Words have connotations whether you mean them or not. It is hard to see how you could not foresee a negative reaction to calling a woman being featured in a professional context a "chick".
By the way, if anyone's inclined to fucking ASK why I used that word at any point in the next century, I use words like "dude", "chick", and "radical" because I enjoy the delightful throwback. Such idioms are definitely in my wheelhouse.