Discussion Divas

Moms in Transition: Tips for Staying Current

Pinterest. Tumblr. You gotta know 'em.

I've been helping Moms and women (and a good number of men!) keep up with the news for many years, truly believing it is important to know what's going on in your neighborhood and world even while you're busy doing other things. If you're a Mom who is taking time out of the workplace, you know how important it is to keep up with your industry, too.

But now, with job postings calling for a "web presence" or "at least five Pinboards," there's another mountain looming--one of time-consuming things to learn and do if you want to stay competitive in the workplace now or in the future--things beyond Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn (which you should already be using one or more of anyway). 

So, let's start a dialogue of what's needed to stay current these days, and add to it over time. Be sure to add your thoughts in the comments, please. Again, this won't be an exhaustive, but it's a start!

1. Know Tumblr (super easy blogging software), Pinterest (the latest Web phenom where you "pin" things you find intersesting), Google Docs (it's all about sharing in the cloud these days), Dropbox (transfer large files), TaskRabbit (find people to do things for you like go to the grocery store or put together Ikea furniture) and Prime (meaning Amazon Prime).

2. Understand the growth and power of sites like Gilt, OneKingsLane, Groupon, LivingSocial, RueLaLa, and the many others that are popping up just like them (hint: all offer deals).

3. Understand how important Facebook is to companies like Zynga (gaming company that derives majority of revenue from Facebook) and Airbnb (rent a room in someone's home for the weekend) and Branchout (find a job).

4. Try to read Top 10 publishings now and then, like this one from FastCompany: http://www.fastcompany.com/most-innovative-companies/2012/industry/webinternet  

5. Pick a site or two to read daily (or at least a couple times a week - even reading the headlines will help!), like WSJ's Career section: http://online.wsj.com/public/page/news-career-jobs.html?mod=WSJ_topnav_careers_main

6. Read our weekly-ish EMAIL! You'll walk away smarter in five minutes or less. SIGN UP

What are you doing to stay current?

- SD

 

Two sides of the working women coin

“She’s gonna change the world. She’s gonna make the world a better world.” - Sesame Street It says a lot about my life when I’m linking the week’s news to a catchy Sesame Street ditty about girls changing the world (watch the video... it will stick with you!).  But it’s ringing in my ears as I digest the recent data on employment, which shows that while women as a whole are helping push the economy forward by joining the workforce in larger numbers, some with higher-earning spouses are also quitting.  The stats on those getting hired In the last two months, more than twice as many women as men have been added to the workforce (see chart), according to NYT.  The Times credits this growth in part to the high number of new female college graduates and the strong demand for educated workers, and also to the specific sectors that are currently hiring, such as health care and education. Overall the economy has added around 245,000 jobs a month for the last three months--strong numbers--but at the same time, more people jumped into the active job search pool, which is why the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 8.3% in February.  The stats on those getting out Meanwhile, in another part of the working world, an upcoming Federal Reserve report is said to show that well-educated women who marry higher-income earners are leaving the workforce. From Reuters:  --It shows that between 1993 and 2006, there was a decline in the workforce of 0.1 percent a year on average in the number of college- educated women with similarly educated spouses. That contrasts with growth of 2.4 percent a year between 1976 and 1992. The result: the labor force in 2008 had 1.64 million fewer such women than if the growth rate had kept up its earlier trend, slightly more than 1 percent of the total workforce in that year.-- The Reuters article goes on to say that during the recession of 2007-2009, the number of educated women leaving the workforce stalled. But the exit picked up again as the economy improved, with this trend happening at various income levels, not just among the wealthy. So what does all this mean? There are many ways to look at this information: Education begets higher incomes, begets the luxury of one parent not working to take care of children, run the house, etc. Or, the high expenses of childcare render a spouse’s (often the woman’s) salary a wash, so the woman stops working.  But it also prompts an interesting discussion about whether women who can afford to leave financially do so because they don’t want to work, or because they can’t find the right kind of work.  One conservative WSJ columnist summed up the Reuters story saying the opportunities afforded by the feminist movement have made way for the “unchained woman”--a woman who isn’t tied to her desk everyday, and the emergence of a two-tiered culture--those who are unchained and those who aren’t.  We all know that when it comes to working and raising children, flexibility is huge. My theory is that in many cases, highly educated women who can afford to not work quit because they can’t find a work scenario that works for them. If one is chained to the desk, there's no flexibility.   It’s too bad when highly educated women leave the workplace--their skill set is valuable to the economy, and their experience can help younger women climbing the ranks. Corporations would benefit from letting experienced women step back for a few years to have kids and then rev up again--they don’t lose all the time and money they’ve invested in the talent.  Final thoughts! Of course I’m curious what you think, soplease share your comments (Did you leave your job? Why? Would you have stayed if you found a more flexible situation? If you work full time, have you found flexibility that works?)   Calling all Moms! I’ll be blogging more regularly about working Moms and Moms in transition (see post on networking). Please TAKE OUR SURVEYabout what the best online resource for working moms would look like to you!

 

Calling all Working Moms, Moms in Transition

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- SD

Working Moms: Strengthen those Networks and Raise the Tide!

 

One of the hardest things I have found as a working Mom is finding the time to keep up with my professional network, let alone my friends. When I am at work, I'm working - there's no time for power lunches. After work, I really want to be with my kiddo. The other days, I'm tired!

But keeping up those social AND professional networks is so key and can make a big difference when you're on the job hunt or when starting your own business. Turns out that men do a better job of referring each other and asking for help from their networks.

So what to do other than drink a lot of coffee and burn the midnight oil?! Some words of wisdom, tips and encouragement from a recent round-up of stories on this topic:

1. Understand the big picture: There's a lot of discussion about female representation in tech - the number of female start-up CEOs, the number of women in tech, and so on. At South by Southwest this year, there are a slew of women-related panels. In her post on Forbes, Meghan Casserly raises the point, does this type of focus underserve the effort? One of her sources says no, and offers a great quote:
   
   “But my theory is that if we continue to grow this strong network of women, well then, a rising tide brings up all boats.” - Tara Hunt, CEO of Buyosphere
   
   Here, here! Read the full post: SXSW 2012 Forecast: Let's Hear It For The Girls
    
2. Use your network to invent a job: Business Insider offers this great tip: “Start networking to create a job (and stop networking to find a job).” Love this. Don’t limit yourself to the jobs you see online. The best job I ever got was over dinner at a friend’s birthday when I wasn’t searching for a job. I just asked really good questions and was genuinely interested in the business we were talking about. The CEO called me a couple weeks later to explore a job opportunity, and I took it.
   
   Read more on tackling the job search in an innovative way: Find A Job Using The Same Skills That Build Great Tech Companies http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-03-07/news/31131130_1_job-search-products-ask#ixzz1oYoGOz
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3. Help other women by referring them: A recent report by the Anita Borg Institute encourages companies to ask current female employees to refer women in their network as a way to up the numbers. We should all think about this strategy in our own workplaces, tech or not.

Final thought: I think it’s best to set some goals to help keep up with friends and colleagues, past and present. 

• Reach out to one person you haven’t connected with in a while every week, by phone, email or LinkedIn or Facebook.
• Attend one networking event or get-together each month (I ALWAYS go to my Discussion Divas Current Events Club meeting, plus one other event).
• Attend an alumni breakfast or simply get together with some friends for a glass of wine.

No matter how you do it, get out there and strengthen those networks--for yourself, and for all of us. Raise the tide!

- SD