Collegiate Leadership Institute Participants Learn a Vital Career Skill: Negotiating with Confidence
More than 100 students in the SWE Collegiate Leadership Institute (CLI) will receive customized early-career education at WE17. CLI participants will learn networking skills, how to manage common career mistakes, and how to thrive in a male-dominated industry. As part of this program, Katie Donovan will present First Job, First Negotiation on the expectations, preparation, and ultimately the language to negotiate pay and benefits.
Katie Donovan
Katie Donovan is a pay equity consultant and speaker. Her company, Equal Pay Negotiations LLC, is dedicated to achieving equal pay by consulting for all the stakeholders: employees, employers, and policy makers. The company works with individuals to negotiate their pay and benefits. Employers and policy makers are taught to eliminate the unintended biases in the hiring, promotion, and review processes. Donovan brings a unique and pragmatic perspective to the work due to her 360-degree background in employment, which includes account management at a staffing firm and an applicant-tracking developer, and as a managing director of a trade association.
Donovan speaks and conducts workshops on equal pay, salary negotiations, and unintended biases in hiring at such venues as Harvard Business School, NASDAQ, Women in Construction, SEUI Interns and Residents, Society of Women Engineers, and Mom Corps. She is a sought-after commentator on pay equity and women in business by media including Mashable, BBC, SELF Magazine, Forbes, NPR, Huffington Post, and more.
A Personal Passion for Pay Equity
Donovan’s involvement on the women’s economic equality issues goes beyond her work. She is a founding and steering committee member of the MA Equal Pay Coalition and a co-president of the MA branch of the American Association of University Women (AAUW). She supports banning salary history questions to close the gender pay gap. The recently signed Massachusetts Equal Pay Law is the first law in the nation to include such a provision. More than twenty states and municipalities are following Massachusetts’ lead with bills and executive orders to end the practice.
Background
Donovan earned her MBA from McCallum School of Business, Bentley University in Waltham, MA and a BA in Economics from College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, MA.
She grew up in Chelsea, MA and has stayed close to her roots, as has her extended family. She loves Boston and its two best sports, Red Sox baseball and politics. When not working, she can be found enjoying Boston and Cape Cod with friends and family, practicing yoga, kayaking, and baking.
