A peek into what change the Forte Foundation is implementing [Show Summary]

In honor of Admissions Straight Talk’s 10th anniversary episode, our first ever guest is back. Elissa Sangster is the CEO of the Forte Foundation which is at the forefront of increasing female representation in the business world - from the classroom to the workforce. 

Interview with Elissa Sangster, CEO of the Forte Foundation [Show Notes]

Thanks for joining me for the 463rd episode of Admissions Straight Talk. I love hosting Admissions Straight Talk because of the fascinating guests I'm privileged to talk to. But today's show is extra special. It marks Admissions Straight Talk’s 10th anniversary. The first show aired on March 29th, 2012, almost exactly 10 years ago. 

So, first I have to thank you, our listeners for tuning in and sharing your valuable time and attention with me and our guests. I also have to thank the guests who share their time, experience, and expertise with you and me during the interview. 

And one of the people I have to give extra thanks to today is our guest Elissa Sangster. Elissa was willing to be Admissions Straight Talk's first guest when there was no track record, no stats to report, no download numbers. Today, I can talk to prospective guests about our 650,000 total downloads, but I couldn't 10 years ago when Elissa first said yes. So thank you again, Elissa. That's why this show is special to me. 

This show should be special to you because of Elissa's critical role as head of the Forte Foundation, which has made enormous strides in increasing women's representation in business school and business through her profound insider's knowledge of the business school and professional world. Elissa earned her MBA at Texas A&M's Mays Business School in 1994, and immediately became the Assistant Director of its MBA program. She moved to UT Austin in 1997, where she served in different roles, including the Assistant Dean and Director of McCombs’ MBA program. In 2004, she became the first Director of Forte Foundation, a consortium of business schools and companies working to increase the number of women in business leadership roles. She's been successfully running and growing Forte Foundation ever since. 

Can you give a background on the Forte Foundation and its growth? [2:47]

Sure, absolutely. We started back in 2001 when there was a research study being done by Catalyst. A lot of business schools and companies were looking at women's advancement into business school and into business leadership positions and corporations and there was grave concern about what was holding women back. So the research came out with a study that we then built into a business plan for an organization. That's really where the launch of Forte began. That was in about 2001, and then in 2002, we held our first event which was a series of MBA forums. We had five of them in 2002 and really continued to grow. I came on board full-time in 2004 as the first full-time employee of the organization. As you said, that's kind of been the history, and here we are today in 2022. We're really excited to see where we go from here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12wKC2JrglE

Can you give an overview of the programs for women in...