SC Women's Leadership Network

Building Racial & Gender Representation from the Ground Up: Through activating geographical and professional Circles networks, creating and encouraging groups at the community level to become informed and involved in civic activities, and connecting women of dissimilar backgrounds with opportunities of interest, SC WIL commits to improving the balance of racial and gender equality at all levels of leadership.

Increase the Collective Influence of Women in Leadership: While we have different political beliefs and live in an era of unprecedented polarization, women have demonstrated the ability to identify common goals, collaborate, and work together on key issues to improve communities. SCWIL is dedicated to increasing relationships, alliances, collaborations and civility to get things done in our State. Women get things done. SCWIL will strengthen their skills and networks to increase impact.

Circles of Women
Circles bring diverse women together across community and partisan lines to discuss common objectives of improving public policy and leadership opportunities. This program targets diverse women (race, religion, economic status, political persuasion) of all ages in nine geographic areas across the state to become more involved in community and state leadership through locally-connected Circle Coordinators. Each Circle provides leadership, encouragement, education, training, and guidance on leadership opportunities in that geographic area and engages participants in Circle training and activities. Future plans include expanding Circles beyond geographic areas to engage college-aged women and specific trade areas such as technology and healthcare.

Governmental Appointments Project
SC WIL is the only coordinated resource offering information about municipal, county and state boards and commissions. We will continue to maintain and expand database of municipal, county and state boards and commissions and increase awareness of available leadership positions, qualifications and how to apply. SC WIL is leading development of the MatchBoard database application for use by municipalities to further coordinate advertisement of and tracking applicants for appointed boards and commissions.

Training
WIL trains South Carolina women to step forward and lead. This training begins at the most basic levels of encouraging soft skills like confidence, self-esteem, and networking, and grows to expertise with hard skills like using technology, managing meetings, and building collaborative plans. Additionally, educating women, in both urban and rural areas on voting and redistricting, matching your qualifications and interests with leadership opportunities and building the confidence to run for office also working toward engaging more women in community and public service at all levels. Despite the hardships the pandemic has presented for WIL, the widespread adoption of online and virtual resources has afforded us the unique opportunity to extend the reach of WIL’s services to women from any connected location who previously would not have been able to participate in person due to constraints of time and location.

We are the only multi-partisan organization working to prepare women to fill pipelines in SC–elected, appointed, and supporting. Our Board of Directors and staff team share decades of experience preparing women for leadership including public policy and politics. We are the only organization that has successfully built and maintained a database of hundreds of available city, county, and state appointed positions on boards and commissions through one portal on our website. By creating alliances with organizations that share the commitment to diversity and women in leadership, we expand the reach of resources. Those allied organizations include AARP, AAUW, All in Together, Black Women 2020, CVSC, EngenuitySC, LWV of SC, Latino Comms Development, Republican Women’s Club, SC Chamber, Sexual Trauma Services, and WREN.

WIL was officially founded in 2015, but did not formally begin operation until April 2019. We marked our first anniversary, just as the pandemic hit, having collected 100 influential women and supportive men as Founders demonstrating their support of our efforts by contributing $1,000 each to help build our infrastructure.

In April 2019, we built and publicly launched, and continue to manage, the only comprehensive database of available positions on municipal, county and state appointed boards and commissions and have presented more than 100 skilled women for the Gubernatorial Appointments Project (GAP) from among the over 300 SC women who have signed up through our portal expressing interest to serve on these boards and commissions. We are the only SC agency funneling opportunities to serve into one web portal while also educating women on how to get involved.

In late 2019 and early 2020, SC WIL hosted physical “Circles of Women” in seven regions across the state. They were well-attended and focused on the Census, redistricting, and building connections. At the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic we were no longer able to engage in person. In order to continue bringing women to the decision-making table, prepare them to use their voices once they have a seat, help women maintain and grow their professional status during the pandemic, and re-enter the workforce following pandemic-related gaps in employment, WIL shifted to offered the following virtual training opportunities in 2020 to teach skills relevant in the “new” economy, reduce barriers to women seeking leadership positions, including identifying their strengths and how to use them, networking, public speaking, self-advocacy and more.

Virtual training programs offered to date include:

Be a Virtual Boss -Expert panelists discussed best practices for organizations to have effective virtual meetings.

SpringBoard - Four-part virtual conference about service on local, state, and non-profit boards and commissions.

Pathways to Power - Two- part workshop to help women develop and implement a personal plan to activate their leadership.

Zoom 101: Tech & Techniques for Raising the Bar on Virtual Presentations - Improve your professional image and technical prowess during the new normal of conducting virtual work meetings.

Virtual Book Club - Monthly interactive discussion on topics related to women in leadership and public service.

In 18 months of operation, WIL has engaged an audience of approximately 60,000 participants across the state, communicating with them via electronic newsletters and social media in compliment to in-person and virtual training and networking.