Moncton woman breaking through in man's world
Published Tuesday November 24th, 2009
Entrepreneurship: Carol Chapman recognized for excellence in marketing work
MONCTON - Carol Chapman jokes that for the last 25 years she has tried to be more like a man in a male-dominated sector in order to rise to the top.
Now, the president of Moncton's C2 Communications Inc. is leveraging the fact that she is a woman.
Chapman is certifying her marketing firm with WeConnect Canada, a new spinoff of the U.S. not-for-profit Women's Business Enterprise National Council, which connects female entrepreneurs with a host of corporations - many of them Fortune 500 companies.
Chapman will be featured in the 2010 edition of the Global Exec Women magazine, a publication of the Global Exec Women International Council, and was honoured at the organization's recent International Women of Influence and Luminary Awards in Toronto, in partnership with WeConnect Canada.
"You know, I've spent 25 years in bigger companies, pretending I'm a guy, wanting to be a man in the man's world in business, especially in marketing," Chapman said in an interview ahead of a luncheon in Moncton to celebrate her achievement, Monday.
"Now they're saying, you're going to get bonused for being a woman."
The executive formed C2 Communications in 2003 after having worked for 18 years at Hawk Communications with such clients as Loblaws Companies Ltd. (TSX:L), McDonald's Corp. (NYSE:MCD), Moosehead Breweries Ltd. and Ganong Bros. Ltd.
She recently spun out a subsidiary, C'volution, to make a "niche play" into cause-based marketing projects and has worked on the Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation's CIBC Run for the Cure and McCain Foods Canada's "Healthier Tomorrows" campaign, to name just two projects.
Chapman was approached by WeConnect Canada after its March formation and was nominated for the award through her affiliation with the not-for-profit agency, which received nearly $100,000 from the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency to get started.
The organization certifies firms that are at least 51 per cent owned, managed and controlled by women and connects them with corporations and public sector members.
The list of corporate members looking for suppliers already includes such firms as Walmart Canada, Staples Inc. (NASDAQ:SPLS), Pfizer Inc. (NYSE:PFE), Cisco Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO), IBM (NYSE:IBM) and BMO Financial Group (TSX:BMO), among many others.
"Once you certify, you literally get this opportunity to have this network unfold," Chapman said.
At the Toronto conference last month, she chatted with heavy hitters at several big corporations looking to create vendor relationships and grow supply chains.
"There is a whole network, and I met senior executives from Walmart, Campbell's Soup, Boeing, because they really want to broaden their supply chain to innovation and women entrepreneurs, in addition to traditionally male-based firms or large multi-nationals," she said.
ACOA's manager of business development, Janice Goguen, helped WeConnect Canada form after she took a trip with agency president, Monique Collette, and Helena Guergis, federal minister of state for the status of women, to New York for a food industry conference a year ago.
They met U.S. representatives of the Women's Business Enterprise National Council, which now has more than 9,000 suppliers on its roster of female entrepreneurs.
Goguen said the initiative fit with her agency's goal to support export expansion for entrepreneurs.
"Diversity has been legislated in the U.S. for about 40 years," Goguen said, explaining how the council formed.
"And what it means is governments at various levels have policies and programs in place to ensure that purchases are made from diversity groups, which includes women," she added.
Goguen said the rules have had a "trickle-down" effect so that private sector companies also look to buy more products from women and other diversity groups.
About 30 of Chapman's friends and colleagues spent the noon hour Monday at the home of Aldéa Landry, president of Landal Inc., former deputy premier of New Brunswick and current chairwoman of Regional Health Authority A.
Landry said she hosted the luncheon to celebrate Chapman's leadership in the community, in addition to her successes in business.
"As a businesswoman, even if she has a small business in terms of numbers, she is very good at forming partnerships to be able to punch above her weight," Landry said.
"The fact that she is now founding a new corporation, C'volution, which is going to do cause marketing, well it shows that she's an entrepreneur, she's with her time and she recognizes opportunities and makes them happen."
Virginia Bradley, the Atlanta-based publisher of Global Exec Women magazine, said Chapman made it to the list of her publication's honourees due in part to her international work.
"When we hand out the awards, we look for women who are doing international business that are women-led but who are also going above and beyond," Bradley said.
Chapman has direct relationships with clients in Canada and the United States and has rolled out projects touching the Middle East, Mexico and Japan.
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