Bozeman Daily Chronicle, September 11, 2007

TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS

Nominees for one of Gallatin County’s most prestigious prizes for business and professional women find that the top doesn’t have to be lonely

>>Nicole Rosenleaf Ritter is the managing editor of Business to Business and a frequent contributor to Balance.

B Y N I C O L E R O S E N L E A F R I T T E R P H OTO G R A P H Y B Y T H O M A S L E E

FOR the Darlene Siedschlaw ladder, climbing some- corporate
times got pretty literal. As a manager in the newly minted affirmative action compliance programs set up at Northwestern Bell—part of the old AT&T or “Ma Bell” phone monopoly in the 1960s—one of Siedschlaw’s first tasks was to find out why so many women were flunking out of the company’s training program for lineman. To investigate, she asked to take part in the course and found herself soon thereafter climbing the metal stakes driven into the side of a telephone pole.

    “I’m only five foot two, but climbing the pole didn’t seem like it would be a problem at first,” she recalls. “But when I got up about three steps from the top, I froze. It dawned on me that because of my height, I was really spread out on those steps.

    “Up until just a short time before, there had been men’s jobs at the telephone company and women’s jobs at the telephone company,” Siedschlaw, who had indeed begun her career with the phone company in a typical women’s position as an operator, adds.

    As a result, the poles’ stakes had been designed to best accommodate someone half a foot taller than Siedschlaw—the average, five-foot-eight man expected to perform lineman’s duties.

    “That explained why the women were having some problems!” she says.

    But Siedschlaw, a native of the tiny northwestern Montana town of Wolf Point, continued to climb, ultimately becoming the executive director for diversity at the Denver corporate offices of US West—one of the companies that emerged from the AT&T breakup. In that capacity, she had responsibility for tackling discrimination through affirmative action, legislation and diversity training and garnered national and international acclaim for her work in the field of diversity. She left the corporate world in 1995, moving back to Montana and founding her own management consulting business, DWS & Associates.

    This year, Siedschlaw joined District Court Judge Holly Brown and Belgrade Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Debra K. Youngberg as nominees for the Bozeman Business and Professional Women (BPW) 2007 Women of Achievement award.

    According to the BPW, the prize recognizes “outstanding contributions within the last five years” as well as the nominees’ work “advancing the public interest in…elevating the standards for women in business and professions; promoting the interest of business and professional women and extending opportunities through education, along the lines of industrial, scientific and vocational activities, including literature and the arts; advancing women’s place in the business and professions by bringing about a spirit of cooperation and by advancing the cause of women through public service.”

    The three nominees boast diverse backgrounds in business, law and management but share the common thread of achieving success in traditionally male-dominated fields. While Brown and Youngberg’s climbs may not have been as literal as Siedschlaw’s occasionally were, all three represent the face of business and professional women in Gallatin County.

    ON RESISTANCE

    District Court Judge Holly Brown went on to win both the Bozeman and the Montana State BPW Woman of Achievement for the year. A native of Wyoming, Brown got her undergraduate degrees in computer science and information systems, and in the 1970s, that meant something very different than it does in today’s world of omnipresent personal computers.

    “I decided to go to law school because I didn’t want to spend my life working on computers in basements. At that time, we didn’t have the microchip yet, so all the work had to be done on these huge systems,” she says with a laugh, adding, “It wasn’t that long ago !”

    Law appealed to her because of its challenge and flexibility, and she chose Vanderbilt University in Tennessee for law school. After getting her J.D., she worked in Tennessee and Wyoming before moving to Montana in the mid-1980s.Wyoming was in the midst of a massive slump, and Bozeman’s economy was a little better. She found a great place to live and practice law—and few barriers for ambitious women. In March 2004, she was appointed to the bench as District Judge—the first woman in Gallatin County to serve in the role—and was then elected to the post in the November 2004 election. Two years later, she won a full six-year term.

    “I never found, in my personal experience, any resistance to acceptance,” Brown says of her career in Bozeman. “I think that’s one of the benefits of the West in general. If you’re willing to do the work, then you will be

accepted. Gender has not been an issue in that regard.”

    For the Belgrade Chamber of Commerce’s Debra Youngberg the issue of gender did arise, primarily after her return to the workforce. She had spent 10 years as a stay-at-home mother and daycare provider before joining the Chamber as a secretary 21 years ago.

    “It was hard,” she admits, remembering her return to working outside the home. “People were dismissive at first, especially when I was ‘just’ the office secretary. I would make calls and do things and people would say, ‘Have your president call me.’”

    Youngberg battled back by continuing her professional education—and demanding better billing.

    “After a few years, I asked if I could have the title of office manager, because people seemed not to take me seriously or pay attention to me as the office secretary,” she explains.

    Later, she went to the Institute of Organization Management an educational program sponsored by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce designed for association, Chamber, and non-profit executives. After graduating, she took on the title of executive director.

    “A lot of people want to know how I could stay in one job for 21 years, but this job is not the same,” Youngberg explains “Every five years I get a new job because the Chamber has grown and changed so much to fit Belgrade.”

    ASK A BUSY PERSON

    One thing that hasn’t changed for any of these Women of Achievement is their commitment to community service. While leading busy professional lives, each finds the time to serve in her own way—and set an example for service.

    For Siedschlaw—who has served as BPW state president the president of the Montana Center for International Visitors, and the president of the Bozeman chapter of the League of Women Voters, not to mention serving on boards of many stripes—promoting an informed citizenry and fostering cooperation, especially among women, have always been important.

    “I think we need to continue to address issues and continue to be involved, as well as support each other, in order for us to continue to make progress,” she notes.

    Siedschlaw’s fellow nominees say much the same.

    “I think people need to make a good-faith effort to be informed and involved,” asserts Brown, who has served on boards for organizations including the Bozeman Public Library

TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS

and the Museum of the Rockies, as well as chairing the Family Justice Coordinating Council. Youngberg—a longtime supporter of the Jaycees as well as Belgrade’s public schools and parks—is blunter: “It just takes a few hours. If people want to see things done, they can’t just sit in their chairs and complain. You have to get up and do it. People say that they don’t have time. Well, I don’t have time either, but I make time.” “If you want something done, ask a busy person to do it,” legendary comedienne Lucille Ball is credited with saying. Brown, Youngberg and Siedschlaw—in their own ways and with their own talents—all embody Ball’s conclusion that the more things a person does, the more she can do.
 

 

                                                  

                                                                                           

Bozeman BPW is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization devoted to achieving equity for all women in the workplace through advocacy, education and information.