CEO-in-Residence Inspires, Mentors Students across the Disciplines

Anita Erskine ’99, CEO of Anita Erskine Media, encouraged students to embrace diversity, overcome failure and get out of their comfort zones during her week-long residency

March 8, 2023

The Trent Voices podcast caught up with award-winning communications professional, broadcast journalist, television producer and host Anita Erskine ’99 during her stint as Trent University’s CEO in Residence. We talked to her about returning to campus after almost 20 years, her experience working with Trent’s current cohort of students, and how Trent continues to inform her life and career. Listen to that interview now.

During her time as CEO-in-Residence, media icon Anita Erskine ’99 spoke to Trent University students across the disciplines about business ethics, how to see problems as opportunities, overcoming bias, embracing diversity and how to pick up the pieces after a failure to ‘live your wildest dreams.’

“Through the CEO-in-Residence, I gained the opportunity to come back to Trent - my nurturing ground where I developed all my courage and fortitude,” says the Trent alumna who is an award-winning communications professional from Ghana, CEO of Anita Erskine Media and has twice been ranked one of the 100 Most Influential Women in Africa. “The experience opened my eyes to how open this wonderful young generation is to being guided to face the world head-on and how eager they are to see what the world in its entirety has to offer them.

The CEO-in-Residence program, coordinated through the School of Business and the student-alumni mentorship program Life After Trent, gives students at both the Peterborough and Durham GTA campuses access and opportunities to learn from business leaders across the country and around the globe. During her residency from February 27 to March 3, Erskine inspired students through one-on-one mentorship sessions, meetups, lectures and a panel discussion.

During her first public talk on the Symons Campus, entitled ‘Innovation, Inspiration, and Inclusion in the New School of Business,’ Erskine discussed moving out of your comfort zone to meet and learn from people who don’t look like you. As an international student, Erskine says the biggest gift she gave herself was to immerse herself in campus life and meet others outside of the Trent International community. “Go out there and do something uncomfortable and change the world,” she told the audience.

Gender stereotypes, meanwhile, were the focus of the panel discussion led by Erskine, Gillian Kunza ’04, CEO of Designed Securities Ltd.; Emily Whetung ’03, a lawyer and chief emeritus of Curve Lake First Nation; and Kristi Honey, a member of the Trent board of governors and CAO for the Township of Uxbridge.

During the discussion ‘Leading Women Speak: What Leadership Means to the Fight for Gender Equality,’ the panelists spoke to students, staff and faculty about issues including having to work harder than men for promotions and raises, relying on support systems to take care of family matters to avoid burnout, and how to be a successful female leader without being cutthroat.

Erskine capped off her residency with a day-long visit to Trent Durham GTA, where she offered one-on-one mentoring sessions to students, class visits to Business courses and a public talk attended by students, faculty and staff where she spoke about changemaking, recognizing and harnessing your passions, and navigating the twists of life after Trent.