Thunderbird School of Global Management and other partners took a market-driven approach to enhancing women-owned businesses in global supply chains, by announcing a Commitment to Action on September 24, 2013 at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Annual Meeting in New York City, which was broadcast live at Thunderbird’s Auditorium 3. The Commitment to Action is an initiative to track and calculate US$1.5 billion in global contract opportunities for women-owned enterprises outside of the U.S., and also create an effective method to recognize and scale high growth women-owned businesses. On campus, the event was moderated by Dr. Amanda Bullough, Assistant Professor of Global Entrepreneurship and was intended to provide T-birds a way to listen to global leaders sharing their innovative solutions to global issues.
The “Commitment to Action” partners joining Thunderbird are WEConnect International and Vital Voices include corporate, government, non-profit and other institutions like, Accenture LLP, The Boeing Company, Cherie Blair Foundation for Women, The Coca-Cola Company, DLA Piper, EY, Exxon Mobil Corporation, Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc., Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women, IBM, Intel Corporation, The International Center for Research on Women, IBM, Johnson Controls Inc., Marriott International Inc., McLarty Global Fellows, Pfizer Inc., The Rockefeller Foundation, The Royal Bank of Scotland plc, The U.S. Department of State, and Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
The Clinton Global Initiative, was formed by President Clinton in 2005, coincidentally the same year Thunderbird commenced Thunderbird for Good! Thunderbird’s social impact initiative, Thunderbird for Good focuses on educating businesswomen in developing countries and has aided in providing business training to more than 89,000 women in 25 countries since 2005. Kellie Kreiser ’04, who is also the Director of Thunderbird for Good said, “We are proud to be a part of this commitment. Thunderbird’s mission is to create sustainable prosperity worldwide. We work to achieve that mission by educating the students in our degree programs and sending them out to work all over the globe, but also by reaching across borders and providing women with little resources the tools they need to make their dreams of owning a successful business and providing for their families a reality.”