Founders, investors, leaders, Hearst editors, and supporters gathered at this year’s Female Force Summit, an impactful event celebrating Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day. Presented by ELLE, Good Housekeeping, Cosmopolitan, Women’s Health, and Oprah Daily, the morning featured conversations about growth and innovation, career longevity, and rewriting the rules.
Below, we invite you to relive the day with us. Recordings of each session serve as a reminder that women can support one another’s business endeavors through networking, advice, funding, and community.
THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS: Spectrum Business, Pura
SPECIAL THANKS TO: BLKSWN
Session 1: The Next Era of Shopping:
How Two Founders Built Phia in the Age of AI
Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni joined Cosmopolitan Editor-in-Chief Willa Bennett for a conversation about founder-led growth, building trust and taste in consumer AI, and what it takes to move fast while staying grounded in values and impact. Their company Phia—an AI shopping agent designed to better match consumers with brands in real time—“answers a question that every shopper thinks of: Should I buy this?” said Gates. “In one click users can find out: Is this the right price? Is it gonna hold value? And is there a better alternative?” What started with a $250,000 investment from their professor, who encouraged the pair to turn their class project into a business, just closed a $35 million Series A funding round. “It still feels surreal to say,” said Kianni. “We’re definitely still in a moment of gratitude and appreciation—even just saying that out loud.”
Session 2: Welcome to the Female Force
Eve Burton, Executive Vice President and Chief Legal Officer of Hearst Corporation & cofounder and Chairwoman of HearstLab took the stage to deliver opening remarks. Introduced by President of Hearst Magazines, Debi Chirichella, Burton discussed the success of HearstLab, a commercial engine for women-led companies. Since its creation in 2016, the 93 companies it has invested in are worth an incredible $3.2 billion.
Session 3: The Long Game:
How Two Legends Turned Sports Mastery into Sustainable Meaning
Two pioneering women in their fields—Misty Copeland, the first Black principal ballerina at American Ballet Theatre, and Allyson Felix, an Olympic champion track-and-field athlete and cofounder of Saysh and Always Alpha—shared that getting a big break is really just the start of the journey. “Getting in the door happened easily for me, but it was staying there that was difficult,” Copeland said. In their session, moderated by Women’s Health Executive Editor Abigail Cuffey, the two discussed how they’re transforming their athletic success into lasting change for women in sports.
Session 4: Click to Impact:
When Connectivity and Purpose Work as One
In a conversation presented by Spectrum Business, Executive Editor of Oprah Daily, Paulie Dibner, asked CEO and cofounder of Beam Impact Viveka Hulyalkar about the missed opportunity that inspired her company. “In a lot of cases, brands are already giving tons of money away [to nonprofit causes] behind the scenes and consumers have absolutely no idea,” said Hulyalkar, who added that with so much noise and greenwashing it can be hard to tell which brands actually walk the walk. Beam helps clear that up, partnering with online retailers like Tarte and Moleskine so that, at checkout, consumers can choose which nonprofit receives 1% of their purchase. By using Beam, retailers are seeing a huge shift in the psychology of their consumers. “People are comparison shopping much less, they’re finishing purchases, and we can prove that brands are making 7-12% more revenue overnight.”
Learn more about how Spectrum Business powers Beam’s day-to-day operations here.
Session 5: The Edge of Innovation:
Women Using Tech to Rewrite the Rules
Women have made huge strides in tech, but there’s still more to be done. Elspeth Velten, editor-in-chief of Good Housekeeping, brought three female founders to the stage to discuss what is starting to shift in the industry and where barriers still exist: Basha Rubin, cofounder of Priori, Kaitlyn Albertoli, cofounder of Buzz Solutions, and Milena Berry, cofounder of PowerToFly. Berry’s company works to literally put dollars in women’s pockets by connecting tech companies to a powerful pipeline of female talent, while Albertoli is using AI to make advancements in an industry that is struggling to progress: electrical utilities. At Priori, Rubin has helped companies save millions on outside counsel by connecting them with a network of vetted lawyers.
Session 6: Scented With Purpose:
Girls’ Education, Locally Led
The story of activist Malala Yousafzai continues to inspire action around the globe. But, as Parampreet Singh, chief external affairs officer for the Malala Fund pointed out: supporting local efforts to give girls an education can be the most impactful. “When girls are out of school, it’s not the girls who suffer, it’s their families, it’s their communities, it’s their countries,” she explained. Community-driven solutions are key for lasting change, which is why Pura, the home fragrance brand, partnered with the Malala Fund to directly support local efforts in Tanzania, Brazil, Nigeria, and Pakistan via their scent collaboration. Watch the video below to learn more about the collaboration with Singh, Lindsey Kneuven, chief impact officer at Pura, and Claire Stern Milch, Senior Digital Director of ELLE.
Session 7: From Pressure to Poise:
A Modern Blueprint for Women Who Lead
To close out the day, 20/20 co-anchor and ABC News correspondent Deborah Roberts interviewed Ida Liu, CEO of HSBC Private Bank, who is frequently named as one of the most influential women in finance. Liu’s career began in finance, pivoted to fashion, and returned to finance in 2007. “Your career is never a linear path forward. Sometimes you need to move two steps back in order to move two steps forward,” she explained. The conversation focused on smart risk-taking, breaking barriers, and the habits that help build a lasting legacy. For Liu, that would mean chipping away at not only the glass ceiling, but what she calls the “bamboo” ceiling as well—the barriers for Asian women in their careers. “One of the things I use to measure myself is not just how the business performs, but how many seats I pull up to the table,” she said.
