Founder of Gravitas apparel to keynote 2021 CWLI Impact Leadership Dinner in Chattanooga

Photo contributed by Chattanooga Women's Leadership Institute / Lisa Sun, the founder and CEO of Gravitas, will keynote the CWLI Impact Leadership dinner on Sept. 9.
Photo contributed by Chattanooga Women's Leadership Institute / Lisa Sun, the founder and CEO of Gravitas, will keynote the CWLI Impact Leadership dinner on Sept. 9.
photo Photo contributed by Chattanooga Women's Leadership Institute / Lisa Sun, the founder and CEO of Gravitas, will keynote the CWLI Impact Leadership dinner on Sept. 9.

The Chattanooga Women's Leadership Institute will host its 16th annual Impact Leadership Dinner in September and will expand the Impact event over two days to include a symposium and keynote luncheon.

Lisa Sun, founder and CEO of Gravitas, will speak at the Impact dinner on Sept. 9. Sun began the retail company with a global patent for building shapewear directly into dresses. Two months after Sun launched Gravitas, her first collection was featured in O, The Oprah magazine, People magazine, and The Today Show in the same month. Sun and Gravitas have since been featured on CNN and in Forbes, Fast Company, New York magazine, Elle, Marie Claire and InStyle.

Prior to founding Gravitas, Sun spent 11 years at McKinsey & Company where she advised leading luxury, fashion and beauty brands and retailers in the U.S., Asia, Europe and Latin America on strategic and operational issues. At McKinsey, Sun was considered one of the firm's top experts in the luxury and fashion space.

"Lisa embodies our 2021 theme: Power," said Tangela Johnson, chair of the CWLI board of directors. "Women continue to face societal systems that make our ability to self-actualize challenging. But in spite of this, we are working hard to gain ground and to power forward."

This year marks the 25th anniversary of CWLI, and the organization is celebrating the milestone by expanding its signature Impact event to two days.

"We have reimagined this event, scaling it to two days, to make it an outstanding resource to the greater Chattanooga business community," said Kim Shumpert, CEO of CWLI. "Together, we are going to explore economic, social, and policy issues related to professional women."

On day two of the event, at the Impact luncheon keynote on Sept. 10, Sun will be joined by Kweillin Ellingrud for a deep dive on gender equity in the workplace. Ellingrud is a McKinsey & Company consultant and contributing author. Sun and Ellingrud were contemporaries at McKinsey & Company.

Julie Davis and Sharon Law will serve as co-chairs for Impact 2021 event. Davis is a financial advisor and partner with The Round Table Advisors of Raymond James. She has been a member of CWLI for six years and served in leadership roles including Membership Committee chair, Finance Committee chair and treasurer. Law is the Tennessee regional manager for Thompson Engineering and is based in the firm's Chattanooga office. With a background in public relations, business development, and community relations, Law is responsible for developing the engineering/architecture firm's client and project portfolio in Tennessee.

- Compiled by Mary Fortune

If you go

The Chattanooga Women’s Leadership Institute will host the 16th annual IMPACT Leadership Dinner on Thursday, Sept. 9 from 5:30-8:30 p.m. The Impact event will also include a second day of activities on Friday, Sept. 10, from 7:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. at the Chattanooga Convention Center.A limited number of tables and individual tickets will be available for purchase online at cwli.org/impact.

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