PROFESSIONAL WOMEN’S NETWORK ROMANIA GALA DINNER, Bucharest, 22nd November 2016

PWN Romania, the strongest women’s professional network in Romania, hosted last night the Professional Women's Network Romania Gala Dinner, celebrating the 5th anniversary since its establishment and honoring distinguished personalities who have supported the association.

PWN Romania is part of PWN Global, a worldwide organization whose mission is to sustain the professional growth of the women and their advancement in leadership since PWN strongly believes that gender balance in leadership and management leads to better decision making, economic sustainability, and a better society. 

Professional Women’s Network Romania Gala Dinner brought together over 130 participants, including PWN Romania’s members, C-level representatives of companies that share and support PWN Romania’s values, government representatives, ambassadors, opinion leaders, and press.

The Gala Dinner celebrated the Honorary Members of PWN Romania who have provided their support for the accomplishment of the mission and the efforts of the association, namely: Elisabetta Capannelli, Country Manager, World Bank; HE Angela Cristea, Ambassador, Head of Representation of European Commission; Dr. Elena Doldor, Lecturer and Researcher, Queen Mary University of London; HE Anneli Lindahl-Kenny, Ambassador of Sweden; Ana Maria Mihaescu, Regional Manager, IFC; HE Thenjiwe Mtintso, Ambassador of South Africa; Princess Marina Sturdza.

During the PWN Romania’s Gala, Lavinia Rască, Professor at ASEBUSS Business School, Founding Member and former PWN Romania President as well as  Sorana Baciu, State Secretary for the Romanian Government, former PWN Romania President and Board Member of PWN Global, were honored due to their continuous efforts and contribution to the development of the association.

Professional Women’s Network Romania Gala Dinner also celebrated the gentlemen who have supported the association and its mission and giving the honorary title of “Menbassadors” to: 

HE Paul Brummell, HM Ambassador to Romania; Gilles Clavie, President and CEO of Orbis Hotel Group; Sergiu Negut, Associate Dean of Entrepreneurial Growth Maastricht School of Management Romania; Sergiu Oprescu, President of the Romanian Banking Association; Laurent Picheral, Member of AccorHotels Executive Committee, CEO HotelServices Central & Eastern Europe; and Ismail Radwan, Lead Public Sector Specialist, World Bank; Ludwik Sobolewski, CEO of the Bucharest Stock Exchange.

Within the Gala Dinner, PWN Romania and Deloitte Romania, as research partner, jointly released the results of the study entitled ”Women on Boards in Romania”, the first of its kind developed locally. 

“Gender balance in the boardrooms brings certain balance and benefits, and underlining these facts was the main reason for our study. When we started to work on it, one year ago, we decided to give Romanian companies the motivation to support women’s professional ascension”, Adriana Lobda, Deloitte Partner, stated.  Oana Petrescu, Partner-in-Charge, Deloitte Consulting, completed: “Our study represents a Romanian reality Xray: besides statistical information, we included quotes from key women business leaders as well as our recommendations which aim to address the gender balance problems that exist on corporate boards”.

”Professional Women’s Network Romania Gala Dinner was a very important milestone for us, the members of this association. It has shown us that we can build together long term strategies and partnerships that can support us in the journey to make balanced leadership our new reality. I have many special thanks for all our partners, for our friends, and for our members, a special and strong community that can drive this change”, Virginia Oțel, Professional Women’s Network Romania President, declared. 

Professional Women’s Network Romania Gala Dinner was powered by Women at AccorHotels Generation (WAAG) and Orbis Group, as strategic partners. Laurent Picheral, Member of AccorHotels Executive Committee, CEO HotelServices Central & Eastern Europe, declared: “Women are an extremely important factor of the travel industry as a valuable customer, being an actor of growth, as well as an important part of our teams. At AccorHotels we have over 240,000 employees in 95 countries worldwide and around half of them are women. Gender equality is at the heart of our Talent & Culture inclusive strategy and our own women network - WAAG, remains a great asset and platform that strongly contributes to our achievements in the field of diversity. I’m convinced that we have the resources and capacity to bring about real change in women professional advancement in Eastern Europe.” At the same time, Gilles Clavie, President and CEO of Orbis Hotel Group, stated: “I see tangible impacts of promoting diversity in every team - women give different perspectives and contribute to the enlargement of any analysis. From my experience, mixed teams simply work better, having a better performance and delivering a lot more of innovation and creativeness. Orbis Hotel Group is committed with clear signals in favor of women - 40% of our hotel General Managers are women.”

About PWN Global & PWN Romania

PWN Global is a non-governmental federation consisting of associations with headquarters currently in 29 cities around the world, that have in total more than 4,000 members, 90 nationalities, and in a continuous expansion at the international level. The Romanian association was established in October 2011, being a local chapter of PWN Global. It is a volunteer-based organization, non-for-profit, non-governmental, with more than 180 members, women senior executives and entrepreneurs, in more than 20 industries. PWN Romania’s mission is to advance women in leadership. Its values are courage, respect, collaborative intelligence, gratitude, excellence, talent, advancement.  The main pillars of PWN Romania are mentoring, women on boards, and entrepreneurship. More information about PWN Global and PWN Romania may be found at www.pwnglobal.net & www.pwnromania.net..

About Accor Hotels and Orbis Group

AccorHotels is the world-leading travel & lifestyle group welcoming over 50 million women each year in its more than 4.000 hotels around the globe. Managing diversity is an important element of competitive advantage for AccorHotels globally as well as for its strategic partner in Eastern Europe, Orbis Hotel Group, the largest network of hotels in Poland and in Eastern Europe, the sole licensor of all AccorHotels brands in the region. The Group has launched its own corporate women network, called Women At AccorHotels Generation (WAAG). WAAG aims to overcome gender stereotypes, promote gender equality within the Group and to give women confidence in their potential offering mentoring programs, trainings and awareness initiatives. WAAG comprises more than 4.400 members globally both men and women, having a very active and developing network with more than 200 members across Eastern Europe. 

Press contact:

Mona Opran, VP Marketing & Communication, marketing@pwnromania.net