A 21-year veteran of commercial real estate, Morse has consistently been a top producer for Grubb & Ellis, and in 2006 the San Jose Business Journal recognized her as one of the top three brokers in the Silicon Valley. The Association of Silicon Valley Brokers has nominated her twice as Office Broker of the Year. In 2009 she became the first woman president of the Northern California Chapter of SIOR, whose membership is less than 2% women. Morse chaired the CREW Connection Project that resulted in the donation of more than $140,000 in services and materials to relocate Career Closet’s San Jose facility. In the past 12 months, Morse completed 38 transactions for tenants such as National University, Allen Systems Group and Iron Construction, to name just a few. Foremost among her goals, she says, is “to provide the best professional commercial real estate service to my clients to meet both their short-term and long-term goals, and to help young women succeed in brokerage.”

Wise represents companies in the acquisition, leasing and financing of real estate and business ventures and specializes in the representation of emerging and established life-sciences and technology companies in their acquisition and development efforts. Among her greatest accomplishments in the past year was assisting a client in managing a $650-million loan portfolio and recasting a $60-million warehousing loan for cash-flow management. She also represented tenants in leases of more than 1.6 million square feet of office, R&D and retail space. Wise has been on the board of directors for the Silicon Valley Law Foundation since 1996. “With wild swings between moribund deals and life-threatening workouts, today’s market faces the greatest challenges I’ve seen in my career,” she says. “I’m confident that demand for solid commercial projects will return, but not before a number of these are sacrificed and someone figures out how to access needed capital.”

Wilson concentrates her law practice in transactional real estate law, representing landlords leasing regional shopping centers and lifestyle centers, tenants negotiating shopping center and street retail leases and landlords and tenants negotiating office and industrial leases. Most recently, she held a position as partner at DLA Piper and has experience representing clients acquiring and disposing of real property and other assets, and represents borrowers and lenders in loan transactions secured by real estate and personal property. Wilson is a member of the board of directors of the Friends of San Francisco City Planning, a non-profit organization founded to support planning activities not funded by the City of San Francisco. “Faced with ongoing uncertainty in real estate and the financial markets, legal and business advisors will serve clients well by focusing on forward-looking tasks rather than the way deals were done in the past,” she states. “Stakeholders need to understand each other’s business needs to bring substance to the mantra of ‘partnering.’”

As lead developer at Keenan, Williams is responsible for shepherding projects across the entire spectrum of entitlement challenges. In the past year, she entitled projects valued at more than $500 million, and she was awarded a certificate of recognition from the California Local Government Coalition for her contribution towards the development of the Coyote Valley Specific plan. “Women are making good strides in the industry, with an increasing role in management and leadership,” she says. “We are particularly skilled working with community groups, stakeholders and government officials in a collaborative way to move projects forward to successful completion. We are also tough and effective negotiators.”

White is the lead staff person in charge of administration, programming and fundraising for the 2,400 member organization. One of her best-known accomplishments is the Transit Oriented Development Marketplace, which other ULI district councils are now emulating. In terms of bringing diversity to membership, the district council recently organized a meeting of private, for-profit female developers. An example of White’s work in the past year is the California 2020 initiative, which is now being pushed forward by all the California district councils. CA 2020 has led to the publication of a white paper. “The land-use and development industries are populated largely by men,” White says. “As an example, the current female ULI membership is around 20%. It is essential as minorities become the majority by 2050 that both racial minorities and women play a larger role in the commercial real estate industry.”

Snider has oversight of five business units and all real estate-related activities, including development, asset and property management, leasing, acquisition and disposition of commercial and residential real estate for Stanford’s $1.6-billion land-endowment portfolio. She also has responsibility for direction and oversight of the Stanford Research Park, comprised of 700 acres of land and 10.2 million square feet of office and R&D buildings. Among her top accomplishments in the past year was maintaining an occupancy rate of 95% within the park. Income from the park directly funds Stanford University’s faculty and programs. She is treasurer of AYSO Regional Organization and a coach of YMCA and AYSO Youth Basketball and Soccer. “The role of women in real estate has changed significantly in the past 20 years,” she states. “The most striking aspect of this change is that the women in senior leadership positions simply don’t think of themselves nor sense that they are perceived differently from their peers in the industry.”

As head of planning for the past four years, Shearly directs, assigns, supervises and plans the activities of the department, develops programs, conduct studies, prepare reports and make recommendations to the city manager, the planning commission and the city council. With 20 years in the business, she oversee budget for the Planning Department, oversees the development of the 2030 General Plan, supports infill development and develops specific plans for high priority opportunities to enhance the city’s economic recovery. “The future commercial market will be driven by sustainability,” she says. “The idea of employees all going to one large corporate building will be passé—employees will work from home, etc. Related to the changing role of women—it is noteworthy that many of the jobs affected by the economic downturn are traditionally men’s jobs—construction, banking and finance and auto manufacturing. Many of the jobs that are traditionally women’s jobs are “recession-proof”—healthcare services, etc. That fact will affect women in the future, not unlike Rosie the Riveter in World War II. Predictions for the future—global warming, climate change and sustainability will be the watchwords, not unlike environment and recycling were in the early '70s.”

Sammartino oversees the management of a 4.5-million-square-foot portfolio of office and retail. Her expertise is in asset and property management, financing, marketing and lease negotiations. She is involved in all company acquisitions and dispositions including due diligence, contract negotiations, financing and closings. In addition, she oversees day-to-day company operations including human resources and investor relations. In the past 12 months she successfully negotiated leases for 160,000 square feet of office, and continued the development of two million square feet of class A space designed to achieve a LEED gold certification. Among these assets was Moffett Towers. She is a member of the San Francisco Auxiliary benefiting Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital. “One of the most important trends in the market is the continued shift toward green development,” she says. “As the number of green buildings increases and sustainable development becomes more mainstream, non-green buildings potentially face functional obsolescence in an increasingly green world.”

In addition to overseeing the operational, financial and administrative functions for RiverRock’s NorCal practice, Rogers monitors, supervises and trains staff. She also supervises the preparation of annual business plans and operating budgets for clients, which include market analyses, property profiles, lease assumptions and income and expense projections. Rogers has been instrumental in obtaining, transitioning and implementing the management of approximately three million square feet of property into the RiverRock portfolio over the last 12 months. Rogers is a member of God Loves Kids, which provides daily care and education to orphaned children around the world. Among the challenges the market faces, she says, are “tenant retention, downturn in cash flow, and loan rate adjustments just to name a few. No one is immune. These challenges affect property owners, financial institutions and receivers.”

Price is the head of Morgan Stanley’s real estate investing business for the Western US, overseeing all investment activities including acquisitions and asset management. She was responsible for the management of several complex joint ventures currently held by the firm's various real estate investing funds, including negotiating equity and debt capitalizations, setting long-term strategy for the projects, board oversight and purchase and exit strategies. Price supports several local children's organizations, including Faces, Jamestown and Koret Family House. “Over the last 15 years, the culture of the real estate industry has evolved from an entrepreneurial boy’s-club mentality into an established institutional asset class,” she says. “Although there are still very few senior women in the industry, I see a lot of talented young women beginning careers in real estate, and I expect to see many more emerge as industry leaders over next five to 10 years.”

Ultimately responsible for the success of the firm, one of Myerson’s biggest accomplishments this year was having the opportunity to reposition Swig by launching a new growth strategy. She’s been recognized by the San Francisco Business Times as one of the Most Influential Woman in Northern California Business every year this century. She has served on the Homeless Prenatal Program and on the San Francisco board of directors, and she was a member of the executive committee of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce for several years. “We need to do a better job of letting young women know about opportunities in commercial real estate,” she says. “Although there are a number of talented young women in entry levels, a whole generation is missing. Real estate wasn’t a sexy career path and was eclipsed by investment banking and dot-com opportunities.”

Murphy is a land-use attorney in San Francisco who has established herself as a figure in the city for significant and historic public/private development deals, including the development of the San Francisco Ferry Building and the Westfield San Francisco Centre, as well as the negotiation of the ground lease and development agreement with Lucasfilm in the Presidio. Murphy represents a variety of developers and investors in real estate transactions and land use issues. She is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Drew School in San Francisco and Board Member of San Francisco Boys and Girls Club. “The long-term future for real estate will lie in greater in-fill development and a flight back to areas where transit, physical and human infrastructure are already in existence and form a critical mass,” Murphy says. “Metropolitan areas like the Bay Area will ultimately fare well because of their inherent human capital. In the short term, however, it will be a challenging year for the real estate industry because of market corrections and decreased access to credit.”

Mudge’s expertise is in land-use law, particularly alternative energy. Her work includes helping clients navigate the site and permit process to win project approvals from local, state and federal agencies for wind, geothermal, solar and biodiesel energy plants. She has assisted in permitting approximately 1000 MW of renewable energy projects throughout the Western US. This past year she was involved in gaining approvals for two wind energy projects--a 170-MW project in Solano County and a 300-MW facility in Kern County. Mudge is a member of the Oakland Planning Commission, and in her spare time is co-president of Oakland Strokes Inc., a competitive youth rowing organization. “Even as the new housing and retail markets falter, development of green energy projects and planning for greener development and land use patterns are hot topics,” she says. “The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 will pump $2.5 billion into the economy for renewable energy, energy efficiency research, development demonstrations and deployment activities.”

A 21-year veteran of commercial real estate, Morse has consistently been a top producer for Grubb & Ellis, and in 2006 the San Jose Business Journal recognized her as one of the top three brokers in the Silicon Valley. The Association of Silicon Valley Brokers has nominated her twice as Office Broker of the Year. In 2009 she became the first woman president of the Northern California Chapter of SIOR, whose membership is less than 2% women. Morse chaired the CREW Connection Project that resulted in the donation of more than $140,000 in services and materials to relocate Career Closet’s San Jose facility. In the past 12 months, Morse completed 38 transactions for tenants such as National University, Allen Systems Group and Iron Construction, to name just a few. Foremost among her goals, she says, is “to provide the best professional commercial real estate service to my clients to meet both their short-term and long-term goals, and to help young women succeed in brokerage.”

Closing a $650 million-plus fund and helping implement its investment program has been one of Moore's biggest recent accomplishments at DivcoWest. In her free time, Moore, who has been at the position of principal and general counsel at her firm for the past six years, is a trustee of Head Royce School and of the Foundation for Autistic Children’s Education. With more than 25 years in the industry, Moore was previously a founding partner and general counsel of Wilson/Equity Office, a San Francisco real estate development and management company. She also served as general counsel of Wilson/Cornerstone, a publicly traded REIT. “Inclusion of woman in the ranks of senior real estate executives has proceeded more slowly than in other business sectors, like technology, probably because the real estate business is so relationship-driven,” she says. “In the past, this has meant the ‘old-boy network,’ but this has been steadily changing as increasing numbers of women have reached prominent positions."

Aside from her role as BRE’s top executive, Moore, who has more than 30 years of experience in the real estate industry, also serves on the company’s board of directors. Prior to joining BRE in 2002, she was the managing director of Security Capital Group & Affiliates. From 1993 to 2002, Moore also held several executive positions there, including co-chairman and chief operating officer of Archstone Communities Trust. She held the same position at Security Capital Atlantic Inc., a predecessor of Archstone, playing an instrumental role in its initial public offering. During her tenure at Security Capital Group, she served on the boards of directors of both public and private companies owned or controlled by that organization. Moore is the 2009 Chair of the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts, a member of the Fisher Center for Real Estate & Urban Economics Policy Advisory Board’s Executive Committee, the Real Estate Roundtable Board of Directors, the National Multi Housing Council Executive Committee, the Urban Land Institute and the RentBureau LLC Board of Directors. She is also vice chair of the Tower Foundation for San Jose State University. “The real estate industry is in the early stages of a massive deleveraging that will be the defining issue for 2009 and beyond; historical metrics are being re-written everyday,” Moore says. “The news is filled with stories about the unprecedented issues facing real estate and the significant changes that will be required to ensure the industry remains viable. I am also confident that there will be ‘unprecedented’ opportunities for companies that take the necessary, yet very painful, steps to restore their balance sheets.”

As the senior attorney responsible for supporting Google’s corporate real estate and global datacenters, McLean’s responsibilities range from acquisition, development, and construction, to leasing and other transactional legal support. McLean has been at her current position for the past three years. In the past 12 months, she has represented Google in its 40-year ground lease at the NASA Ames research center in Mountain View. McLean is a board member of the Samantha Corpus Foundation and has been in the industry for more than 14 years.

As leader of the global corporate services consulting practice at CBRE, Mackay specializes in corporate strategic planning, portfolio analysis, location/site selection and land-use analysis for both private and public-sector clients, and she consults with clients throughout the US, Canada and Europe. In the past year, her significant assignments included portfolio planning for the likes of Microsoft, General Motors, Northrop Grumman, Pfizer, Washington Mutual and Discover Financial Services totaling more than 200 million square feet. She has been a director and is a past president of the CREW San Francisco Board of Directors and she has chaired its Governance Committee. While she believes the global recession will likely persist another four to six quarters, “institutions that are committed to excellence will look for ways not just to weather this storm,” she says, “but to use the downturn to fundamentally reshape the way they operate and do business, in the process gaining market share and improving the productivity of their operations.”

With approximately 30 years in the business, Lundeen is skilled in the full range of real estate transactions, including purchase and sales; finance, leasing and loan workouts. Her clients range from large institutional clients—MetLife, New York Life and Wells Fargo, for instance—to small companies. Lundeen has been a member of Allen Matkins’ Management Committee since August 2007. She has also served as: a past president, board member and special advisor of WIRE; a co-chair of the Real Estate Finance Subsection of the Real Estate Property Section of the State Bar of California; a member of the Commercial Panel of the American Arbitration Association; and a panelist on the annual CEB course on Recent Developments in Real Property Law. She was also named as a Super Lawyer in Northern California in 2006 and is a member of CREW and ULI. Among her charitable activities, she negotiated a master lease for the Shanti Project, the largest AIDS housing project in San Francisco. Lundeen’s goal is to have a positive impact on the careers of younger women in the real estate field. To this end, she has conducted an ongoing negotiation seminar for the women associates at Allen Matkins. “The opportunities for women in real estate have grown significantly since I started practicing law over 30 years ago,” she says, “but I still look forward to the day when being a woman in any role in a real estate project--a developer, a general contractor or an engineer--will be a fact and never an obstacle.”

In addition to her responsibility for all financial accounting, tax compliance and structuring, and financial reporting to investors at Rockwood, Levey oversees the firm’s human resources, information technology and administration. Levy joined Rockwood more than 10 years ago and rose to several supervisory and management positions, playing a role in the majority of Rockwood’s portfolio acquisitions, including the 2007 acquisition of a national hotel portfolio valued at nearly $1 billion. She volunteers regularly at the San Francisco Food Bank. “Women excel at understanding the importance of relationships and investing in them,” she says. “As 2009 and 2010 unfold, we expect to see further pressure on real estate fundamentals, and organizations with strong finance, legal, brokerage, investor and peer relationships will have a clear advantage.”

Currently serving as the portfolio manager for Wells Fargo’s CMBS and balance sheet loans totaling $130 billion, Lemley has been busy in the past year, in which she: established a preferred provider relationship with a DUS lender; developed standardized procedures, processing and reporting for multiple Freddie Mac licenses; developed relationships and participation programs with life insurance companies; and led due diligence investigation on two FNMA DUS lender portfolios, culminating in acquisition of Reilly Mortgage Co. by Wells Fargo Bank. Lemley served as a fundraising member of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s Team in Training for Leukemia and other Blood Cancer research from 2005 to 2007. “We’ve been here before and I’m confident that after 24 to 36 months of difficult conditions we’ll thrive again,” she states. “We were in asset-building mode through the first part of the decade; we are in character-building mode for the balance.”

Khazen oversees day-to-day activities at the firm. She stays connected with local politics and is known throughout the San Jose business community. Some of her biggest accomplishments in the past year include working on leasing and consulting for Cupertino Square Shopping Center, developing strategies for a 1.2-million-square-foot shopping center with 70% vacancy and negotiating the creation of a collection of parcels in Santa Cruz for a $70-million mixed-use project. She was recognized by the San Jose Business Journal as one of the 100 Women of Influence in the Silicon Valley. Khazen’s charitable activities include membership in the local and national chapter of the Parkinson’s Institute and Children in Crisis. “Successful women in California like Nancy Pelosi and Meg Whitman have continually shown what can be done,” she says. “I see a bright future for women. With the first African American president, color/gender is now secondary to capabilities and credibility.”

Kennedy’s practice focuses on complex real estate and land-use transactions, including CEQA compliance, development conditions and exactions, zoning, subdivisions, planning, entitlements and Williamson Act contracts. She specializes in public/private partnerships and ground leasing on behalf of both property owners and tenants. In the past year she negotiated the sale of a Silicon Valley property for $270 million, and was named a “Northern California Super Lawyer” for 2008 in San Francisco Magazine. She previously held a position as partner of real estate and land use at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips LLP. Her charitable activities include serving as president emerita for the board of directors of the Hillel of Stanford, and Building Committee Chair of the Ziff Center for Jewish Life, Hillel at Stanford. “Commercial real estate has yet to see its darkest days,” she predicts. “Tenants are seeking help negotiating early terminations or reductions in square footages. Commercial rents are dropping and vacancy rates are rising. The phenomenon of ‘see-through’ buildings is becoming more prominent. Absorption will likely take at least three years.”

Katter provides commercial real estate brokerage and consulting services to clients in the Bay Area, nationwide and globally in financial, communications and software, insurance, ad/PR and law industries. She is best known for her tenant representation work, with clients like Bank of America, Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Exigen Group, PLM International, GE Capital, MCI WorldCom, Omnicon, Prudential Securities and Probitas Partners. Among her tenant work is representing Bank of America as team leader in the disposition of 55 BofA branches in the Western US. Since she founded Commercial Partners in 2006, the firm has experienced consecutive annual growth, including a 28% growth in 2008. Her affiliations and memberships include CoreNet, CREW and WIRE, and she has been a member of the San Francisco Economic Council for the past two years. She states: “I have led by example to break through that glass ceiling so others behind will have an easier path to follow. We are facing the most challenging time I have ever seen in my 30-plus years of experience. We and others in this industry need to reinvent ourselves in order to succeed.”

Working as an executive director of several C&W corporate alliances, Hughes focuses primarily on technology, telecommunications, insurance and financial services. She has been active in the industry for 25 years and has been part of the C&W team since 1987. She is responsible for the real estate strategy and transaction management of the company’s real estate portfolios, with a focus on reducing costs and increasing the overall quality of the transaction process. Her alliances have included Hewlett-Packard Co., Lucent Technologies, Fireman’s Fund Insurance Co., Cognos Corp. and the Symantec Corp. In the past year, she’s completed transactions totaling 2.6 million square feet. She is involved with St. Isidore Catholic Church, Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts of America. “Commercial real estate can be a fulfilling and lucrative industry for professionally driven women,” she states. “It is exciting, challenging and affords women the ability to have a work-life balance. The industry needs more women to add to the diversity of the business.”

Among Hoffman’s biggest accomplishments in the past year was completing a 108,000-square-foot life-science building at 180 Oyster Point in South San Francisco, with a second 84,000-square-foot adjacent life-science building set to be delivered in October. Hoffman, who has been in the business for 26 years and in her current position for three, is also in the process of securing entitlements for a master redevelopment plan for a neighboring property currently 285,000 square feet to be redeveloped to one million square feet. Hoffman’s charitable activities include overseeing the corporate donation program for Chamberlin as well as personal financial support of a variety of non-profit and charitable organizations. “Those who have conducted business using sound and prudent business practices will withstand this challenging market and capture opportunities brought about by those who were operating on the edge,” she says. “Women will continue to contribute effectively at all levels of the business. In 10 years questions concerning women’s roles as distinct from those of men in this and most businesses should have become quaint and unnecessary.”

A 21-year veteran of the industry, Hearle has responsibility for JLL's Northwest region. This includes tenant representation, agency leasing, project management and a property and facilities management portfolio of 41.4 million square feet. She recently oversaw the integration of the company’s Pacific Northwest operations with Staubach Co., following the merger of the two companies. Prior to joining JLL in 1999, Hearle served as property manager, senior vice president and regional director for Prentiss Properties, where she supervised property managers, engineers, leasing agents and the construction-management team on assets owned by several large institutions. Clients included Citicorp Real Estate, TIAA-CREF and Nissan Motor Acceptance Corp. Before that, she was a General Manager at R&B Commercial Real Estate in San Francisco, where she was responsible for assets owned by institutions such as Northwestern Mutual Life and the Yarmouth Group. Hearle began her real estate career in real estate syndication, performing investment underwriting and property management for Capital Solutions, a small investment firm in Palo Alto. She is a licensed California Real Estate Salesperson and a member of the Building Owners and Managers Association. “Given the state of the global economy, companies are being naturally cautious,” she explains. “Within the real estate sector there is an increased emphasis on managing costs. One of the more important measures to position ourselves for the next part of the cycle is the embrace of sustainability. Many owners are looking to position buildings positively for the next expansion as well as reduce costs and the carbon footprint.”

Greenwold, who joined TMG in 1992, has been responsible for expanding the company’s portfolio through strategic acquisition of projects with particular emphasis on development opportunities and value enhancement. Greenwold has more than 30 years of real estate and finance experience with an extensive background in development, including 12 years as vice president for Calprop Corp. She has managed more than $2.7 billion in project financing and development activity. Greenwold is also a mentor at Mills College and a volunteer at Stanford GSB and for San Francisco Homeless Connect. “I am optimistic about the future of women in our industry as creative, multi-level thinkers, with negotiating skills that encourage solutions,” she says.

One of Duffy’s top achievements of the past year was advising the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers on their new 68,000-seat stadium project. Duffy practices primarily in the areas of commercial land use and development, with expertise in large public and private-entity transactions. Projects she undertook this year include acting as lead counsel for the new Exploratorium Museum project on the San Francisco waterfront and the proposed 150-acre smart growth urban mixed-use Napa Pipe project in southern Napa County. In her spare time, she’s served as a director of public television station KQED Inc., and she was a mayoral appointee to the Citizen’s Advisory Committee on the Reuse of Treasure Island Naval Base. “With a challenging economy, a limited supply of natural resources and land and an intense focus on the environment and climate change, there is increasing pressure for developments to not only make economic sense, but to be sustainable and add value to their communities,” she says. “This is a challenge, but it is also a tremendous opportunity for a legal team to add value and creative solutions.”

Croshaw works with developers to dissect, prepare or amend the necessary documents to take a project from inception through sales or leasing. Her work includes preparing all sales and governing documentation for various types of subdivisions, condominiums and mixed-use projects. She was behind two high-profile, high-rise projects in San Francisco that recently came to fruition. She amended documentation, allowing both complex projects to move forward, reworking the documents to provide for a key tenant and writing in new protections for the developer. She also completed three Mission Bay projects and another San Francisco high-rise where she created a new program tailored to best suit that particular market. Also in the past year, Croshaw was appointed partner-in-charge of the firm’s San Francisco office. She is a member of ULI; CREW; WIRE (Women in Real Estate); and CBIA, as well as being a member (and former committee chair) of the Home Builders Association of Northern California. “In the current residential real estate crisis, developers are more aware of the need for consistent, specific and thorough documentation of their transactions with consumers,” she says.

Corley initiates and manages projects like the UrbanPlan, a high school problem-based urban economics curriculum developed in collaboration with faculty, practitioners and students at Berkeley’s Fisher Center for Real Estate & Urban Economics. She manages the center’s annual gift program and leads development efforts for academic chairs, scholarships and other programs related to the center’s outreach. Among her top accomplishments in the past year has been facilitating linkages between research, graduate students and industry leaders. Recently, she hosted a Fisher Center, Bridge Housing Corp. and ULI housing policy forum, a collaboration of real estate practitioners, policy makers and implementers and academics. Since 1994, she has been a member of the executive committee of the Urban Land Institute, the San Francisco District Council and a member of ULI, national. There she served on the Urban Development/Mixed-Use Council. “The economy is going through a major recalibration,” she says, "and some of our markets will never be the same again. If you are an optimist, this is a great time to be a student, or student-like, and prepare to benefit from upcoming demographic and generational changes."

Since 1975, Collins’ involvement in the industry has included economic and fiscal-impact analysis, land-use processing and management responsibility for large-scale commercial, industrial, medical and residential developments. She has served as general manager for Daon Corp.’s NorCal regional office, and she has worked in the property and facilities division of United Airlines. In the public sector, she was part of the original project development team for the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco. Most recently she completed in San Francisco the Sony Metreon project and the Four Seasons Residences and Hotel, developed in joint venture with Millennium Partners of New York. In 2000, Collins was awarded the Entrepreneur of the Year Award by the National Coalition of 100 Black Women Inc. Collins is also vice-chair of the California State Automobile Association and Inter-Insurance Bureau. She is a director of BayView Bank and BayView Capital Corp. and serves as co-chairperson for the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. “As the commercial real estate markets deal with the impact of shrinking capital sources and weakening demand,” she says, “women find themselves in the same predicament as many of their other professional colleagues. However, given that the number of women in strategic corporate positions has increased during the last decade, as well as the fact that the appetite for entrepreneurial ventures is still alive, albeit in a different format, many women are positioning themselves to weather the storm and emerge ‘launch ready’ as the economy improves. Meanwhile, like so many others in real estate, I am learning to do more with less.”

Callas provides profitable ongoing operations for a national wholesale platform that funds billions annually in agency and FHA loans, and she serves CMG Mortgage as a member of the risk management committee. She also oversees the company’s compliance department, which provides regulatory guidance as well as broker approvals. One of her greatest accomplishments in the past year was helping guide CMG operationally through the industry turmoil. Also in the past year she led the implementation of new in-house loan processing systems as well as driving the business forward through the meltdown of the Alt-A business. She regularly donates to support Aids research, the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and suicide prevention. “Given the changing nature of the lending business today, market participants are going to have to look for new ways to differentiate themselves through product, service or both,” she says.

Byles is currently overseeing the master-plan development of two large, environmentally progressive neighborhood communities in San Francisco—Treasure Island and Park Merced. She is also managing the construction of more than $450 million in multi-disciplinary academic-research facilities including the Harvard Northwest Science Building and a project at Rice University that will provide multi-institutional research for Rice and five institutes at Texas Medical Center. Her active portfolio also includes several mixed-use office and residential projects in the entitlements phase in San Francisco. Byles, who has more than 22 years in the business, is a member of the Board of Trustees of St. Francis Memorial Hospital and serves on their master facilities and finance committees. “The industry can expect a continued emphasis on sustainability and green design practices from developers, civic authorities, and consumers,” she states. On women in the industry, she says, “It is great to see more women in leadership positions on both the client and design sides, reflecting the progressive nature of their respective organizations.”

Bryant, who has been in this business for 23 years, is responsible for the asset management, finance, accounting and treasury functions of the NorCal office of Sares Regis. On the deal front, her company was successful at acquiring two industrial projects in 2008 and closing on debt and equity financing for a new housing community. These transactions represented more than $100 million in new debt and equity raised during 2008. Bryant has been a member of CREW San Francisco since 1992 and served as president of the chapter in 2000. She was a member of the board of the national organization, CREW Network, from 2002 to 2006, serving as president in 2005. Bryant also served on the board of Palo Alto Housing Corp., a non-profit dedicated to providing affordable housing alternatives, between 1993 and 2003. In 2001, she received the Girl Scouts of San Francisco Bay Area Beacon Award. “Women have been important players in commercial real estate for many years, but often not in the most visible roles,” she says. “As our industry has begun to value and recognize all the people who contribute to a successful project, we will see and recognize more women of influence. The trend of women starting their own businesses—small companies that collaborate with others to accomplish great things—will continue.”

Boyer’s responsibilities include the oversight of Swig’s NorCal properties, including strategic planning, leasing, capital improvement programs and general operations. Her responsibilities also include asset acquisitions, transitions, repositioning, and redevelopment. In the past year, Boyer has handled more than 100,000 square feet in lease transactions for the likes of Kaiser Permanente, University of California, BART and GT Nexus at Kaiser Center. She serves as the interim president of the Lake Merritt/Uptown Community Benefit District Association. When she started her career 25 years ago, she says that she knew only one other woman working in commercial construction—an estimator for a mechanical subcontractor and "my only female role model. The role of women in real estate has clearly changed dramatically over the past 25 to 30 years, and we continue to see more women entering the field.”

As regional director of both debt and equity direct investment for Northwestern, a wholly owned subsidiary of Northwestern Mutual Life, Allor is responsible for managing real estate equity and mortgage loan assets through a staff of asset managers, investment production managers and analysts. Her region includes Northern California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah and Hawaii. Northwestern invests its general account in real estate among other asset classes, but real estate comprises approximately 25% of its total asset base of $150 billion. “The current environment is as challenging as we have seen in a generation with continued uncertainty for the future,” Allor says. “Real estate is a long-term asset class that is getting repriced today with the rapidity of shorter term, more liquid asset classes. Those who have the staying power should be able to hold and manage assets during, and opportunities that can be pursued will begin to present themselves.”