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WISE Conference achieves objective of making attendees a lot wiser

By: J. Werner
| Published 10/15/2014

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THE WOODLANDS, Texas -- The women organizations of The Woodlands met Wednesday, October 15, for the benefit of helping themselves, helping each other, and helping some essential causes, at the 2nd Annual WISE Conference, an acronym for ‘Women Inspiring Supporting Empowering.’

The three women’s organizations...the Business Women’s Forum, the Montgomery County Association of Business Women (MCABW), and the WOAMTEC (Women on a Mission to Earn a Commission) chapters of Cypress, Conroe, Magnolia, Spring, and The Woodlands, were instrumental in filling the ballroom at The Woodlands Resort & Conference Center, with 400 in attendance.

“The best way to help women is to bring authoritative resources together to share their knowledge,” said Carol Gooch, the founder and Executive Director of the MCABW.

The conference was Gooch’s idea last year, to provide women with information and tools to grow their careers and their businesses.

“We originally did a Ladies Night Out event to raise money for our philanthropic causes, but our members kept saying they wanted information and tools to grow their businesses, so we combined an educational conference with a fundraiser to accomplish this,” said Gooch. “The MCABW’s motto is ‘Women Helping Women,’ so we figured we better help them out, so we came up with the idea of the WISE Conference.”

Partnering with the Business Women’s Forum and the five WOAMTEC chapters in the surrounding area, was a wise idea. The WISE Conference committee is comprised of members from these organizations to ensure that their respective objectives or met. In truth, most are members of two, and in some cases, all three organizations, which all belong to the Montgomery County Women’s Council of Organizations. In a county where several municipalities are in close proximity to each other, it’s just wise to be affiliated with all the resources at your disposal for the purpose of marketing your business.

Organizing the conference for the second year was the owner and Director of Events, Glenda Minshew, of Plan Ahead Events - The Woodlands. Minshew assembled a marquee of influential speakers who not only shared their success stories, but the methodologies they used to achieve success.

Special guest was the Honorable Kevin Brady, U.S. House Representative of the 8th District of Texas. Congressman Brady addressed the congregation and underscored the importance of women's contributions to business and the community.

This year's emcee for the event was FOX 26 Anchor and Traffic Reporter, Michelle Merhar, who introduced this year's speakers:

Keynote speaker, Dani Johnson, is the female equivalent to Tony Robbins, transforming lives with a somber story and a powerful message, which she has detailed in books, and shared throughout the country in conferences and on almost every talk show.

Other featured speakers included:

-Jessica Fraser, the CEO of Digital Texas, the parent company of Woodlands Online

-Dr. Pamela Schlembach, Associate Professor in the Department of Radiology at MD Anderson Cancer Center

-Monette Smith, Owner, PR Marketing & Publishing, LLC /reviewit Magazine & Vida Social

-Justina Vail, owner of Justina Vail Coaching, Actors, Life Coachingm and co-owner of RGL Executive Coach Training

Benefactors for this year’s conference include the Montgomery County Emergency Assistance, a non-profit that assists families in times of crisis, and Dress For Success, also a non-profit, that helps prepare disadvantaged women for the job market.

The conference takes place in October when the community is focused on women’s health, in particular, breast cancer. Although next year’s date is not yet scheduled, Woodlands Online will have the event posted on its online calendar as soon as next year’s date has been set, and will notify the community via the social media outlets.

In addition to lunch, door prizes, tote bags with literature and promotional items, those in attendance also left the conference a whole lot wiser.

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