Introducing Women in the Workplace's Maribeth Fitzpatrick

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At Imarc, we are fortunate to have a large group of talented women. To support them, we host regular meetings of our affiliate group, Women in the Workplace (WITW).

40% of Imarc's leadership ranked at Director-level or above are female.

While our WITW meetings are common knowledge to our team, we realized recently that we've been missing the opportunity to share their knowledge with our wider community and quite frankly... brag about them as we're very proud.

This article is about the current leader of WITW, Director of Front-end Engineering, Maribeth Fitzpatrick who has been a rock-solid member of the Imarc team for an entire decade.

At Imarc, we make it a point to celebrate women year-round. We know that talking about their challenges and accomplishments is vital to a brighter future. Join us!

An abbreviated history of WITW

WITW launched in 2020 during the height of the pandemic. It was one of the many ways Imarc sought to boost engagement and foster community.

The group was spearheaded by Ashley Romagnoli, who has since moved on to run her family's business but is considered an Imarc alumna of the highest caliber. Even during the beginning, Maribeth was performing a pivotal role, but after Ashley left, she took the leadership spot on formally.

While taking the group over was no small effort, Maribeth felt it needed to be done. She said, "I am passionate about making sure our women feel like they can succeed – that they have support. Coming up in my career, I didn't have the specific kind of support that showed me how involved women were in the companies I worked for. For example, I had never seen an employee resource group (ERG) that focused just on women."

2023 recap

While all members are encouraged to present topics throughout the year, Maribeth closed 2023 by presenting one herself. As a leader in Engineering and beyond, she focused her recent presentation on themes and lessons she heard while attending various women in technology events throughout the year.

Some of the themes included the difference between mentorship and sponsorship, the importance of advocacy, how to attract and retain women in the technology industry, career journeys, and finally statistics about women in the technology industry.

Understanding and sharing experiences within relevant industries like technology is crucial for our female-identifying team members. It enables us to support each other effectively and gather strategies for overcoming various challenges.

Q&A with Maribeth

Why did you pick the technology industry and has this choice helped you lead?

"If I'm being honest, I kind of fell into the industry. My first two jobs dealt with software in the healthcare industry. I always dreamed about working at a digital agency and they were the perfect stepping stones to get me to where I am today."

We previously noted your mentors in our piece about you judging the Technovation Girls’ Challenge (TGC). Can you tell us a bit more about why they help you?

"My mentors help me a ton by being sounding boards for ideas I have and giving advice. It's invaluable to have people you trust that you can be open with and ask for honest feedback. It gives you that extra confidence you need."

Have other events like TGC and leadership sessions helped you when it comes to facilitating WITW?

"Absolutely! I attend as many women-focused events as I can and I gather inspiration from there. I try to share what I learn in those sessions and apply those lessons in my day-to-day as well. Last year I attended a few sessions hosted by the Mass Technology Leadership Council (MTLC) including Key Strategies for Women to Thrive, Untapped: Roadmap to Gender Equity in Tech, and Road to Leadership: Fostering Women in Tech Roles.

"I also recently attended their Design Thinking Workshop: Strategies to Retain Women in Tech Roles which was a fun and informative workshop where I not only got to network but work in a group setting with other women in tech."

How do you choose which pieces of professional advice to take and leave?

"At the end of the day, I'm in charge of making the final decision on how I handle a situation, so I take in all of the advice I receive, and either modify or temper it to my personality and rapport with each individual."

Do you feel your work with WITW helps you give back to other women?

"I hope so! I do think it gives the women of Imarc a safe space and the courage to bring up difficult topics, and share advice, whether it's in front of the group or 1:1, something that they may have hesitated to do before."

The future of WITW

While WITW was formed to create a comfortable venue for working women to express concerns and find solutions, it has evolved to be much more.

Imarc's leadership team supports this group by letting us host it during lunches, providing materials when needed, allowing our team members time to create and present topics to our colleagues, and most importantly, participating when it's appropriate.

For many topics, we also invite our male counterparts to provide them with context as to our issues. They too have been remarkable supporters and contributors.

Without our leadership team in the equation, our core team consists of 46% women.

This year we've already covered the topic of glass ceilings and pay equity and are equally excited and energized by the rest of the year's remaining ones: