Sitting on the giant oriental rugs of Stevens Oriental Rugs of Rhode Island, Betsy Stevens and Debby Mullen rarely come up for air when talking about the Providence Chapter of the Rhode Island Women’s Network. Stevens, the group’s new president and owner of the East Greenwich store, and Mullen, the group’s new vice president, have a plethora of ideas that they just can’t wait to share.
“I don’t know why we work so well together, but we just do,” Stevens said. “Her ideas and my ideas are in tune. We see this entity growing and we see this as an opportunity to make a name for the organization, which has been in the background for years and is unfortunately not widely recognized.”
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Formed in the early 1980s, The Rhode Island Women’s Network is the oldest continuous women’s network in the country, Mullen said. Started as a group of women meeting for dinner once a month, the focus of the group changed, Stevens said, when one woman was bold enough to hand out her business card.
Now with two chapters, the Providence Chapter and the Newport Area Chapter, the group has more than 200 active members.
“In business you feel more comfortable doing things with people you understand and who understand you,” Stevens said. “This group provides that for women.”
But both Mullen and Stevens said for many women networking can be very difficult.
“Women can be very intense when they try and network,” Stevens said. “They put their thinking cap on for a business even when they go out for cocktails. We try and tell them that you need to slow down and progress from the personal to the professional.”
As a result, each meeting begins with an hour of networking.
“It gives women more exposure and at the same time allows them to practice networking with people they are comfortable with,” Mullen said. “Making contacts is a vehicle for them to gain new business.”
Stevens, who moved to Rhode Island after spending more than a decade in the corporate world of New York City, said the group provides more than just business contacts.
“Having been in the corporate world, it always befuddled me that women didn’t feel secure enough to support each other,” she said. “Coming back to Rhode Island I found that here, women feel more comfortable doing business with one another, helping one another, and sharing with one another.”
And Stevens said you don’t have to own your own business to be part of the group.
”We have an eclectic blend of members,” she said, including women starting out in the business world, lawyers, construction workers, a medical librarian, and women who no longer work, but like the company.
The organization’s meeting topics are picked by the members and represent a wide-range of topics, Stevens said, including motivational speakers, women in politics, and even a course on the increasingly popular design know as Feng Shui, adapted.from a Chinese theory.
”Our goal is to give them something they can all use or enjoy at the meetings,” Stevens said. “What we are really trying to be is a resource for women by providing them with all kinds of information.”
Both agree that though women are making strides in the business community, there is still a long way to go.
”Women are getting more comfortable speaking out,” Stevens said. “But unfortunately their voices are not getting louder.”
The two say they try and set an example for other group members, as they are both very outspoken.
“We both consider ourselves extemporaneous speakers,” Stevens said. “But we also enjoy letting people know that it’s okay to be off the wall.”
Stevens said she would also like the group to become a resource for the community, maybe by offering scholarships to students.
“Our goal is helping women,” she said. “But I think it may be time for us to step outside, and show the rest of Rhode Island that we are not just here for ourselves.”
