ML22140A246
| ML22140A246 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 03/08/2022 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation |
| To: | |
| References | |
| Download: ML22140A246 (74) | |
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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34TH REGULATORY INFORMATION CONFERENCE (RIC)
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TECHNICAL SESSION - W18
MAKING A GLOBAL IMPACT-WOMEN IN INTERNATIONAL
NUCLEAR POLICY MAKING
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WEDNESDAY,
MARCH 9, 2022
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The Technical Session met via Video-
Teleconference, at 3:00 p.m. EST, Nader Mamish,
Director, Office of International Programs, Nuclear
Regulatory Commission, presiding.
PRESENT:
NADER MAMISH, Director, Office of International
Programs, NRC
STEPHANIE ARCHIE, Administrative Assistant, OEDO/NRC
MARGARET DOANE, Deputy Director General and Head of
Management, International Atomic Energy Agency
LAURA DUDES, Regional Administrator, RII/NRC
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KAMISHAN MARTIN, Human Factors Engineer, Human
Factors Team, Operator Licensing & Human
Factors Branch, Division of Reactor Oversight,
NRR/NRC
ANDREA FERKILE, Director for the Office of
Nonproliferation Policy, National Nuclear
Security Administration, U.S. Department of
Energy
JOYCE CONNERY, Chair, Defense Nuclear Facilities
Safety Board
MOLLY KEEFE-FORSYTH, Safety Culture Program Manager,
Reactor Assessment Branch, Division of Reactor
Oversight, NRR/NRC
JUSTIN VAZQUEZ, Reactor Operations Engineer (Human
Factors), Operator Licensing and Human Factors
Branch, Division of Reactor Oversight, NRR/NRC
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P R O C E E D I N G S
(3:00 p.m.)
MR. MAMISH: Good afternoon.
MS. ARCHIE: Good afternoon, and thank
you for joining us to celebrate the NRC's Women's
History Month event sponsored by the NRC Federal
Women's Program Advisory Committee, FWPAC, and our
Office of International Programs. I am Stephanie
Archie, Chair of FWPAC. And on behalf of our
committee, I would like to extend a warm welcome to
Chairman Hanson, Commissioner Wright, and Deputy
Executive Director Darrell Roberts, all who are in
attendance today.
I would also like to welcome our esteemed
panel who you will be hearing from shortly. This
year's event is a result of the dedicated efforts of
an amazing group of people who have worked hard to
put it together. I want to give a sincere thanks to
our FWPAC members and volunteers, my fellow FWPAC
board members, Vice Chair Molly Keefe Forsyth, and
Secretary Justin Vazquez, and finally to our
executive sponsors, MJ Ross-Lee and Brooke Clark.
I also want to thank the members of the
NRC's Office of International Programs and our Region
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II office who have worked so hard to organize all
aspects of this events, Joanne Savoy, Jennifer
Holzman, and Andrea Jones. I'm so excited about
today's program. Today we'll have the opportunity
to hear some inspiring remarks from an impressive
panel of women.
And you will also have an opportunity to
participate in our annual Equal Employment
Opportunity award presentation ceremony during which
we will present our EEO award to a very deserving
individual. To start the program, I am proud to
introduce Nader Mamish, the Director of NRC's Office
of International Programs, who will provide
introductory remarks and moderate our panel. Nader?
MR. MAMISH: Thank you very much, and
good afternoon, everyone. I'm delighted to be here
with you to chair this panel on making a global
impact, women and international nuclear policymaking.
We have an outstanding panel, and I'm looking forward
to hearing from each of them.
My opening remarks are brief to devote as
much time as possible for our discussion. It's been
demonstrated that including diverse people and
perspectives in policymaking process results in
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stronger, much more effective policy. Diversity
enables policymakers to better anticipate and address
the needs of those wherein their policies can be
impacted.
The NRC is immensely fortunate. They
have talented women at all levels, both within our
own staff and amount the U.S. government colleagues,
women who enrich the agency's domestic and
international work and assist in broader foreign
policy decision initiatives. Today, our panelists
will share experiences that led to change, broaden
international nuclear policymaking, enforced
interesting and dynamic career paths for themselves
and for others.
Throughout the past few years, the NRC
has embarked on efforts to apply transformative
thinking to all aspects of our work, to think outside
the box, and work smarter and more creatively. I'm
very pleased to note that this panel exemplifies
those transformational efforts. This year, we have
combined a traditional RIC panel with the annual
event run by our Federal Women's Program Advisory
Committee in honor of the Women's History Month and
International Women's Day.
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NRC advisory committees play an important
role in helping the NRC meet its diversity and
inclusion goals and enhancing opportunities for
Agency employees. It is an honor for me to be part
of this event where I get to share the good work with
our RIC stakeholders. Before I introduce our
panelists, I want to remind you that if you would
like to ask a question, you can do so using the chat
function. We will address audience questions later
in our program.
It is now my pleasure to introduce Margie
Doane. I'm sure most of you remember Margie from her
time at the NRC where she most recently served as
Executive Director for Operations before leaving the
Agency last year to assume the role of Deputy Director
General for management at the International Atomic
Energy Agency. Margie, we would love it if you would
kick things off and kick our discussion with some
introductory remarks. Margie?
MS. DOANE: Thank you, Nader. Thank
you, OIP. And thank you, FWPAC and all my friends
at NRC and others who are here today. So I'm really
excited about this. I love the topic, and I can't
wait to hear from the panelists and also the questions
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that you have today.
So let me just start out with a few
introductory remarks myself. First of all, it is
important that we are here to talk about this
important topic. For today's discussion, I'm going
to draw from my experience, as Nader said, from both
the NRC and as the current Deputy Director General
and head of Department of Management at the
International Atomic Energy Agency.
Okay. I'm going to say a few words about
policymaking. But if you take anything away from
what I contribute today, it would be my
recommendation for your to join the international
nuclear policy debate. What is this debate and why
would the NRC as a technical agency be involved in
nuclear policy?
Nuclear policy comes in many forms. At
the NRC, policies involving civilian use of nuclear
materials are of significant importance. And I have
spent a great deal of my career cooperating with other
nations to promote nuclear safety.
Importantly, the NRC is one of many U.S.
government agencies involved in the development of
U.S. policy positions. And you're going to hear from
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prominent women in this field that will highlight
other Agency work. It was essential throughout the
time that I was working at the NRC that collaboration
among the U.S. agencies goes smoothly so that when we
entered cooperation with other nations, the U.S.
position was clear and consistently advocated.
NRC as a technical agency has a unique
role to play in developed U.S. nuclear policy because
policy positions are often trained by the underlying
nuclear safety questions. For example, in nuclear
energy, the U.S. has advocated for a measured
approach for international standard setting. That
is commiserate or consistent with the level of
safety.
Other countries' governments have the
policy position that you can never be safe enough.
And safety standards should always strive to keep up
with the latest thinking on how to make the technology
safer. I enjoyed also my time that I spent
cooperating and negotiating nuclear safety principles
and standards with international regulatory
counterparts aimed at reaching consensus on these and
other issues. These are really wonderful times.
Another interesting aspect of NRC's
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policy position is that as an independent agency, the
NRC does not set U.S. foreign policy. That's for the
president and not the U.S. agencies. But NRC is
involved in the development of the policy to ensure
that political views do not inadvertently alter NRC's
technical and scientific conclusions.
For example, when setting policies for
exports, the NRC is often called on to give its views
on its licensing activities, the risks technology,
which uses, et cetera. NRC collaborates with the
U.S. states and licensees to ensure that it is well
aware of the technical issues before giving its final
views. If you are one of the international
participants in the audience today, you've probably
seen these or similar programs in your country
informing your policy positions.
The second point I want to make is about
the importance of having more women voices in the
nuclear policy debate. Why? Because women are half
the population, and any policymaking process that
does not adequately include them is likely to have
blind spots.
This approach does not only elevate the
women's role, but also benefits everybody. This is
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what an increasing body of research is showing.
McKenzie has been writing a series of reports
investigating a business case for diversity, and it
contains some interesting facts.
For example, it showed that greater
representation, the higher the likelihood of
outperformance. Companies with more than 30 percent
women executives were more likely to outperform
companies where this percentage ranged 10 to 30. And
in term, these companies were more likely to
outperform those with even fewer women executives or
not at all.
A substantial differential likelihood of
outperformance, 48 percent, separates the most from
the least gender diverse companies. The research
also showed that diversity winners and adopting
systematic business-led approaches to inclusion in
diversity. It also highlighted areas where companies
should take far bolder action to create a long-
lasting inclusive culture and promote inclusive
behavior.
We're talking about inclusion which is
much more than a percentage of representation. You
would've heard the saying diversity is being invited
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to the party while inclusion is being invited to the
dance, while full inclusion looks more like being in
a position to weigh in on decisions regarding the
music, the date, the theme of the party, really coming
to the dance. This is something that IEA takes very
seriously.
In 2020, the Director General committed
to the goal achieving gender parity in the
professional and higher categories by 2025.
Following this announcement, he adopted special
measures for gender parity. These measures are aimed
at encouraging women to apply for vacancies in the
professional and higher categories, creating
conditions for more balanced representation.
And we're on our way to meeting that
goal. We're there DDGs and for professionals, we're
at 37 percent. To help increase the number of women
in nuclear, we also have started a scholarship for
young women pursuing master's programs in nuclear
related studies at accredited universities.
Upon graduation, selected women are
provided with an opportunity to pursue an internship
facilitated by the IEA for up to 12 months. The name
of this is the Maria Sklodowska-Curie scholarship
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program. And I invite all of you to google it and
especially young women in the audience.
Since then, 210 students of 93 countries
have been selected to participate in this program.
This concludes my introductory comments. And I look
forward to hearing from my fellow panelists and to
take questions. Back to you, Nader.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks so much, Margie.
Now I'd like to turn to Laura Dudes. I think many
of you know Laura as the Administrator of our Region
II office which has had substantial international
engagement as the office overseeing the construction
of the AP1000 units at Vogtle Plant. Laura has been
personally involved in a broad variety of
international cooperation activities throughout her
NRC career. Laura, the floor is yours.
MS. DUDES: Thank you, Nader. And thank
you for setting up this panel. This is probably
going to be the best part of my day. And I thank all
the fellow panelists.
Listening to Margie, Margie, you're
always such an inspiration and you're always hard to
follow too. So I'm going to kind of shift a little
bit on my messaging. I have had quite a bit of
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domestic experience here at the NRC and held several
jobs.
But I've also had several international
interactions. Nader mentioned some of our bilateral
work with the UK, with China. I've had the
opportunity to share a working group on the
regulation of new reactors at NEA.
I have to say that was a real enriching
experience for me. And I think the diversity of that
group, that was actually a working group that I was
the chair of. And the co-chair was a colleague from
Switzerland, and we're both women.
And it was just really an amazing thing
to see in a working group of that many people. But
it was a really rich working group. And we produced
a tremendous amount of guidance for the whole world
to use when you're embarking on a new nuclear program.
And we developed a lot of relationships
and we learned from one another in those
interactions. And it was a really important activity
at the time of the nuclear renaissance. And
thankfully, those documents live on today as people
embark on new programs.
But I do want to leave a message or talk
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a little bit about, well, how did I get into this,
and maybe encourage everyone who's listening. I had
great mentors that kind of brought me into the
international arena, whether it was my first early
interaction as a branch chief to go over on a
bilateral and kind of learn all the different policy
aspects and the bilateral. And then I had inventors
who would invite me to their meetings at the Nuclear
Energy Agency.
And as a young woman, I would look around
and I would think, well, there's not a lot of young
women here. And I was so grateful to my mentors who
thought it was a great opportunity for me to really
learn all of the different aspects of that. So if
there's a takeaway for folks who are listening, be a
mentor.
And if you have these opportunities to
bring young women into the international arena and
early in their career so they get comfortable, they
learn the policy aspects of it. And then they're
going to be fantastic contributors for the remainder
of their career. I think that is one key to success.
So with that, I think I'll stop. I really look
forward to all of the questions that folks have, and
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I thank you for the opportunity.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you for those
perspectives, Laura. I would like to introduce
Kamishan Martin. Kamishan is a human factors
engineer at the NRC. Last year, she returned from a
five-year assignment at the OECD Nuclear Energy
Agency in Paris where she focused on safety culture,
human, and organizational factors, public
communication, and stakeholder involvement regarding
waste management and decommissioning activities.
Kamishan?
MS. MARTIN: Thank you. When you read
out everything like that, it certainly makes me feel
like I did a lot more than I felt I was doing at the
time. But I would like to open up with saying the
environment that we're in and the environment of the
times is very important when you think about not just
gender equality as far as what women can contribute
but also what kind of rich experiences we can have as
women.
And that includes the type of
relationships that we build and the type of inputs
and insights that we may gain. And that starts --
at least for me, it started in my academic career
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starting at a very large institution for my
undergraduate degree and then going to Florida A&M
for my graduate degree and that is definitely a
comparison of different environments. And going from
a traditional American university to an HBCU, the
type of support and the type of diversity in that
type of environment definitely enriched my
experience.
And I was one of those who was recruited
directly from a university to come to the NRC which
had an even different environment for me to
experience. As stated, for about 14 years, I did
work as a technical person in the area of human
factors and safety culture which is important when
you think about that being something that is a softer
science. I do have an engineering background.
But because of that, I was lucky to work
with a lot of just amazing women which is very
different than most of the rulemakings and technical
work that we do at the Agency. I had the opportunity
early on in my specialty to have mentors that we're
just frankly the status quo of men within the Agency
but people who had a social science background and
other women and other colleagues. So I was very
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lucky to have that experience.
Going into the international realm, it
seemed that this only continued my trajectory of
being surrounded by women in that there was a new
division being developed at the NEA where I was, as
you described, for five years. And that division was
headed by a women. And most of my colleagues were
then women.
And then we went to working groups, and
the chairs were women. And I just felt very blessed
to have that experience. And it was comfortable to
be a woman among women -- among other women, excuse
me.
And also to be able to give my insights
as someone who's moved through the world as a Black
woman in these spaces that don't often have different
levels of diversity being a minority group within any
country, having that experience, being able to say
during meetings. Well, we should also look at other
countries and how they do it there and not be so into
what the majority does. And I think that balance of
not just gender equity but diversity and gender
equity together definitely gave different
perspectives in the work that I did at the NEA and
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all those different areas you named as well as giving
me the experience of being heard and having other
people understand the differences.
So I would say everyone should be open to
not just experiencing different environments but open
to how the environment can enrich you. And women
should be encouraged to do that in STEM and in social
sciences as well because they're both important. And
working in the human aspects of nuclear safety,
that's the human side.
And we all have the knowledge of
operatives, the run the facilities. And that's also
quite important. So I would leave my last word with
encouraging everyone to know that they can have an
input and an influence on policy development, even
when it's down in the weeds and you don't think about
it because you're not a leader. But on the totem
pole at the bottom, that's what holds everyone else
up. So every level counts and everybody can have
input. Thank you.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Kamishan. Now
let me turn to Andrea Ferkile. Dre currently serves
as the Director of the Office of Nonproliferation
Policy in the Office of Nonproliferation and Arms
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Control at the Department of Energy's National
Nuclear Security Administration.
Before joining NNSA, Dre was a valued
member of my staff in OIP. And I hated to lose Dre,
but it was a win for the United States government.
So with that, Dre, take it away.
MS. FERKILE: Thank you, Director
Mamish. And yeah, it's a heartfelt warm welcome to
come back and obviously be a part of this panel. I
can't thank you enough for inviting me here to
participate and especially amongst these remarkable
women that are with me on this panel to talk about
this topic. So thank you so much for the
opportunity.
At least for me, as mentioned, my career
kind of started at the NRC. I've had a long history
coming from a science background, working through
STEM, and trying to find that support through other
communities, trying to help develop myself and push
myself and experience as much as I can. And so when
you're entering into a technical agency, sometimes
those links are hard to find.
But I have commend NRC that I always felt
that there's a community there. There was always
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leadership pushing through and being those kind of
role models that like Laura mentioned that if we can
empower that type of actions and those activities and
trying to instill these type of diverse conversations
and make that a norm within various different
organizations, to me, that is, like, the roots in the
ground that will continue to promote and push
individuals into these types of opportunities and
positions. So for myself, I have grown up in the NRC
and it's been a cherished part of my life.
And when I got introduced moving from
technical work into international policy work, I had
those questions of where does the regulator fit at
this table? How do we participate in the policy
development? And to me, it gets right to the key of
that diverse thing, that diverse discussion that you
want to introduce and invite.
You want to create that open minded look
at policymaking because there are the implementers on
the back side that are fulfilling and taking the --
making those policies operatable. So I think that
this a critical part of some of the diverse think and
why pure demonstration and example of how that
contributes to the whole process. And especially on
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an international platform, I feel very fortunate to
have had opportunities to negotiate bilaterally, work
on multi-lateral organizations throughout my career.
And not only the NRC but when I went on
to the National Security Council and we were working
on these policies and working directly with other
countries, you can definitely tell that there's a
much more openness there. And I really want to push
our U.S. government, especially as civil servants and
the leader in one of the most powerful countries on
the planet. You want to have that leadership.
And so I'm thrilled and excited to
continue to talk about kind of how diversity -- how
we can use our platform to encourage and empower those
that are coming up to carry on this legacy and make
diversity in all of its different dimensions an
essential part of policy in a globalizing world. I
think the world is getting smaller. And I think this
is a great opportunity to talk about those challenges
of how do we integrate everything. And so just I've
been thankful obviously for the opportunity to have
leaders and role models that have helped promote and
just encourage me to take those chances and break
through the norms and come from an NRC regulatory
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background and take an NSC job position at the table
to develop policy.
And that eventually projected me into
where I am now. And again, working at cabinet level
departments and agencies, I think it's just an
opportune time for us to continue making this
conversation a normal one and to not fear that and
just to push ourselves out of our comfort zones. So
thank you guys for having me speak today, and I look
forward to hearing what my co-panelists have to say
as well.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Dre. Finally,
it's my pleasure to introduce Joyce Connery. Joyce
is the Chair of the Defense Nuclear Facility Safety
Board. She has been a very close colleague of the
NRC and a huge supporter of the Agency for many years
in her previous positions at the National Security
Council and the Department of Energy. Joyce?
MS. CONNERY: Thank you, Nader. I think
I'm the only one here who hasn't done a stint at the
NRC. It seems like a hole in my resume that I'm
going to have to fill someday. But until that time,
thank you for inviting me to speak today and thanks
for letting me be in what I call the anchor position
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of our relay team.
I'm excited to be here with my fellow
panelists to discuss the long and winding road of
women in international nuclear policymaking. But I
don't want to repeat some of the remarks that are
already made here. So I'm going to ask you to indulge
me a little bit because I'm going to go a little bit
off topic as usual and talk more about the women
aspect versus international policymaking aspect.
But you can ask me anything during Q&A
about the NSC, my role at the DNFSB. And just a
shout out to those of you who organized this today.
Virtual conferences are really tough to do.
We did a hearing this summer, and it was
a nightmare. So I can't even imagine what you guys
went through with this. And it's the second year,
so God bless you for all the work that you're doing
with that. And just like anything else, NRC does it
with excellence as they do with all things.
So since NRC is hosting, I'm going to
take a prerogative to give a shout out to all of the
NRC -- amazing NRC women with whom I've had the
privilege to work over the years. And it's not going
to be a full exhaustive list. But I just want to
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give a flavor.
So in no particular order, just this is
a shout out to Janice Dunn Lee, Margie Doane, Jennifer
Holzman, Laura Mayrose, Christine Svinicki, Annie
Caputo, Leah Smith, Nancy Fragiamis, Alison
Macfarlane, Patty Matt, Karen Henderson, Brooke
Smith, and Heather Astwood and all of you who are on
the panel today. I'm sure I've missed some. And the
reason why I rattled off that list is a couple of
reasons.
One, women seldom get recognized for the
work they do. And in the spirit of the fact that
yesterday was International Women's Day, I'm going to
name check as many amazing women in this field as
often as I can. And I'm not going to stop doing it
just in the month of March.
What's missing from my list? Women of
color. Why? Because we don't have enough
representation in the industry. So I'm going to name
another phenomenal woman and that would be Bonnie
Jenkins and commend her for her outstanding work in
founding Women of Color Advancing, Peace, Security,
and Conflict Transformation, WCAPS. While not
specific to our industry, women like Bonnie who now
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hold the rank of Undersecretary for Arms Control and
International Security Affairs, they are blazing
trails and lifting up others to follow in their
footsteps.
Second reason why I name check was to
point out a characteristic that women bring to the
table. Not making generalizations about what women
do better than men. Just pointing out something at
which we excel.
We excel at building and sustaining
relationships. Why is that important? Because
those relationships make working in the international
field better. Establishing and maintaining
relationships lead to meaningful connections,
information sharing, trust building, and better
outcomes.
Some of the women I name checked, I
haven't seen in person since 2015. But we still keep
in touch, follow up, provide advice to each other,
and maintain the connection. That might be why I'm
on the panel today. Just saying. So as I noted on
social media yesterday, again, and I'll paraphrase,
behind every successful woman is a, technical term,
crap ton load of other strong women holding her up,
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propelling her forward, name checking her. And
that's been true of my career as well.
So I'm going to give you homework. I
want you to name check some amazing women this week.
Retweet them if you're on Twitter. Promote them if
you're on LinkedIn, and remind the world of their
contributions because they're not touting themselves
loud enough and they should be.
I think the team wanted us to talk a
little bit about our bios and our experience in the
international policy realm as a woman. And I profess
to being an accidental nuke. I did not attend a
career in nuclear policy. And my first international
experience was two and a half years in Turkmenistan.
Living abroad is a great way to test your
assumptions about being an American, about yourself
as a person, and as a woman. They actually had a
running joke about there being three sexes, men,
women, and American women because our experiences and
approaches to the world were so different. And this
goes to some of the stuff that Kamishan was saying
about when you work in the international arena.
As a foreigner, as a woman living in
another country, you're living in a fish bowl. They
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have expectations about who you are and how you should
act based on their cultural experiences of women and
their impressions of American women. So a little
funny note, when I was in Turkmenistan which was in
the '90s because I'm old, early '90s, they only had
two TV shows from America: Twin Peaks and Santa
Barbara.
So do you think that their expectations
of American women were a little bit skewed?
Probably. My first nuclear assignment was a couple
years later overseas in Kazakhstan. There's a theme
here. And I was working on nuclear nonproliferation
issues for NSA and Department of Energy.
I met countless people from our industry
coming into the country because what I would do is
just jump on the logistics bus to go to the airport
and meet any U.S. delegation that was coming into
town and offer my services, not because it was my
job, because I was a single woman in Kazakhstan and
what else is there to do at 1:00 o'clock in the
morning when planes to come in. And I was curious
to learn everything that I could know. And what's
interesting was that for every ten of us, there was
one Kazakhstan working in the arena.
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Didn't matter if it was NRC, DOE,
Commerce, DoD, they were all meeting the same, like,
six Kazakhstanis. And the Kazakhstanis were very
confused about this and didn't understand why we just
didn't send one delegation to talk to them about all
those things. This insight was actually really
helpful later on because it inspired team USA later
in my career when we got government and industry
together to do trade missions on nuclear energy where
the whole interagency was branded as one, including
the NRC.
But since this panel is about women, a
few observations about women's field, so to speak.
One is it has its benefits. It's very difficult for
high ranking officials to ignore you because they're
polite, at least the Central Asian context and the
Russian context.
I had no trouble walking up to ministers,
chairmen, a couple of prime ministers because they
didn't perceive me as a threat and because they were
too polite to shoo me away. They were probably taken
aback a little bit by my approaching them, but it
worked. The disadvantage that some of the real
conversations took place, at least in that part of
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the world in the banya which is the bathhouse which
is where I didn't go. And so I missed out on some
of those connections.
The other challenge to get real was
physical security. Women tend to be more vulnerable
in these settings, and I know I was. This is not
unique being posted abroad, folks. It happens here
too. And I just want you to stop and think about all
those amazing women that I name checked plus all the
ones that you could name check and think of all the
times they were walking back to their cars, taking a
taxi, at an event leaving along and trying to recall
the conversations so they can go write that cable
while in the back of their mind, what are they doing?
They're thinking about, are their keys in
their hand facing the right way with one sticking
out? Did they have safe passage to their car? Are
they in a well lit place? Is there anyone suspicious
in the vicinity? And is that cab driver's intent to
take you to your destination while you keep one hand
on the door?
People joke about the ability of women to
multitask. Every woman in your life does it and
sometimes it's a matter of survival. When I talk to
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women in international policy or my own staff
regarding the challenges they would face, I would
note the following.
It should go without saying that our
leaders, our workforce, our employees are 360 degree
people. What does that mean? They don't just exist
within the context of a 40-hour work week.
They have other demands on their time and
talent. As leaders in the field, it's incumbent upon
us to remember this and remind our senior managers.
They have families. They have children or parents
that need taken care of. They need paid family
leave.
They need sufficient paternity leave to
bond with their children. It's necessary but not
sufficient. We need to get rid of the stigma that
still exists around working mothers in particular.
Parents need to have the flexibility to take care
their kids to the doctor without being penalized.
Relatedly, we need to stop the suffering
Olympics. This is why some women do not go into
certain jobs or shy away from that job at the NRC
because it's a badge of honor to see who can stay in
the office late. And they talk about it.
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This is the atmosphere at NRC at times,
and it's an atmosphere that I've seen across U.S.
government agencies. Yes, in a crisis, you stay if
you need to. But if you have good cross trained
teams, you shouldn't need to have that as a regular
occurrence.
But we reward -- our structures reward
just that. We consider hours worked above the
required time as significantly exceeds expectations.
I'm not sure that's the right metric.
Consider how many on your team have use
or lose at the end of the year. And think about
whether your culture is conducive to the workforce
you want. We subtly leave women out of many
conversations.
In Russia, it was the banya. But have
noticed the favored activity of many of our
conferences is a golf event. Opposite that golf
event is a spouses program which is basically a
rebranded wives program.
I'm not just saying that women aren't
golfers. I golf occasionally, but I do it to be
included in the conversation. And it hasn't really
improved my golf game.
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I don't know about you. But when I was
18, I didn't do 18 -- when I was young, I didn't do
18 rounds with daddy at the golf club when I was in
high school. And if your happy hours are at a cigar
bar, chances are your female staff is going to be
excluded.
Who ends up at the table matters. How
loudly they speak matters. The table should reflect
our country in which we live because we're doing the
work on behalf of our nation when we're making nuclear
policy, not the work of whatever ivy covered school
you happen to come from.
Different perspectives shape and form and
sharpen our policymaking. But it isn't enough people
in the room when it happens? That room has to be a
welcoming place for those people to not only get into
the room but to keep them there.
It's human nature not to stay where we're
not welcome. So appreciate the chance to be a little
provocative. So thank you, and I look forward to
questions.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Joyce. And
thank you, everyone, for getting us started with such
thought provoking introductions and ideas. And
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there's a lot to talk about already.
Now let me pose a question to each of
you, each of our panelists, to get us started. And
I'm sure we'll get a number of other questions from
the audience. My first question is, why is it
important -- and some of you already kind of addressed
it and others may not have.
Why is it important to have diverse
voices when discussing or negotiating international
policy? Relatedly, how has international engagement
broaden or change your definition of diversity or
raise new issues in that regard? And I'm going to
start with Margie and go in that order.
MS. DOANE: Okay. Thanks, Nader. So
yeah, so I did try to talk about diversity. But
first of all, I'm going to say Joyce Connery. That's
my name check. So that was awesome, so enthusiastic.
I loved it.
So we're talking about just why diversity
is so important, right? Did I get the whole question
because it was long. Is that most of it?
MR. MAMISH: Yes, yes.
MS. DOANE: Okay. So right. So I think
what you heard from a number of the speakers is just
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how the conversation changes when you get a new
perspective. I'm in a multi-national organization
now. Kamishan was talking about this as well because
she came from the NEA. And it's incredible because
when we talk about diversity, it's diversity and
diversity and diversity.
It's so many different cultures, and then
within certain regions, different cultures. And so
it's rich in perspectives. And what I have found is
in my -- and I don't want to exclude men because there
are men that are very good at this as well.
But women are very good at relationship
building. Like Joyce was saying, what that means is
they're very good at bringing people to the table.
They often are noticing who isn't talking or how to
get things started and showing sort of a more
intuitive side to a debate from the perspective of
seeing who can contribute and has contributed or
whose voice isn't loud enough and helping it be
louder.
The problem is like Joyce said sometimes
women are at the table, but they're not the loudest.
But I think the more I think women get in positions
to be influential but also that you put yourself at
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the table to be influential, I think that the debate
will be enriched. So I think a lot has been said
here, Nader, but I'm going to leave it at that so you
can give everybody else a chance to say a few words.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Margie. I'm going
to go to Laura.
MS. DUDES: -- Nader, and I got to say
you're going to just get name checked by everyone,
Joyce, because that was really inspirational. And
you just wove a tapestry story. And really I think
all of us are just resonating with all of the
subtleties that you just shared because they are
things that we deal with every day. So I just really
thank you for that, for creating and putting that out
front.
So to really answer the importance of
diversity. So I'm going to just take it. And I
think the second part of your question, Nader, was
impacts on us, right? And I mean, I think my -- I
have gotten, I've learned so much more. I think my
decision making is richer from being in an
international setting.
I think I always just look now to people
from -- I've worked with folks from many different
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countries. And I will say when I first went into the
international arena, I had the American woman hat on,
Joyce. And it was -- and I had a certain perspective
about how things should be done in nuclear safety.
And I quickly learned from my colleagues
around the world, right? All their views, there's
more than one way to get at safety. I mean, if you
look at regulators around the world, their programs
sometimes look very different than ours.
And yet, they have the same reasonable
assurance of adequate protection and safety. And so
having that dialogue with an international group
really enriched me as a person. It made me a better
regulator. It made me a better leader.
And I will just say having that voice at
the table is a great thing. But then also we should
all be advocates, right? Whenever you're in a
meeting, right, it's not enough to come to the women's
panel but make that effort. Speak up.
If you have the opportunity, make sure
you're going around the table. You're asking people
what they think because that will make the
conversation and the work so much richer. Thank you.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Laura. Let's go to
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Kamishan. Kamishan, I'm sure when you went to NEA,
you were one person. And you came back to the NRC
hopefully a different person in terms of your views
on diversity. And you touched a little bit on that
in your introduction. Can you give us a little bit
more about how that experience changed your
definition of diversity.
MS. MARTIN: Well, I hate to repeat, but
it is paramount that when you have these
international experiences that you do wear the hat of
an American, even when you don't feel so American.
So when you move throughout the world, that is the
first thing that people notice about you is that
you're an American, especially if you're not in a
place where people don't speak English. But having
the background of being part of a minority population
here in the States, it gave me the insights to speak
up for other minority populations, particularly in my
work in stakeholder engagement because it was a goal
to seek out a lot of the immigrant populations in the
various countries when they're talking about rad
waste management.
So I had the perspective of saying this
may be whatever everyone is saying in this room among
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these people who have this level of education in this
particular area or just experience. But it gave me
a perspective of what it's like to be -- I wasn't an
immigrant. I was an ex-pat.
But it gave me a window into what it's
like to be an immigrant in some of these countries
where it's very important to engage that community
when discussing what decisions will be made and how
they should be engaged and how they should be
considered. So that's a perspective that I didn't
have so much of before, living overseas and working
in that type of environment. But it also gave me a
perspective on all the different cultures that exist
and how they should all be respected and considered
when having these conversations, be it throughout the
entire life cycle of nuclear.
So I focused a little bit more on waste
management. But even in the beginning in the
development stages, some things have to be considered
and who you choose to populate from academia on into
operation. All of that has to be considered.
So I think I had the background of
understanding diversity on a personal level before
going there. But that definitely broadened my
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perspectives in seeing what kind of national cultures
and pocket cultures that I was exposed to in these
discussions. So I hope that answered the question,
but that was just my experience with what diversity
can do and how it contributes and enriches all the
conversations when you have different people and
different experience and different levels involved in
the conversations.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you. I'm going to go
to Dre.
MS. FERKILE: Thank you, Nader. And as
my co-panelists eloquently explained and to your
point, Joyce, I take on the challenge. Name tag
challenge accepted. So I'm going to continue it on.
We're starting something new. So it'll be across all
of social media hopefully within the next couple of
hours. So fantastic.
To answer this question, Nader, I mean,
to me some of the things that I try to focus on or
what I've learned through this process is how do you
embrace diversity. Like, how do you become open to
that? So we're presented in our positions as a
federal employee, either representing the United
States or you're in these multi-lateral board
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meetings or meeting bilaterally, working with
regulators or other international governments.
What does that mean? Like, how do you
actually do that? And so, for me, I try to hone in
on that and identify some things that I thought could
be characteristics to portray and act in such just
being open minded, to understand what is diversity,
right? What is different about us?
So there's that saying that says, if you
walk a mile in someone else's shoes, you'll have an
understanding. So I really try to listen more than
try to absorb and take on and learn from others and
their experiences because even though it seems like
those human parts of interacting with another person
wouldn't come to play in these types of dynamic
situations where you're negotiating agreements or
working with other international counterparts. I
think that's a critical element that's needed.
You have to seek to embrace that
difference and to understand how to embrace it.
Those characteristics to me is critical in trying to
kind of find a ground because to me that's the only
way they're going to strengthen the international
policy that your objective is, right? And so to
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understand those differences to me is key number one.
So I think it's a challenge to everybody,
as Joyce mentioned, challenging people. But I think
that's a part of it is how -- yes, we should be
diverse. But what does that actually mean? Like,
how do you do that? And embracing that to me is
asking those questions, being inquisitive, being
open, listening, understanding. That to me is
something that I personally think is an actionable
characteristic that could help promote this across in
the longer term.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks. Thanks, Dre. Over
to you, Joyce.
MS. CONNERY: I love the answers that
everybody has given. And I think when you think
about your international delegation, when you come
over to the U.S. delegation, think about the people
that you're with. And when somebody says, where are
you from, when you're overseas, you say you're from
the United States.
When you're in D.C., you say, I'm from
Boston or I'm from Atlanta, right? So even
understanding your own identity is one way to kind of
look at the identity of others. And I love what
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Kamishan said about coming as a minority and then
recognizing the minority.
Who's representing the other countries?
What minorities aren't at their table that we're
missing in the conversation and embracing that. It
comes down to what Dre was talking about the Atticus
Finch test, walks a mile in his shoes. It comes down
to empathy and understand it.
But I think for a long time -- I'm a
social scientist. And for a long time, we talked
about cultural competence. And I think we're moving
away from that because you can't be culturally
competent right?
So we have to come at it with cultural
humility is how I would look at it. And that's how
we need to look at diversity to say, like, I don't
know the cultural ins and outs of the countries that
I'm working with. So all I can do is look at the
perspective.
And why you need it, it is because it
sharpens your pencils. I makes you -- gives you
perspectives you wouldn't have. It avoids group
think which everybody wants to avoid. But I think
it's also that if you are in a diverse delegation,
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for instance, you might not pick up on the subtleties
that's happening in another culture.
I'll give a couple of quick examples.
Like, so one, in Russia, there's an expression that
says that the man may be the head of the household,
but the woman is the neck that turns the head, which
I think is a fantastic statement. It doesn't have
to be about men and women.
But there's always -- it doesn't have to
be the person at the table who's leading the
delegation. It's the guy behind or the woman behind
that's giving them all the information. And so once
you realize that, you can make breakthroughs by
having that side conversation because you noticed
that, right? So you have to be -- as Margie said,
you have to be observant. And you have to study
human.
And the second one that I'll give was
when I was in Kazakhstan and we were working on
decommissioning the BM-350 reactor, I was kind of --
I was working there with the Kazakhs, the Russians,
and the folks from Idaho National Lab because they
had a fast breeder reactor, right? So they were all
working together. And what I discovered was the
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language they had in common was technical, right?
They could speak to each other -- they
couldn't speak to each other, like, in the same word
language. But as soon as you brought out a
blueprint, they were all speaking the same language.
And that was their cultural similarity.
So you have to find the common ground and
then start to work from there. So what I interpreted
was not English to Russian. I interpreted technical
speak to policy speak so that they can get the money
do what it is that they needed to do that they agreed
on from a technical standpoint.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Joyce. It looks
like we have a number of terrific questions here.
The first one if for Kamishan and Laura. What are
your suggestions on how to switch from a
technical/engineering career into a policymaking
career? Kamishan, do you want to start us off?
MS. MARTIN: Sure. Laura had unmuted
herself, so I was letting her go. Well, I would say
that you have the choice to switch from a technical
engineering degree -- or career into policymaking.
Or you can take a technical track.
I think that if you go into a more of a
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leadership role and making the decisions on exactly
what the policy would be, then maybe that path would
involve some different professional development.
But for me, I was always a technical specialist. And
so for my contribution to policy development is
giving the technical aspects and the technical
expertise and the technical perspectives.
So to piggyback off of the saying of the
neck that moves the head, you have these policymakers
who may not be steeped in the technical and
engineering day-to-day experiences. But they will
always need someone with a technical expertise who
understands all the political aspects and the nuances
that go into policy development as well as having the
technical background. So I would say you may -- if
you want to take the path of being strictly in policy
development, you may need to take a path of leadership
and looking at different type of developments.
But there's also the opportunity as a
technical specialist who have that common language of
technical or nuclear science and development, all the
working groups that I've observed and helped to
facilitate while I was at the NEA. All the people
from all the various countries that were at the table,
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that was their common language.
These were technical experts. And they
were giving and gaining insights from other technical
experts from different countries. So I think that
you have an option to switch or to be more of a
technical advisor and be on the cutting edge of new
developments.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Kamishan. So
now Laura?
MS. DUDES: I think that was a great
answer and I want to get to some other questions. I
want to kind of just add a little spin to it. And
one of things I agree is you always have a choice,
right?
You can find your career path and
hopefully it's a zig zag because it's a lot more
exciting if you're moving around a little bit. But
I would say that you are -- I think it was a natural
transition for me that I spent the early part of my
career honing my technical capability, my
understanding of nuclear power plants and all of the
issues and learning. And so it was very natural
then.
I think you're a better policymaker if
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you actually can bring that understanding of the
technology forward. And I think that's true
domestically, and I think in the international area.
And I know a lot of my colleagues that I've worked
with on various working groups are incredibly
technical. And then they evolve into being
policymakers and leaders. And I just think it's a
richer conversation and a richer decision when you
have kind of knowledge of the topic you're making
policy on. Thank you.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Laura. The next
question we have is for Margie. Margie, you were an
inspiration to women across the NRC. How had your
transition to the IEA impacted your ability to
influence your ability to promote women across the
international community?
MS. DOANE: Well, okay. Thanks for that
question and for the nice compliment. Thank you,
everybody. I think I have to thank so many women in
my life. So maybe of whom Joyce -- Joyce and many
of the other women that she talked about for helping
me. And so I had such incredible role models.
I think many of you know I kind of said
to everybody when we were talking about what we talked
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about here today, I said, I'm not going to talk about
myself because everybody had heard my career journey.
I've been at so many of these. I didn't want to bore
you guys.
But I will say that I switched offices a
lot at the NRC. I went from opinion writing as a
lawyer for many years, then I went up to a commission
office, then I went down to international programs.
I didn't have any international background.
I'd taken courses in college, but I
didn't have an international background at the NRC.
I got that through working in the Commissioner's
office. And then I sort of learned on the job --
thank you to everyone in OIP that taught me -- and
then from there to the general counsel's office.
And then I jumped over again to the EDO's
office. And what I'm trying to illustrate for you
is that you touch so many people's lives by taking on
those opportunities that your mentors push you into.
And I'll say push because there are a lot of those
jobs, a lot of those switches I wasn't ready for.
But really I embrace them. And I was so
enriched by doing it. And everywhere along the way,
getting to how -- to really the ability to promote
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women and then in the international communities.
All along the way building good
relationships. So when you go up to that next job,
you can pull those people up with you or you can bring
them into projects and things like that. So building
really good relationships all the way and really
having a commitment to bring women to the table.
And in the international community -- and
I remember saying this a lot at OIP -- I'm sorry, at
NRC when I was there that when you struggle, when
times are very difficult at your agency, we are going
through change if you remember. It's well understood
that minority and disadvantaged communities who
already aren't at the table have a difficult time, so
women or any -- and sometimes it can be a personal
perspective that it's hard to be at the table.
But when you go through then in more
difficult time, you actually have more of an impact
on those communities. So I was so fortunate to be
at the NRC when we were going through this big change
because I really -- that was where I really struggled
is to make sure that we included everyone. And this
has helped me so much in my job.
I'm using this all the time now, and we
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have a lot of work to do. Deechy Grossy maybe you've
seen has really branched out into a number of
different areas. He's now into solving issues with
plastic, Raise Hope for Cancer, I can't tell you. A
lot of different things that the Agency is doing.
And so we're changing how we are managing
all this because I'm on the management side. And
again, this is the struggle because it's a lot of
work to take on these new issues. I'm making sure
that we are promoting women, that we are promoting
diverse groups that anyone that's in a group that is
disadvantaged that we're reaching everyone.
We're making sure that we're hearing all
voices because as we always say at the NRC, never
know whose got the right answer. And so I think for
my part, I tried to mentor. And I promise you. I
think I get as much out of these mentoring
relationships as my mentees get. So that was long.
I should stop now. But those are just a few things
that I've been working on. So back to Nader.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Margie. I think
your comment about mentoring certainly I'm sure
resonates with a lot of us who mentor others. It's
always a win-win for both the mentor and the mentee.
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So that's for that.
The next question I have is for Dre. So
Dre, in your position at DOE, how do you help create
an environment of inclusiveness and empowerment? How
are you extending your support to junior staff
including staff that work for you?
MS. FERKILE: I think it does kind of
bode well and build off of what Margie was mentioning,
especially on the mentor side. And the second part
of the question of how do you do that. I mean, a lot
of times I think we get too stuck in our ways and
think that into our schedule and into those meetings
and providing stuff for our leadership and our
managers.
But finding that time to either seek
mentorships or be a mentor to others is so critical.
I think it's just, again, building on those
relationships and learning something different about
different parts of the organizations or if you seek
mentorship outside of your organization, learning
ways that other practices are operated and how things
are kind of done. I mean, I know it's a big part of
it of trying to encourage folks to prioritize that,
to make time for that.
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Most people, I think at for myself coming
up the ranks when I was younger, I would almost be
nervous to ask. Oh, that senior leader is too busy
to take time or meet with me. But that's not the
case.
Many, many senior leaders want to share
their experiences. So I encourage you to reach out
and find those opportunities and ask them if they
have time. Ten minute coffee, I think you just get
so much and on both side.
I think the truth is that it's not just
the mentoree that learns a lot. I think the mentor
also can gain quite a bit just from having that
discussion and dialogue of what they're experiencing.
So I think mentorships are extremely valuable. For
me, that has probably been the number one thing.
I haven't gone through the ranks. Where
I am now was not a selected path. I definitely was
the ping pong version of bouncing back and forth.
Through different experiences.
And I wouldn't have taken some of those
opportunities if I didn't have mentors that were
pushing me out of my comfort zone. So you need that.
You need that in your career as much as you do in
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your general life.
And so I think that's a big component of
trying to get out of our normal practices and just
make that a priority. Find that time to push
yourself into seeking some sort of discussion with
others. I mean, as far as the inclusivity and
empowerment, I mean, I think those are extremely
vital to a successful organization.
And the current position I have now, I
think it gets down to the basic human being nature.
We want to respect and value -- I think humans in
general want to be respected and valued for their
information uniqueness. And they want to be known
that they add value and that they matter.
And I think this kind of gets weaved in
through your career and your work path. And so I
believe that if you create these relationships with
coworkers, you can do that through trusting each
other. And it's both the need to trust and to be
trusted. I think those are critical aspects of it.
And when those needs are met, I believe
that you can develop a culture of empowered people
across the board. I try to think about this often
to be honest because I do think at least in my current
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organization there's a lot of siloed discussions
going on. And so to create, again, an environment
where you're bringing different viewpoints to the
table, allowing people to share their uniqueness.
And I think that's critical to meet the
mission of the organization wherever you're working.
And so in order to how do you do that, to me, it gets
back to those elements that we've kind of heard
throughout the panel, whether it's empathy or respect
for others. The nurturing relationships with
coworkers, you have to build that trust with the group
that you work with.
That, to me, is creating that
environment. And it allows and enables kind of
bringing to the table again those varied abilities
and experiences. And through that, I think it
organically generates new ideas and approaches for
the work that you're doing, through the team
dynamics.
And so to me, it's really about human
element. Talk to the people that you work with. Get
to know them. I think that's such a critical part
of what we do. Plus we spend a lot of time with each
other in our lives.
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And nowadays, I do feel that we work --
we spend more time at work than we do with our loved
ones at home. So spend time with them and develop
those relationships. And to me, that's how you'll
instill empowerment in those areas, finding those
leadership connections to help move forward, whether
it's goals and objectives in the organization or your
own personal career development. So that's one of
the ways I've been trying to approach that.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Dre. Joyce, you
covered a lot of ground in your opening remarks, but
a credit to the audience who have a very good question
for you. So what is your perspective on how to help
women get noticed while working remotely?
We are in a unique environment. And so
they don't have daily in-person access to leadership.
How do they get noticed. How do they outshine others
in their office?
MS. CONNERY: Okay. So I'm just going
to -- I'm not picking on you. But that framed in a
very male-centered way. How do you outshine others?
We don't think that way. We shouldn't be thinking
that way, right?
How do I get noticed from my work,
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because it's not a pie where if I get noticed,
somebody else doesn't get noticed. So I'm just going
to start with the premise of let's change how we frame
the question. Framing is important.
Secondly, I would say, look, this
environment is very, very difficult for a number of
reasons. I struggle with this because I see the
folks that naturally don't want to engage disengage
when they're in a virtual environment. I see it
being a struggle for folks not just about whether or
not they get noticed but whether or not they get heard
because you can actually self-select by not teamsing
with somebody, right, or if you're picking your own
teams or those who aren't necessarily inclined.
And so this is really a management and
leadership challenge to be able to reach out to each
one of those individuals and make sure that they are
developing the way they want to develop in their
particular career field. And I believe that as we
move from completely virtual to hybrid to having more
flexibility, I think we have to change expectations
too. And we as managers and leaders have to
recognize that it's not whoever puts all the hours in
the office that is necessarily doing the work.
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Let the work stand for itself and not
about who has the face time. And to the extent that
you're a good manager or a good leader, you're paying
attention to what the dynamics are on the screen the
same way you should be paying attention to how they
are in the room. And so the camera is on, camera is
off thing is also very touchy too because people's
home environments are different.
And you don't necessarily have the right
to be in their home even if they're in a telework
status to be able to see what's going on, right? So
there are a lot of challenges with that, that I would
say. But let's reframe the question it's not about
a competition, about how gets more notice than
others. It's about how you as an individual move
along the work path and the career path that you want.
And to Dre's point, have people challenge
you to say, I think you're too stuck in your comfort
zone and you need to move on to the next level. It's
not above did I get all five? It should be about,
am I making the contribution that I want to make to
the organization and does the organization value it?
Because as soon as we stop valuing what it is that
they're doing, they're going to stop contributing.
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MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Joyce. The next
question is for all of you. So how do you combat the
perception that women have more opportunities because
they are a diversity hire rather than being valued as
a skilled person? Let me start with you, Joyce.
MS. CONNERY: Okay. I feel like I'm set
up for that. So I actually (inaudible) because I
didn't want this to fall off and I want to hear
everybody's answers to this because I think this is
a challenge. People who say, oh, you're in that
position because you're a diversity hire, it says
more about them than it says about you, right?
That is their insecurity coming to the
forefront. But the more of us there are, the less
often they get to say that. I've heard it a lot in
my career where people, oh, well, they put her in
that position because they wanted a woman, right?
There's plenty of well educated, smart
women with qualities who can fill any of these jobs.
And I understand that any woman could take my job.
I don't think any man could. But there are a lot of
women who could take my job.
So I just think we have to think about it
in those terms when they come at us with that. And
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I think we have to debunk that myth. The difference
is that a man is automatically assumed qualified
without having to prove his qualifications and a
woman isn't necessarily.
And I've experienced that even in my own
organization. If I'm standing there with a man, the
man will get talked to versus me. And they have to
nudge them and say, oh, no, she's the Chairman. You
have to talk to her.
Because there is a mental assumption that
the main is automatically qualified and the woman has
to prove her qualifications. And that is the
difficult myth that we have to debunk. And I want
to hear everybody else.
MR. MAMISH: Okay. I am going to go to
Laura.
MS. DUDES: I could not have said that
better. I mean, and I think I've been experiencing
that assumption since I was in college. I didn't
even get grades because I studied. I got them
because I was a female which I never understood why
that was.
But I used a similar phrase that Joyce
did. And I'm probably a little bit more blunt about
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it, you said about qualified. I felt like -- and in
particular as I started to get into leadership
positions. She's exactly right.
You can walk into a room. Nobody says
anything. There's actually social experiments where
you take a man and a woman into a large crowd and
they describe their backgrounds. And the crowd picks
who has what job.
And it's, like, a high statistic that
says most of the audience says that he is the senior
person, he is the supervisor. And I always used to
say to my folks that I was mentoring that men are
assumed brilliant, right? And women are assumed
stupid until proven smart whereas men are assumed
smart until prove student. And maybe those aren't
the best words. I like qualified better. So I'm
going to up my language.
But I think you're dead on. I think we
have to -- and the last thing I would say is I really
agree. And people have asked me this question
recently, right, some of the women I've mentored and
how do we deal with that. And I keep telling me,
well, it is their problem, right? Anybody in this
day and age who's going to say that, it's probably an
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issue that they have.
But I think there's more to it. We have
to be advocates. If you see something, say
something. And we need everyone to be advocates,
right, all across the board. Men and women to be
advocates to understand. But that's just not the
case and that's just no longer an acceptable thing to
say for a behavior to exhibit.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Laura. I'm going
to go to Kamishan next.
MS. MARTIN: There's not a whole lot to
add with the adage that is truly their problem. And
I have encountered people who may have had the notion
that I was a diversity hire because I am a Black
woman. And they may feel like, well, you check two
boxes.
So you're taking this opportunity from
someone else that's qualified, without ever
considering that I am qualified. Otherwise, I would
not be here. So I don't know that I would say I
combat that perception. I just do my job.
I live up to my qualifications, and I
respect everyone. And when I do encounter other men
who do not hold this particular antiquated notion, I
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implore them to speak out. Because what I've learned
is what happens when you try to overcompensate or
combat, I'm going to show you, that doesn't always go
over so well and it's not really good for you.
So when you find an ally, you say, hey,
you be the mouthpiece. I'm doing my part by doing
my job and being qualified and providing excellence.
So you have to be an ally and to your fellow gender
mates. And that's my personal approach because it
is their problem. And we can't solve other people's
problems in that manner in the workplace.
MR. MAMISH: Well said, Kamishan. Let's
go to Dre.
MS. FERKILE: Sure, absolutely.
Obviously, the panelists have brought up really great
points on this. I mean, think that you're going to
have critics regardless. Like, they're going to have
those narratives and pick us apart, in general, us as
in people in general.
Every position, it's rare. I can't
imagine anyone that walked this earth does not have
that type of judgment or filter put on you. So when
we're talking about women in a career position, it's
something that I think my co-panelists also
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highlighted on.
But just to me, keep your head down and
keep pushing. Like, you have to have that confidence
and know in yourself that you got that job because
you deserved it. For whatever, like, you have the
education. You are a hard worker. You've
demonstrated you're disciplined. You're persistent.
Whatever it is that got you to that
point. You hold on to that and that is your rock
internally. And then when people have those
comments, just keep doing what you're doing and it
will speak for itself. And I truly believe that. I
really do believe that.
I just, yeah, I think it's -- you always
have people that will have comments. And does it
take a culture shift? Yes. Are we there yet? No.
Definitely as others have alluded to more eloquently
than I can right now.
But yeah, there's absolutely people out
there that still approach individuals differently.
And until that day and age where this isn't a problem
anymore, we have to keep our heads down and keep
pushing forward and be that example. Be that person
that you want to be, that you've seen and kind of
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aspire to be. Fill those shoes and do it in your own
way. But that unique voice and just have confidence
in it and find that rock within yourself.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Dre. And last but
not least, Margie.
MS. DOANE: Oh, thanks, Nader. So that
is -- it's a question that it gets my blood boiling.
So I don't think you can progress through an
organization and not have people think that.
And so I am competitive by nature. So I
would encourage anyone who feels like they're in this
position to use it to motivate you because you have
the skills, you have the knowledge, or you can acquire
it. Use mentors.
But the more you promote yourself and the
better you do in that job, that will self -- it will
be self-fulfilling for you. You can't -- I mean,
it's just noise on the outside. So you just have to,
for yourself, be the person that deserved that job
that you know you are and that you can be. So that's
the first thing. That's how you combat it.
And then the other thing is you make sure
that when people are saying that about other women
that you speak up. Like, be an advocate. Never
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allow that to go unchecked because I will tell you.
I was in international programs back in the day in
the 2005 to 2010 at this time.
And I had a very good friend who was in
SBCR, not your current head of SBCR. But she was in
small business and civil rights. And she came to me
and she said, hey, we did a diversity review on the
office for you and everything went well. Really good
marks.
But there's one issue. And now is
everybody ready? You have too many women in your
management level. And I said, okay. I'm sorry about
this for everybody who were involved in this.
But at the top in the EDO's office there
were no women. And there had not been women for
years. There had been one woman who had come in and
then come out. And so there were all men.
And so I said, did you have the same
conversation with the -- now here I'm just, like,
little lowly new SES. Did you have this exact same
conversation with the Executive Director of
Operations because his office is all men. And so she
started laughing and we were talking about it.
And I said these women earned this job.
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They were qualified. And this ups the statistic. So
be an ally for other women, and you give everything
you have into that job. You're going to shine
because you did deserve it. Tell yourself you
deserved it.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Margie. So I think
what I heard from the panel here on this particular
question which was an excellent question is ignore
the noise. Let your work do the talking. And let
these perceptions be your motivation. And that is
really the formula to get to the right place.
I think we have about ten minutes left.
So I've got one last question for all of you. But I
want to thank everyone for your incredibly
interesting discussion. I wish we had a whole day
to continue talking.
There was a lot of nuggets that I heard
today and I'm sure our audience heard. But
unfortunately, we need to wrap this up in the next
few minutes. So before we do that, I would like to
ask each of our panelists if there is one parting or
one final message you want your audience to take away
from today's discussion, what would that be?
I'm going to go in opposite order this
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time, starting with Joyce. And so I'd like to ask
each of you to give us a minute or two maximum on
that question. So with that, Joyce?
MS. CONNERY: You know I can't clear my
throat in a minute, right? Just kidding. So first
of all, message to take home. I gave you one homework
assignment.
The second homework assignment, be an
ally. Be an ally. Call it out when you see it.
Applaud the women around you. Make sure that you're
making some noise.
The second thing I will say is I love
speaking on these panels. I love speaking about
women. Sometimes, though, we would actually just
like to speak about the stuff that we do because we're
all competent professionals.
So if you want to have an entire panel of
women talking about human factors about nuclear
safety, we're all available. And we can talk about
that as much as we can talk about being women. It's
not about our double X chromosomes. It's about the
qualifications we bring to the table. Thanks for
having me.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Joyce. Dre?
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MS. FERKILE: It's a hard one to follow,
but I'll do my best for me. It's advocacy. Just be
your own advocate. I think that is something to take
with you is just advocate for yourself. Advocate for
others that you see are obviously stepping forward in
the right light and in a pattern that you would also
want to represent for yourself.
By advocating, I mean get out there.
Talk to people. Talk to your senior leaders. If
you're interested in something, ask them, talk to
them. I think that's the biggest thing that I could
try to leave everybody with. Thanks.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Dre. Kamishan?
MS. MARTIN: I would say whatever your
interests are, let them be known. And as much as you
are an advocate for other women, be an advocate for
yourself. Let people know if you're interested in
doing international policy work, if you're interested
in doing any international work.
If you just want to change offices and do
something different, let that be known. Build those
relationships so that people know you and your voice
is heard. So that way, when an opportunity comes
around, people will think of you and people will
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contact you because that's what happened to me.
If I didn't make it known, if I didn't
participate in international meetings and say hey,
this is something that I'm interested in, people
would not have known that, oh, she's willing to live
oversees in a country where she doesn't speak the
language. So whether that was wise or not, I would
say be an advocate for yourself. And don't let being
the only woman in the room, even if that happens
frequently, don't let that stop you from speaking out
on behalf of yourself and let your interests be known.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Kamishan.
Laura?
MS. DUDES: So that's really great
because I'm agreeing with all of this and it's what
we're going through. So I'll actually go back to two
things for you. My challenge in my opening remarks
to all the men who are listening, become a mentor.
Become an advocate. Mentor. Bring people with you,
right?
And I guess it's for the entire audience.
Let's bring all people into our international
activities and give them the exposure and include
everyone in that. So mentor your folks and give them
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the opportunity.
And then I think the other thing that I
would just leave for some folks in the audience, we
sometimes -- and you hear it in some of these
questions. And I see it. I've seen it in my career.
We self-select out. We have these things
that we're -- well, maybe I'm not going to go for
that or try for that. Take your seat at the table,
right? You deserve it. You earn it. I would
encourage you to just pull out your own chair and
have a seat. Thanks.
MR. MAMISH: Thank you, Laura. And
Margie?
MS. DOANE: Okay. So first of all, I'm
going to say don't just seek out women mentors. Seek
out men as well. And Nader, you are a great example
in this regard. And thank you so much for being so
respectful on this panel and taking all this flack
that we've given you. You are awesome and I'm so
appreciative.
Back to my first words, join the debate.
The world needs women in order to make important
changes. And we're at a very pivotal time in the
world as you know.
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And we really need everyone who can
contribute to contribute. I know there are amazing
women on this call. And I can only imagine if all
of you just sort of joined the debate and really help
push these issues forward, what difference that would
make.
So be motivated. Seek out ways to do it.
And get good mentors for sure. And thank you so
much. I miss all of you tremendously.
MR. MAMISH: Thanks, Margie. Thank you
all again for your terrific thoughts and wisdom. I
know that you've given us and you've given the
audience a lot to think about and reflect on. At
this point, I'm going to turn things to Molly Keefe-
Forsyth from the Federal Women's Program Advisory
Committee. Molly?
MS. KEEFE-FORSYTH: Thank you, Nader.
So good afternoon, everyone. My name is Molly Keefe-
Forsyth, and I currently serve as the Vice Chair for
the Federal Women's Program Advisory Committee.
I'd like to thank everyone in attendance
for attending our panel session today and especially
thank you to the outstanding women on the panel for
sharing their experiences and wisdom with us. I'd
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also like to add my own little quote that inspired me
this week during International Women's Day. I posted
on my Facebook feed yesterday.
It says, feminism isn't about making
women stronger. Women are already strong. It's
about changing the way the world perceived that
strength. So that really resonated with me this
week. All right. Let me get back to where my notes
were.
All right. So it is my honor to announce
this year's recipient for the Equal Employment
Opportunity award. This year, the Federal Women's
Program Advisory Committee has selected our secretary
actually, Justin Vazquez.
Justin hit the ground running when he
joined FWPAC as a regional representative in 2018.
Shortly after joining, he agreed to co-lead FWPAC's
professional development subcommittee. And he was
eventually selected for his current role as the FWPAC
secretary where he has continued to serve as a strong
and effective leader within the committee.
Justin has spearheaded and led the
coordination of several important FWPAC events over
the past few years, including a series of
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professional development workshops in 2019, an
agencywide flash mentoring session in 2020, and
numerous panel discussions on diversity and inclusion
and professional development topics. On top of all
of this, he's also fulfilled his duties as secretary
diligently. And he is an overall active contributor
to the FWPAC discussions and activities and is
definitely an advocate for women at the NRC.
It is clear that Justin has a passion
about FWPAC's mission to empower women to establish
and achieve their career goals. And we are thrilled
to recognize his contributions with this award. So
on behalf of the NRC Federal Women's Program Advisory
Committee, to my friend and colleague, Justin
Vazquez, congratulations.
MR. VAZQUEZ: Thank you, Molly. And
thank you to FWPAC. I have really been quite
privileged to work as an ally with such a strong and
dedicated group of women at the NRC. And it's truly
an honor receive this award.
Thank you so much for giving me the
opportunity to serve our cause over the past few
years. And in response to Laura's call during the
panel, I'll say that I am proud to be an ally and
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advocate. And I'm looking forward to continuing our
work together in the years to come.
MS. KEEFE-FORSYTH: All right. Thanks
again, everyone, for attending today. Take care. Be
safe. Thank you.
(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter
went off the record.)
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