it means there is something valuable and desirable about you and it’s a leader’s responsibility to share it and help someone else. It’s the ultimate gift-giving role.
2) What advice would you give to your younger self?
“Have fun a little bit more!” This advice is for all of my fellow, Type-A personalities. What I’ve learned since leaving college is that networking and growth isn’t limited to the classroom, rather it’s earned through time spent with people who have the same goal, or meet a challenge together, or build an idea into a reality – all of which come from a shared glass of wine (or beer), a board game and a few good laughs with others.
3) What challenges do you face as a female leader and how do you overcome them?
I actually feel it would be a bit of a farce for me to say I’ve “faced challenges” as a female leader when I look at the many women who charted the path before me so that I could have leadership opportunities. This doesn’t mean I haven’t had times when there was a voice of imposter syndrome in my mind while taking on a new contract or work situations that weren’t healthy or put me down simply because I was a female, but most times I try and see these small challenges as something I need to navigate to get to what I really want. I’ve seen the most perception gaps about women and men from the older generation of men I’ve worked with, but not from men and women around my own age – things are in fact changing. Some of my best clients, vendors, business partners, etc. have been incredibly supportive men who have believed more in my skill than I even have (cheers to my brewery colleagues!), but there is still farther to go.
All of this to say, challenges can be relative to the person experiencing them, so try and attack them with the idea that you aren’t alone (someone else likely has been in the same situation or had it worse) and this is a momentary set-back, even if it doesn’t always feel that way. Because if you focus on the difficulty and not on the positive outcome, you won’t overcome it.
4) Name one way women can support one another.
Realizing that we are a team of women who have to work together in this larger effort to see real change and success in the workplace, life, etc. Any small moment when I don’t acknowledge a female colleague in a meeting, or lift up another woman in front of someone else, or I have a poor attitude in a professional setting means that there is just one more crack or bit of erosion in this worldwide ladder we as women are weaving together for equality. We’ve got to be humble enough to know that success or failure in our own lives is still affecting a larger dialogue about women, and use that understanding to propel us to get up the next day with a bit more grace and forgiveness for ourselves and other women. Honestly, let’s just give each other a chance or opportunity to succeed at something – women do rise to the occasion, you know!
5) What is a goal of yours for 2020?
My goal for 2020 is to navigate this transition of career woman to career woman + motherhood, while not losing myself. I love leading my two companies and charting our future growth, and being involved with my church and friends, but I know this new part of life will change me in ways that will be hard and wonderful all at the same time. Basically, I want to survive (and thrive)!
Join us for the Women in Leadership Conference on today at the Turnbull Conference Center from 3:30-8:15 pm. You can hear Jessica speak at the “Investing in YOU and Leading others: Leadership in Communication” workshop from 4:45 – 5:45 pm. Register for FREE here.