March 8, 2016 is International Women’s Day and it’s being celebrated in style across Ciena with a Networking Power Hour. Ciena values the diversity of its workforce and respects its employees as individuals, regardless of their race, nationality, religion, sexual orientation, gender, or age. At Ciena, we run an initiative called ‘Women @ Ciena’. This is an internal networking and diversity initiative that aims to motivate and inspire women at all levels and at all disciplines; recognizing and fostering talent.

Women@CienaAs part of the Women@Ciena initiative we are bringing everyone together on this special International Women’s Day with events in all our major city locations and using technology to include remote workers ‘virtually’, wherever they’re working. It’s fantastic that so many co-ordinated events are being held, allowing more Ciena people than ever to take part in the day, make the most of some great networking opportunities, and listen to interesting speakers.

International Women's Day (IWD) is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women, and has been observed since the early 1900's. IWD is all about celebration, reflection, advocacy, and action - whatever that looks like at a local level - and also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity.

Everyone - men and women - can pledge to take a concrete step to help achieve gender parity more quickly - whether to help women and girls achieve their ambitions, call for gender-balanced leadership, respect and value difference, develop more inclusive and flexible cultures, or root out workplace bias.

Ciena’s global women’s network aims to support this goal with events across the globe. We will be celebrating IWD at 3 India sites (2 in Gurgaon & 1 in Mumbai) where we have had activities including health talks, interesting cookery/salad making competition, and our community outreach activities to connect & celebrate as a women’s network.

In the USA we’re hosting a virtual event for our New Hampshire and Massachusetts people plus ten events in Denver, CO; Raleigh, NC; New York, NY; Alpharetta, GA; Spokane, WA; San Jose, CA; Miramar, FL; Petaluma, CA; Dallas, TX and our Corporate Headquarters in Hanover, MD.

In Europe we’re hosting a simultaneous video call between London, Paris and Belfast followed by a networking opportunity and a charity bake-sale to raise funds for local women’s charities.

In Canada, our two main locations in Ottawa and Montreal will run local Networking Power Hours to mark the occasion too.

All events are run by enthusiastic volunteers across the company who want to make an impact on accelerating gender parity within Ciena and beyond. Thanks to everyone taking part!