Oakland University’s Women in Leadership class hosted three panels talking about the ways in which women have become leaders within the workplace. The panel held on Nov. 20 was centered around women working with non-profit organizations.

Beth Morrison, president and CEO of HAVEN; Denise Dalrymple, CEO of Girl Scouts of Southern Michigan; and Lori Kitchen, chief philanthropy officer for NEW, were all invited to speak to a crowd of about 20 people about their struggles and successes within their field.

Lisa Tillman, an Oakland University student who was part of the five member team that put on this specific panel, said that they had significantly more people in attendance for the Friday panel, than the Monday and Wednesday panels.

“This is really exciting to see,” she said.

Women in NPOs

Not all of the women in the panel began their careers believing that they would one day work with non-profit organizations.

“I was interested in politics, and didn’t think of NPOs as an avenue for a career,” Kitchen said, “I was working in DC, when a colleague asked if I loved being a bureaucrat. I didn’t, and came back to Michigan, where I decided I wanted to get more involved on a local level.”

Morrison, however, landed her first post-undergraduate job working for a non-profit.

“I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do,” she said, “But I knew I wanted to save the world.”

All of the women in the panel laughed when asked about their typical day, all three responded that there really was no typical day working for a non-profit.

“Some days I’m on call 24/7,” Morrison said. Dalrymple agreed with her, stating that she never had a typical nine-to-five job in her life.

Challenges Because of Gender

All of the women in the panel laughed again when asked about the challenges thanks to their gender, and commented how they knew this question would be coming soon.

“The larger the NPO, the more likely a man is to be in charge,” Morrison said.

“People assume women can’t handle financial stuff,” Dalrymple said.

Kitchen herself had a very strong reaction to learning about challenges women faced in the workplace. Her mother, who was an engineer, never shared with her the hardships of being a woman in a male dominated field.

“Eventually my mom steered away from the corporate world and went to teaching CAD to a classroom filled with mostly boys,” she said. “For a long time she was the only female in the state teaching these classes.”