EWA raises funds to support funding for women leaders whose organizations cannot or will not support them

Once upon a time, a serial entrepreneur and immigrant to the USA, Larraine Segil decided to take her decades of experience and pay it forward to future generations of women who had some of her same challenges of "being exceptional but different."

​Her goal was to guide and connect them. She endowed the educational institutions that educated her and selected upper career Exceptional Women Who Walked the Road Less Traveled from those places annually. They called themselves the Larraine Segil Scholars (or LSS). These women learned from Larraine how to guide, connect and mentor each other and Larraine realized that there was a need that went beyond the institutions that had educated her. That is why she founded the Non-Profit Public Foundation, Exceptional Women Awardees (EWA).

Founding EWA.

​Larraine approached some of the world's leading companies and asked them if they wanted their high potential, high-level women to be enabled to rise even further in their organizations through the EWA Proprietary Metrics Driven Mentoring and Executive Coaching group by volunteer C-level Executives, and if so, if they would support this program?

The answer was a resounding 'yes'.

Aspirational Women

KPMG, Adecco, Intel, Cisco, Korn Ferry, Amgen, UBS, ITV Studios America, Frontier Communications, Cisco, Amgen, GlobalLogic (Hitachi), White & Case Lawyers and many more nominated their women executives, and continue to do so. Some women whose companies would not support them, nominated themselves.

C- Level Women

Over time, it became clear that there is a  segment of women for whom EWA has become a critical community. Most of them nominate themselves. They are women at C level who are either thinking of transitioning into a portfolio career, paying it forward along with Board work, or selling their businesses or the ones they are running, or even moving to another C level position. These women find when they make these transitions, they leave behind their identity, community and often their purpose with the P&L they just left. We fill that gap with a peer group of intellectual stimulation, mutual referrals, support and community. EWA now has multiple cohorts annually which are only C level and Board level women.

Public Sector Women
EWA fundraises to enable a public sector woman to join selected cohorts ( LAPD, FBI, ATF and more) at no cost

The Awardee not only benefits in her own career, but she also learns how to coach and mentor, and joins the Alumnae group to pass her knowledge on to those who follow. The ladder of success for our women is always moving in both directions - reaching up and reaching down.

The accepted Candidate is awarded participation in a customized and personalized Peer to Peer Certified Mentoring Program. She will have a dedicated Mentor who also acts as a liaison to the entire network of over 35 industries, using a proprietary metrics-driven in-person and online Mentoring Program. As a graduate, she joins the Alumnae, enabling her to be mentored for life! Download PDF for more information

Her C-level Mentor provides 9 in-person days and twice a month Zoom mentor sessions,  metrics-based, intensive and one-on-one. She interacts with a cohort of high potential, high-level women leaders or C Level women depending on the cohort, from multiple industries, accessing the growing network of EWA's as well as globally recognized women leaders in multiple CEO popups during her program. When she becomes an alumna, she is mentored for life. Our customized Metrics Driven, Individual Mentoring, and Coaching for our EWA's guides her on how to progress in the corporate, organizational, or portfolio environment as well as gives her advice on balancing career, personal, physical for best outcomes leading to higher productivity for herself, as well as her employer. Society benefits when women rise, as the statistics of only 29% of all employees in mid-career roles who are women and a paltry 8% of CEOs who are women, are bad for business. Another phenomenon is that when C-level women consider moving away from that role and transitioning into another C-level role or a portfolio career  -they lose their community, their identity, and their work friends  - it's a lonely place, not addressed by any other organization. EWA brings those women community, identity and a new group of peers, for the rest of their lives. Download PDF for more information