Employee Resource Groups at Zurich Benefit from the Summit

The Global Leadership Network’s premier two-day leadership event of the year has been held annually in August for the last 25+ years. Recognized as one of the largest leadership events of its kind, The Global Leadership Summit (GLS) brings leaders and aspiring leaders together from around the world and from various backgrounds and industries including ministry, business, government, education, entertainment, and more.

But the GLS has become more than just an event—what makes it what it is today are the leaders from companies like Zurich North America, who are part of a diverse audience of curious, growth-minded, change-driven people with a vision for positive transformation in their organizations and communities. Through the GLS, these leaders are equipped and empowered to take action toward creating a better world.

One of those leaders is Julia Oltmanns, Outreach Coordinator for Good NewZ and Director of Workplace Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) Services for Zurich. With a passion for creating equal opportunity in the workplace, she decided to take action to address this growing need in an increasingly diverse society. “I desire to see everyone have equal opportunity, but we are still far from that dream,” said Julia. “I became convinced I needed to do more.”

And more she did—in 2018, Julia was one of the founding members of Good NewZ, the first Christian and faith-based Employee Resource Group (ERG) at Zurich, collaborating broadly both within Zurich and beyond. As a result, Good NewZ has inspired an Interfaith Network group where colleagues from different faiths work together to improve inclusion and belonging for everyone. Good NewZ also collaborates with the eight other employee resource groups (ERGs) at Zurich North America. Employees at Zurich have been participating in the GLS since 2019, when Good NewZ and another ERG called Emerging LeaderZ began bringing the Summit to Zurich’s employees. Further, Good NewZ realized that the GLS would be a perfect addition to its work with external organizations like Community Leadership Fellows, which seeks to provide leadership development training to future community leaders on the West Side of Chicago.

There is no better way to get inspiring, life-changing leadership development than at the GLS.

Through the collaboration with Good NewZ, several community leaders attended the GLS in 2021. “Good NewZ established a long-term relationship with community organizations on the West Side of Chicago, and especially the Austin neighborhood,” said Julia. “I believe it’s imperative that we invest in the communities where our organizations operate. This is necessary to ultimately see more employment opportunities for all types of people at Zurich and in corporate America as a whole. When Good NewZ learned that Community Leadership Fellows was looking for leadership development for the Fellows who go through the program, we thought The Global Leadership Summit would be perfect. There is no better way to get inspiring, life-changing leadership development than at the GLS. That’s why Zurich has decided to send 25 more future community leaders from the Community Leadership Fellows program to the GLS in 2022.”

Not only has the GLS been a tool to empower community leaders, but Julia was also encouraged to go deeper with her passion to create greater diversity, equity, and inclusion in workplaces across America. “For 14 years, I’ve been specializing in legal advice on DEI matters, and unfortunately I wasn’t seeing much progress in our society in this area,” said Julia. “I became increasingly discouraged. But when I attended the Summit in 2019, I left believing I could do something about it if I would simply accept the call. This led to my decision to leave my legal position in employment law and work in DEI full-time with a focus on helping more companies in this area.”

Zurich saw this need too and recently created a groundbreaking DEI assessment and consulting service for customers, led by Julia herself, within the Zurich Resilience Solutions team. “The GLS helps us challenge the status quo by inspiring us to believe that we all can have a positive impact on this world, and we can start right where we are,” said Julia.

What may happen in your life when you attend The Global Leadership Summit?

Are you part of an organization with Employee Resource Groups? Find out how The Global Leadership Summit can benefit you and your organization at GlobalLeadership.org/ShareGLS.