Archive for Books for Businesswomen
The Business Case for Building a Flexible Work Culture- Series Part I
Posted by: | CommentsWhy do organizations offer flexibility? Business - Business- Business. Successful accomplishment of business strategy is the primary reason for building a flexible work culture.
The majority of our employees require flexibility at some point in their careers. Research increasingly points to flexibility as one of the most important career considerations of staff, emerging leaders and even our seasoned leaders. If we do not offer this flexibility in our organizations we will lose productivity in our top talent pool and we may lose this top talent completely to our competitors. In addition to flexibility as a requirement for top talent, consider the possibility that flexibility can actually improve your organizational results.
There are many definitions of flexibility. For the purposes of this discussion we are talking about any type of flexibility that allows team members to depart from the standard schedule of an early morning start time to an early evening departure, with all hours served as face time, either at a client/customer site or at the office location. There are many articles and books written regarding the types of flexible work arrangements available. This posting will not focus on the mechanics of the arrangements but the business case behind them.
It takes a Beginner to write a Beginners Guide
Posted by: | CommentsI envy those people to whom numbers come naturally. In elementary school, arithmetic was not my strong subject and to this day I can’t figure out how I got an “A” in my high school algebra class. My mother, however, was a genius with numbers – she had a successful home business offering bookkeeping and payroll services and doing taxes for folks. Mom didn’t progress beyond high school but she gave herself the equivalent of a degree in accounting. I marveled at the way she could look at a column of numbers and add them up without the use of a calculator.
Me? I always found English class an easy class. Remember those exercises in breaking down the structure of a sentence? Remember conjugating verbs and tenses? I’ve always been as at home with words as my mom was with numbers. One of my former positions was as marketing director for a large nonprofit agency in the central valley of California. One year I was fortunate to have the assistance of a college intern from the University of the Pacific in Stockton. This young woman was in the communications department and wanted to go into public relations. However, I spent quite a bit of time proofreading. For her the words “then” and “than” were one and the same.
Walking your Talk: Establishing Core Values for your Business
Posted by: | CommentsIn creating websites for clients over the last six years, I’ve met many different types of people, all within the context of a specific task at hand: developing a website. The process requires planning, thoroughness, and vision. It also requires the ability to idealize, on paper and in one’s mind, prior to making the website a reality.
Our process affects our customers in many different ways, usually bringing forward many emotions related to decision-making. We’ve refined our process to lead to a focused, calm, assured, and effective result. However, we’ve found someone’s internal emotional state often has the ability to influence any external endeavor.
I think about how this reflects in my daily life.
- Why am I here?
- What do I represent?
- What guides my daily decision-making?
- Who am I in my marriage, my business relationships, and my family?
- How do I do the right thing as a parent, volunteer, and member of my community?
Stephen R. Covey, in Seven Habits of Highly Succesful People, writes about character development. He researched the history of self-help and personal growth articles, and he notes that in the first 150 years of the United States, the literature focused on character-building. The tools promoted were related to character traits, such as integrity, honesty, personal responsibility, and honor — these are more “internal” qualities. In modern times, he found a shift in the literature towards technique-building. The tools promoted were related to influence, such as relationship management, networking skills, and personality-shaping — these are more “external” traits.
Women Leadership and Mad Men
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Some revolutions are bloody, and some are flash-in-the-pan moments.
The women’s movement began quietly with a book “The Feminine Mystique”, moved to bra burning, and gained traction with consciousness raising groups.
All of that seems like it was centuries ago.
We now head large organizations, are in key positions in government, and have a say in just about everything. Yet some of the pleaser and martyr behavior patterns that were handed from generation to generation are still dying a slow death.
Just watch “Mad Men” and remember how it was. You worked if you typed and delivered. No not ideas – merely the coffee to the men. While much has changed, there is more work to be done.
This is a year of both celebrating change and dialoguing about what still needs to change. CELEBRATION: in the next few months women will cross the threshold and become the majority workers in America. CELEBRATION: women professionals are in the majority in this country. CELEBRATION: women have become economically powerful in their own right.
What is the next phase of the revolution toward equality, and even beyond that, toward partnership?
Leadership and “Process till you Puke”!
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In every business, in every life, it is vital to process all information and even emotional content to make sure that you are making the best decisions you can make. Yet, there are extremes and when you get caught at one end point of the spectrum or the other, there is a tendency to either deny what is going on, or indulge in over-thinking the process.
One of our best consultants at Creative Energy Options, Inc. (CEO), Dianne Moore, who covers the Midwest for us, had an amazing “aha” moment about too much process time and what it does to us. An eloquent writer, she talks for so many of us, especially women who do tend to be the queens of analyzing and looking over and over again at what life holds, both at home and in the business world.
I’d love your comments on what you do when you get stuck in a place where you begin to over think what you are doing.
“The Pity Pot”
Let’s hear it for process! Yes, let’s give it some well-deserved, rousing applause….clap……..clap………..clap……..clap.
I am sick of process.
Create Your Own Prosperity
Posted by: | CommentsGuest post by Allison Maslan (learn more about Allison at the end of this post)
Money alone will not make you happy. It’s what the money can do for you that can bring joy. It can give you leverage to capture a life-long dream. It can go to a family in need. It has given me the ability to buy this computer, my writing tool in sharing my coaching, teaching concepts and to write my book, Blast Off! Money is often given a negative connotation. You’ve heard the idea that having wealth will make you greedy or give you an attitude of being “better than.” How can this be true? Money is actually an avenue for freedom of choice. Just as a state of balanced health gives us freedom to move and be in the world, money gives us the freedom to do, or not to do, what we choose. When money is limited, your choices are limited. If you’re struggling to come up with cash, your choices of housing and food decrease. The more money you have access to, the less you worry about survival, which frees up your mind from unwanted thoughts. Therefore, money is an avenue of liberty because it gives you independence to express your creative and individual voice.
What you want to spend your money on may not be what I want to spend my money on. Money is used to express your desires, whether you save it, invest it, or spend it. You may enjoy spending your cash on mystery novels and I enjoy spending mine on a vacation to Mexico. You may donate funds to the homeless and I choose to support a literacy campaign. Money gives us the freedom to express our passions. If you have money, you have more choices.
Do you struggle with issues of fear around money? Have you ever thought that the fear and the action of holding onto your money or your safe job could actually be the very things that may be causing you to struggle in survival mode? This fear of losing or not making money will actually hold you back from creating more money.
Leadership Partnership and Business Possibilities
Posted by: | CommentsClearing out the old to make way for the new is a wonderful practice as we enter a new year. This time, as we graduate into a new decade, the teen years of the century, we have an amazing opportunity to find a better balance and create a different kind of partnership between men and women.
I believe that female leaders in the work world can lead the way in positive and exciting ways. It struck me, and with pride, I acknowledged our successes to date. While we have a rocky road ahead, any transformation worth its weight means twists and turns and boulders to be confronted. Yet, if we stay centered with our eyes on the goal of male/female partnership, we can and will change the world for the better.
Here is what happened as I dove into some dusty, old boxes. I found a journal, like really old. One my daughter wrote as a teenager. I did call and ask permission to read before I sent it to her in San Francisco. I remember learning my lesson about snooping a long time ago!
Journaling Your Way to the Top
Posted by: | CommentsGuest post by Selena Rezvani (learn more about Selena at the end of this post)
Increasingly, journaling is a core component of leadership classes and related training programs. Why? Journaling is an effective technique for reflecting on one’s strengths or areas of weakness, or in response to a significant incident that shaped you in some way. Journaling is a process of self-development that aids progress and is helpful when used alone, in a group setting, or with a trusted advisor. Many women executives I interviewed suggested keeping logs or diaries of career successes and lessons learned to reflect upon. The concept of a professional diary fosters accountability and progress, and represents an organizational system for documenting your talents. Alexandra Miller, Chief Executive Officer of Mercedes Medical, Inc., encourages young women to use concrete strategies that encourage goal setting. She advised, “Focus like a laser beam on what you want. Set goals, and timelines on how you’ll achieve them.”
Documentation has a practical use as well; it becomes handy in hiring, promotion, and compensation conversations. Whereas many of us are used to engaging in verbal dialogue about our careers, journaling converts it to a tangible medium, thereby increasing our chances of accountability and effectiveness in meeting goals. Your journal can also be a reference that you consult to help substantiate how you have improved in an area.
Journals can be used in many forms; below I have listed some of the methods with which creative journaling can be most useful:
Recommended Reads for Business Women
Posted by: | CommentsPost by Cheryl Santa Maria, contributing Women On Business writer
The path to self-enlightenment is a long one, but the journey becomes easier to manage when we’re using the right educational tools.
Finding the right tools, however, can be a bit of a challenge. Personally, I’ve wasted my share of time on supposed “self help” products – books and films with wording so muddled and rambling that they’ve left me with more questions than answers.
If you’ve been looking for some well-written words of wisdom, you’re in luck. Below are 3 personal development books that I strongly recommend. In addition to being beautifully written, they are concise, simplistic and timeless.
If you haven’t read these 3 books, you must. They will change your life for the better.
