Celebrating Women In Management With Leonie Sheehan
As part of international Women’s Day we are celebrating Women in Management and the challenges they face within their careers.
Leonie is the salon manager at Atelier Hair and has a social media marketing Instagram page called Your Statement .
Through Your Statement Leonie assists local businesses and offers marketing advice to help promote their services through social media marketing.
What challenges have you faced as a female within your industry?
Luckily for me, the hairdressing industry is pretty female oriented so I haven’t met many challenges in that case. I do find as a woman in management I tend to be met with judgements that men wouldn’t.
For instance if you stand your ground or implement a rule a woman can be seen as ‘bitchy’ where as a man is strong – (in my team we’re very empowering of each other). Ive also got the ‘your the manager?’ look a few times as a small girl but I’ve always been in managers roles from a young age and had this leadership quality that I’ve been so lucky to pick up from other amazing female managers from I was younger.
Who is your female role-model and why?
I always had this view that the woman above me was my role model. When I was a sales assistant my manager was my role model, the woman I aimed to be.
I’ve always been a real female advocate, a little cheerleader for women working their asses off to get where they want to be and smashing their goals – those women will always be my role models. The CEOs, the Business owners, the full time mothers, the students who are starting their paths, the models with the unreal wardrobes – women are incredible.
What advice would you give to the younger female generation and what can they do to make a difference?
I feel like the younger female generation have such an empowerment around them and I LOVE IT. So much more educated than I was. My advice would be keep following what you want, know your worth and ALWAYS empower other women no matter what. I find there’s so much more strength behind women who empower each other. Never ever let someone tell you that you can’t do something because ‘you’re just a little girl’. YOU CAN DO IT and you can probably do it in heels