By Liz Stevens, writer, The American Mold Builder

The number of women in the executive ranks in mold building is on the rise. Why do women choose an executive career in mold building, and what kind of background is good preparation for this type of professional role? AMBA’s members include many successful, respected women in mold building C-suites, and The American Mold Builder magazine talked with three of them about their careers.
 
Julie LaVanway is president of Hanson International, St. Joseph, Missouri. Donna Pursell is CEO of Prestige Mold, Inc., Rancho Cucamonga, California. Carol Ebel is president/CEO of Janler Corp., Chicago, Illinois. The women shared their backgrounds and industry experience, along with their insights into the prevalence of women in mold building.
 
Formal Education
This trio of accomplished mold building executives has something in common: Each of them started her higher education studying accounting. Hanson’s Julie LaVanway earned a Bachelor of Science in Accounting degree from Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan. Prestige Mold’s Donna Pursell began her education at a junior college and then attended California Polytechnic State University, Pomona, California, where she majored in accounting. Janler’s Carol Ebel earned an undergraduate degree in accounting and economics at Loyola University, Chicago, Illinois. Ebel then became a certified public accountant. She went on to graduate school at Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, and earned a master’s degree in business management.
 

Industry Experience 
Pursell landed a role in mold building early on and has stayed for the long term. “My education gave me the fundamentals,” Pursell explained, “but it has been hands-on experience within the industry where I have learned the most.” She has been at Prestige Mold for 42 years, solving real-world challenges under pressure. “There aren’t books that can prepare you for what you’ll come up against,” she said, “or that describe the sense of accomplishment you gain on a regular basis.”

LaVanway got her start at a logistics company and then made the move to an affiliated mold building company. “I came from a sister company – Hanson Logistics – seven years ago to be Hanson International’s controller,” she said. “Two years into that role, I was promoted to vice president, chief financial officer.” LaVanway thought she had reached the height of her career when company leadership approached, asking her to interview to be the next president of Hanson International to succeed the retiring president. “I earned the promotion to president three years ago against the odds,” she explained. “I was in competition with two male candidates who had over 25 years of experience in the industry and with Hanson.” Company ownership and the internal team selected LaVanway because they wanted a fresh set of eyes on the business.

 
Ebel was born into a mold building family, but she did not expect to have a career in the family business. “My father started a mold building company in 1952,” she said. “Some of his brothers worked in the company and so did my older brothers, so I heard a lot about it.”

After receiving her undergraduate degree, Ebel moved to Phoenix, Arizona, and lived there for eight years. “I took a controller position with a large family-run/owned contracting company involved in land development, sand and gravel, road building and mid-rise buildings,” she explained. “That role included lots of budgeting, project development/management and corporate strategy.” She moved on to banking and more land development and building/financing before returning to Illinois for graduate school at Northwestern.

“At that time, I was living with my parents, and I got involved in the business with my dad,” Ebel said. “During graduate school, I did consulting for the company, which then had grown to nearly $30 million in sales, and which also had a component manufacturing side.” When Ebel’s father wanted to retire, she joined the company as president – 35 years ago.
 
Why Mold Building? 
Ebel described what drew her to a career in mold building. “I loved business, in general, because of our family business and the company issues that always were being discussed by my family,” she said. “That background made me eager to understand tax and business and accounting, but I really never aspired to be in charge or to run the family company.” Ebel returned from Arizona, however, with general knowledge about running a business. “When the family company needed some financial expertise and leadership, I had more business knowledge to offer than my brothers in engineering, sales and operations. And so, I stepped in. I love the business.”
 
LaVanway has fallen in love with mold building, too. “Over the past seven years,” she said, “moldmaking has won my heart, and I have become passionate about it. One of the drivers is the talent needed to run a company like this. We have a very highly skilled workforce that is critical to what we do.” For the most part, Hanson grows its talent straight out of high school and enrolls graduates into a Department of Labor-registered apprentice program. “We have a workforce of 90,” LaVanway explained, “and 19 of the teammates are apprentices, which is amazing.” 

Another driving factor for LaVanway is the technology emerging in the industry. “It always is changing and advancing,” she said, “and that is exciting to me. And finally, I love this business because I am improving people’s lives. I have the responsibility to ensure that Hanson’s teammates have a clean, safe and engaging place to work in, with a good income and benefits.”
 
Pursell echoed the commitment to lift up employees in a supportive workplace. “I take pride in being accountable, making decisions and creating an environment where people can thrive and do their best work,” said Pursell. “I lead this company because I am driven to build something meaningful and leave a legacy. Leadership allows me to turn my vision toward long-term success for the business.”

Mold building, in particular, appeals to Pursell. “From a financial and operational standpoint,” she said, “this industry presents unique challenges – tight margins, capital-intensive equipment and the need for efficiency at every step. Being part of an industry that produces tangible, high-demand products is both rewarding and intellectually engaging.”
 
Prevalence of Women in the Industry 
The women commented on the growing number of women in mold building and its supply chain, yet lamented that finding a woman in a mold building corporate setting still is an unusual sight. “From what I have seen,” said LaVanway, “there are not very many of us, but the situation is improving!”

According to Pursell, women have made stronger inroads into businesses that are adjacent to mold building. “I do see more women in upper executive roles with our customers and throughout our supply chain,” said Pursell. “Just speaking from my experience, within the moldmaking and molding community, women in these roles are few and far between, leaving room for growth.”
 
“Thirty-five years ago,” said Ebel, “I would have said I was almost a loner in the industry. Today, there are more of us, but the executive ranks still are predominantly male.” Ebel noted that there is a group of women who are running companies, but in many cases, they are doing this after having taken over a company that was started by their father or husband. “I haven’t met a woman who has started her own mold building business,” she said, “but I have seen some who have taken over the lead role and developed their companies into something larger.”
 
Ebel is one of the women who has guided her company toward modernization and growth. “After 35 years, I feel like I have made a big mark on Janler,” she said. “Forty years ago, when I started, there wasn’t the kind of equipment like we have today, and our approach to training was very different from what it is now.” Ebel stressed that the relationships she has cultivated with employees have spurred her to champion causes for better health benefit options and for training and education to build a better workforce but also to improve the lives of Janler’s employees. 

Career Inroads 
The trio of executives has found that the gains that have been made in attracting and keeping more women in mold building, in the C-suite and in general are modest and are due to a handful of identifiable reasons.
 
LaVanway cited the value of role models and companies that understand the realities of the work-life balance. “Having other women to look up to has helped, for sure,” she said, “and so has making work hours less rigid and more flexible to accommodate those who have a career and a family… I have five kids!”
 
Ebel shared her experience. “Over the years,” she said, “I’ve made a lot of efforts to attract and hire women, but I have not been very successful in finding women who want to do the work of a mold builder or a machinist, or in the quality area.”

She noted that in the suburbs of her Chicago-area company, there are good high school shop machining programs, but most of the shop students are male. “In colleges or junior colleges,” Ebel said, “there are some good technology and machining engineering programs. So women do get into engineering, but in the high school shop classes, females are hard to find.” High school counselors, she said, say that females are just not attracted to mold building and manufacturing in general, perhaps due to old misconceptions of industry workplaces. “‘Dirty, dark and dumb’ was how I used to sum up those misconceptions,” she said, “when, in fact, our workplaces are bright, clean and organized. We must work on changing that perception because people in our industry earn excellent wages and have very good lifestyles.”
 
Pursell agreed that presenting the industry’s opportunities and giving girls and women more access to STEM education early will help attract more talent. “I believe that education and manufacturing career awareness have helped drive women into the molding world,” said Pursell. “We have seen more female engineers coming out of college. Early STEM program exposure for young women introduces them to manufacturing careers that I never had even considered, nor even knew existed when I was younger.”
 
Women bring knowledge, talent, work ethic and fresh perspectives to manufacturing and mold building. The more women are hired at every level in a company, the more that company expands its horizons.
 
More information: www.hansoninternational.com, wwww.janler.com and www.prestigemold.com