Babson will host its 16th annual Black Affinity Conference on Feb. 27-28, 2015.

The two-day celebration during Black History month was created to strengthen innovation and entrepreneurial leadership among Babson’s alumni, students, faculty, and staff. The event is open to the public and costs $25.

Successful entrepreneurs will share their visions, and a series of interactive workshops and panel discussions are planned to help build entrepreneurial skills and raise diversity awareness.

Registration and Full Conference Schedule »

Keynote Speakers

Liz Walker will welcome and address the Saturday morning session. Walker is an award-winning television journalist, a documentary film producer, an entrepreneur and a humanitarian currently working in the war-torn country of Sudan. She is on the ministerial staff of Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Jamaica Plain, where she works with young people. She is the founder and principal of The Walker Group LLC, Communications Specialists, focused on non-profit capacity building and corporate public engagement.

Richelieu Dennis ’91 a Babson Alum, Founder and CEO of the Sundial Group will share the evolution of his entrepreneurial journey. Sundial is a leading maker of natural skincare products that includes the 20-year old SheaMoisture brand. Dennis will be the keynote speaker for the afternoon session on Saturday.

Workshops

Principles of Objectivity− Babson Professor Elizabeth R. Thornton will coach participants to better understand how objectivity, the most critical management skill, can help entrepreneurial leaders make smarter decisions for better results. This action-based curriculum is based on Thornton’s recently published book, The Objective Leader: How to Leverage the Power of Seeing Things as They Are.

Color Brave Action Workshop – Babson Professor of Management, Tina Opie, will ask participants to consider how to make themselves and their organizations more “Color Brave” as suggested in a TED Talk by Dreamworks Animation Chairman, Mellody Hobson. Opie will lead a compassionate workshop about a conversation that is uncomfortable for most.

Circles of Influence – Babson Associate Professor of Management, Wendy Murphy, will explore how positive relationships across the work-life-interface facilitates career success. Murphy recently coauthored Strategic Relationships at Work: Creating your circle of mentors, sponsors, and peers for success in business and life ,which applies the scholarship of mentoring to help everyone become an entrepreneurial protégé.

Film Screening, Award Presentation

The conference will screen the award-winning documentary by Gary Ford, Justice Is A Black Woman: The Life & Work Of Constance Baker Motley. The film chronicles the inspirational life of Constance Baker Motley who became the lead lawyer in desegregation and trespass prosecution cases throughout the South after 1954, and won nine of ten cases before the U.S. Supreme Court from 1961-1965. She was also the only female attorney of the legal team that won the landmark desegregation case, Brown v. Board of Education.

Rounding out the conference events is the presentation of The Black Alumni Achievement Award.

To learn more about the conference, please contact Katrina Fludd, ’08 M ’10, Chair, Babson 2015 Black Affinity Conference at [email protected].