Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A. Inc. has announced that Kay Fernandez, senior vice president of marketing, recently received a Bronze Stevie Award for Women in Business as well as Linkage's 2022 Women in Leadership Executive Impact Award.

The Stevie Awards for Women in Business are the world's premier business awards for female entrepreneurs, executives, employees and the organizations they run. Fernandez was honored in the Women Helping Women — Business category.

She was also selected as one of Linkage's 2022 Women in Leadership Executive Impact Award winners. Recipients are innovators and change-makers who are committed to developing and implementing new approaches to achieving gender parity within their organizations, and beyond.

As a key member of Konica Minolta's executive leadership team, Fernandez is dedicated to empowering other women and continually works toward extending opportunities and creating an environment for her female colleagues to learn, grow and lead. In 2015, she established the Step Forward Program to inspire women in professional excellence. The inclusive monthly program encourages the advancement of women through leadership development skills training and an open forum for both male and female employees to share experiences and best practices. Since its inception, the company has seen a 118% increase in the number of women at the director level.

Most recently — and modeled after the Step Forward program — Fernandez launched Step Together, a new initiative for the empowerment of women in Konica Minolta's dealer channel. The program is intended to inspire the professional development of women of the office technology industry, and bring them together for support, collaboration and inspiration. Through fun and engaging networking events, the program builds community, creates a positive environment to share experiences and supports intentional leaders.

"I feel so honored to be recognized by two such prestigious organizations and fortunate that Konica Minolta supports programs to encourage women to aspire to leadership roles," Fernandez said. "I'm extremely grateful to The Stevie Awards and Linkage for supporting the efforts behind the advancement of women as we strive to achieve gender parity in the workplace."

As the head of marketing at Konica Minolta, Fernandez oversees the efforts of Konica Minolta's CSR team to support the community and carry out Konica Minolta's global mission is to create value for society. She sits on the board of the YWCA of Northern New Jersey, whose mission is to empower women and eliminate racism.

"As a champion for female leaders, Kay works hard to identify ways to support women's advancement in the workplace by creating seats for them at the table," said Sam Errigo, president and CEO, Konica Minolta. "Her efforts have inspired and benefited many women in their career development. Congratulations to Kay on these well-deserved honors."