Bentley Center for Women and Business Receives $1 Million from Liberty Mutual Insurance to Advance Young Women’s Leadership

WALTHAM, Mass., March 1 -- Bentley University issued the following news:

The Center for Women and Business (CWB) at Bentley University has joined forces with insurance giant Liberty Mutual Insurance to strengthen young women's leadership and education. Thanks to a generous $1 million grant, Liberty Mutual will be the founding partner of the CWB's new Women's Leadership Program. The program will develop and deliver women's leadership training initiatives and prepare highly-qualified female students for success in their future careers. "CWB Leaders" will be selected to participate in the program based on demonstrated leadership experience and potential.

Grant funds provided by Liberty Mutual will directly support financial awards as well as co-curricular programming. CWB Leaders will participate in various academic and career focused programs from their freshman through senior years, gaining essential skills and experiences that enhance their potential to advance into leadership roles across all areas of business.

"We are thrilled to join forces with Liberty Mutual, a company well-known for its dedication to diversity and inclusion," said Deborah Pine, executive director of the Center for Women and Business. "This grant will help encourage talented young women to pursue an education and career in business with added support and training to help them succeed."

The CWB Women's Leadership Program will focus on workplace leadership and diversity, with an emphasis on gender; utilizing workshops, experiential learning and academic courses in areas such as leadership, negotiation and gender intelligence. Students will benefit from unique exposure to work life through mentoring and visits to organizations where women thrive.

"For Liberty to continue to succeed in the global marketplace, we know we must attract and retain the right skills and the best, most diverse, talent," said Melanie Foley, executive vice president and chief talent and enterprise services officer for Liberty Mutual. "The CWB program helps us strengthen and diversify our talent pipeline with highly-qualified female candidates who are familiar with our business, our people and our goals. Bentley has always provided us with the problem solvers, analytic thinkers and leaders whose skills best fit our environment. We are excited to partner with Bentley on this new initiative and look forward to working with the next generation of insurance leaders."

Bentley and Liberty Mutual have had a long-standing recruiting relationship and Bentley now ranks as the second school in the country in executive representation at Liberty Mutual, with well over 500 Bentley alumni who are current Liberty employees. Alumni and managers from the firm often participate in numerous classroom and recruiting activities, including career workshops, career fairs, career skills videos, and programming developed by the multicultural center and several student clubs.

The CWB is seeking additional corporate partners interested in furthering the mission to positively impact young women's academic and professional careers. Please contact CWB Executive Director Deb Pine.

About the Center for Women and Business

The Center for Women and Business is dedicated to advancing women in business, from the classroom to the boardroom. The CWB identifies and leverages best-in-class policies and practices and provide tools and training to apply in the workplace. Through targeted programs and thought leadership on critical issues, the CWB informs and supports students and professionals. The CWB Women's Leadership Program is essential to our student development goals. Learn more at www.bentley.edu/cwb.

About Liberty Mutual Insurance

Liberty Mutual Insurance helps people preserve and protect what they earn, build, own and cherish. Keeping this promise means we are there when our policyholders throughout the world need us most.

In business since 1912, and headquartered in Boston, Mass., today Liberty Mutual is a diversified insurer with operations in 29 countries and economies around the world. We are the fifth largest property and casualty insurer in the U.S. based on 2015 direct written premium data as reported by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. We also rank 73rd on the Fortune 100 list of largest corporations in the U.S. based on 2015 revenue. As of December 31, 2015, Liberty Mutual had $37.6 billion in annual consolidated revenue.

Liberty employs more than 50,000 people in over 800 offices throughout the world. We offer a wide range of insurance products and services, including personal automobile, homeowners, accident & health, commercial automobile, general liability, property, surety, workers compensation, group disability, group life, specialty lines, reinsurance, individual life and annuity products. You can learn more about us by visiting www.libertymutualinsurance.com.

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