FeMale Leaders

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Baker McKenzie Switzerland has joined the Europe-wide Baker McKenzie campaign "FeMale Leaders" in 2024 and recently held its first event under the new name.

We had a discussion with female leaders about new beginnings, and we were delighted to welcome Manuela Leonhard, who, after an unusual career path, started a social media career at age 50. Manuela has always followed her own path and done things differently: from being a mother of four to being a flight attendant, to working as the mayor of Zurich's assistant, to now becoming a social media star. We spoke with Manuela about why she built her career "anti-cyclically" and where she found the strength for change. Of course, we also wanted to get some tips from her on reorientation and success on social media.

Power networking with “FeMale Leaders”: Again a successful event full of inspiration. On 5th December 2023 around 140 women attended the “FeMale Leaders Christmas Market” and enjoyed the Christmas atmosphere at the roof terrace of the Ruby Louise Hotel Frankfurt. 

The aim of our “FeMale Leaders” event series is to steadily increase the ratio of female executives in the business world. Our Baker McKenzie Germany partners Katharina Stueber and Katja Haeferer have brought together fantastic women for this high-calibre networking event. Anna Hinrichsen held an inspiring keynote speech "Start-up myths in check - experiences of courage and reality". The discussions between those female role models from business and media sector and our Baker McKenzie colleagues were pure joy!

FeMale Leaders at the Frankfurt Goethe-Haus | „Can we save the world with AI?“, 12 July 2023

The second event in our "FeMale Leaders" series took place on 12 July 2023 at the Goethe-Haus in Frankfurt – it was an extremely successful event, with Katharina Stueber and Katja Haeferer as lead partners.

At the end of last year, in December 2022, Katharina Stueber initially launched the FeMale Leaders initiative with a successful kick-off even with more than 130 female guests. With this ID&E initiative, Baker McKenzie Germany is breaking new ground: FeMale Leaders is primarily intended to address women who are or will be in leadership roles in companies or institutions of interest to our firm.

More than 190 successful and inspiring women took part in the FeMale Leaders event this time. For the first time, male supporters were also involved as "Allies" - true to the motto: "Unleash Our Potential".

With Claudia Schick (TV presenter at Hessischer Rundfunk) as moderator as well as Katharina Stueber and Katja Haeferer, a lively and stimulating discussion on the topic of "Can we save the world with AI?" unfolded in the top-class panel, which this time included Isabelle Adelt (CFO of Fuchs SE), Heike Eckert (Member of the Executive Board of Deutsche Börse), Melanie Kehr (Member of the Executive Board of KfW, CIO and COO) and Christine Lutz (Co-Founder and Managing Director great2know). The evening then continued with a power networking session which, according to the many positive responses, was very well received by all participants.

A great evening - it was pure inspiration and joy! More than 130 successful and inspiring women kicked off Baker McKenzie's FeMale Leaders event series on 13th December 2022 and turned the roof terrace of the Ruby Louise Hotel into a networking hotspot in Frankfurt.

Over mulled wine & co., female role models from business and media met with our colleagues at the FeMale Leaders Christmas Market to exchange ideas and network in a particularly beautiful Christmas atmosphere.