November 11, 2021
Harriet Harriss RIBA, ARB, Assoc. AIA, Ph.D., PFHEA, FRSA
Dr. Harriet Harriss is a qualified architect and Dean of the Pratt School of Architecture in Brooklyn, New York. Prior to this, she led the Architecture Research Programs at the Royal College of Art in London. Her teaching, research, and writing focus on pioneering new pedagogic models for design education, and for widening participation in architecture to ensure it remains as diverse as the society it seeks to serve. Dean Harriss has won various awards including a Brookes Teaching Fellowship, a Higher Education Academy Internationalisation Award, a Churchill Fellowship, two Santander Fellowships, two Diawa awards, and a NESTA (National Endowment for Science Technology and Art) Pioneer Award. Dean Harriss was awarded a Clore Fellowship for cultural leadership (2016-17) and elected to the European Association of Architectural Education Council in summer 2017. Dean Harriss' public consultancy roles include writing national construction curriculum for the UK government's Department for Education and international program validations and pedagogy design and development internationally. Across both academe and industry, Dean Harriss has spoken across a range of media channels (from the BBC to TEDx) on the wider issues facing the built environment, is a recognized advocate for design education and was nominated by Dezeen as a champion for women in architecture and design in 2019.
Leading Beyond Biased Paradigms
“Whoever has the power takes over the noun – and the norm – whilst the less powerful get the adjective.” Gloria Steinem
In the same way that Corbusier insisted that Modolor Man represented the metric standard against which all architecture could be determined, and all users served equally, pervasive concepts of leadership within both architecture and academe position cis white male conservatives as the standard by which all leaders - independent of their gender, color, identity, and context - are measured and judged. Consequently, this biased, paradigmatic default serves to automatically disadvantage difference and perpetuates an ongoing lack of diverse leadership, and in doing so, stymies the chance to see progressive change in how practices, departments, and schools of architecture are structured, organized, and led.
Subsequently, this seminar/workshop will highlight some of the obstacles women face in securing and sustaining leadership positions, with reference to the ways in which women are complicit in or contribute toward their lack of representation through women-on-women competition (Tracy, 1991): notions of ‘feminine' leadership (Jablonski, 2000, p.245) forms of ‘post-heroic’ leadership (Fletcher, 2003), the specter of leadership androgyneity (Jagacinksi, 1987; Lemkau, 1983), the debilitating influence of ‘gender-blind’ (but largely male-authored) organizational theories (Hearn and Parkin, 1983), and whether it really is feasible for women to use their ‘marginality as a tool’ for professional progress (Groat & Ahrentzen, 1997), or, whether paradigms for facilitating, sustaining and measuring the success of women's leadership needs radical new tactics altogether.
Kathy Gallo Founder, CEO & Executive Coach
Kathy Gallo is Founder and CEO of Goodstone Group LLC, a global network of executive coaches working with leaders, teams, and Boards. Kathy’s coaching of senior leaders includes several Board-directed succession assignments. She also consults on retaining and advancing women. Kathy holds leadership roles on two non-profit Boards and invests in and advises a for-profit startup in the energy sector.
Previously, Kathy was an SVP for Fannie Mae, where she led a transformation of the Human Resource function and partnered closely with the Board on culture, executive assessments and compensation, and on C-level succession planning. Kathy was a Partner with McKinsey & Company where she worked for sixteen years, leading global programs to help recruit, develop, excite, and retain 12,000 consultants operating in 44 countries.
Kathy holds a B.S.E.E. from Virginia Tech, an M.B.A. from Marymount University of Virginia, and a certificate in Leadership Coaching from Georgetown University.
Getting the Feedback You Need to Succeed
Battles to identify and remove biases rage on - in hiring, in assessments, and in promotion and rewards. Meanwhile, learning to obtain candid, timely, and usable feedback can help you be more successful in your current job in spite of biases. Quality feedback can also help you demonstrate readiness for the next role and can improve your ability to decide if it’s time to find a new job, elsewhere. In her work with highly successful female leaders in roles up to and including Managing Partner and CEO, Kathy has found clear evidence that women leaders receive less feedback, and less useful feedback. In this session, Kathy will share techniques she’s learned from 17 years as an executive coach who begins most engagements by seeking and decoding colleagues’ feedback on her coaching clients. She’ll share two mini cases to illustrate the power of “the whisper”, and then she’ll share tips and techniques to get the feedback that you may not be getting.