Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Inc. (Konica Minolta) announced Kay Fernandez, Senior Vice President, Marketing, recently received a Bronze Stevie Award for Women in Business as well as Linkage’s 2022 Women in Leadership Executive Impact Award.
The Stevie Awards for Women in Business are the world’s premier business awards for female entrepreneurs, executives, employees and the organisations they run. Fernandez was honoured in the Women Helping Women – Business category.
Fernandez was also selected as one of Linkage’s 2022 Women in Leadership Executive Impact Award winners. Recipients are innovators and change-makers who are committed to developing and implementing new approaches to achieving gender parity within their organisations, and beyond.
In 2015, Fernandez established the Step Forward Programme to inspire women in professional excellence. The inclusive monthly programme encourages the advancement of women through leadership development skills training and an open forum for both male and female employees to share experiences and best practices. Since its inception, the company has seen a 118% increase in the number of women at the director level.
Most recently, and modelled after the Step Forward programme, Fernandez launched Step Together, a new initiative for the empowerment of women in Konica Minolta’s dealer channel. The programme is intended to inspire the professional development of women of the office technology industry, and bring them together for support, collaboration and inspiration. Through fun and engaging networking events the program builds community, creates a positive environment to share experiences and supports intentional leaders.
“I feel so honoured to be recognised by two such prestigious organisations, and fortunate that Konica Minolta supports programmes to encourage women to aspire to leadership roles,” said Fernandez. “I’m extremely grateful to The Stevie Awards and Linkage for supporting the efforts behind the advancement of women as we strive to achieve gender parity in the workplace.”
As the head of marketing at Konica Minolta, Fernandez oversees the efforts of Konica Minolta’s CSR team to support the community and carry out Konica Minolta’s global mission is to create value for society. She sits on the board of the YWCA of Northern New Jersey, whose mission is to empower women and eliminate racism.
“As a champion for female leaders, Kay works hard to identify ways to support women’s advancement in the workplace by creating seats for them at the table,” said Sam Errigo, President and CEO, Konica Minolta. “Her efforts have inspired and benefitted many women in their career development. Congratulations to Kay on these well-deserved honours!”
