Telling your story is a lot more than just saying what happened. It can be a powerful tool to advance your career and connect to community. “Stories have to service the community,” says Megan Finnerty, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, director of the Storytellers Brand Studio, founder and director of the USA TODAY Storytellers Project and moderator of the Power Up Conference panel, “Why Women Should Take The Lead in Politics.”
Read MoreSome entrepreneurs have a knack for turning personal needs into great ideas, and then turning those great ideas into huge successes.
Stacey Blackman, founder of Stacy Blackman Consulting, the Blacklight Channel and Stryke Club, is just that entrepreneur.
While she has been reaping rewards professional for two decades, early on, she was deterred.
Read MoreOh no, he didn’t. When Jamia Wilson was an undergraduate at American University majoring in broadcast journalism, an older white male professor emeritus called her into his office over what he called “a cause for concern.” Wilson, now Executive Director and Publisher of Feminist Press at City University of New York, knew it was not about her grades, her work, her performance or anything she could imagine.
Read MoreMiky Lee perked me up from nearly nodding off toward the end of my friend’s Oscar party. While the staging was gorgeous, the tone had been much mellower than last year’s symbolic #metoo moments and other years when full throated political declarations ripped the air.
Even the iconic Jane Fonda, who most recently has been getting arrested weekly to raise awareness for climate change, stuck with the script as she presented the best picture Oscar.
Read MoreThe middle of three sisters raised in Bloomfield, Michigan, Lori Caden always knew sisterhood was a key part of her life. Indeed, sisterhood would drive her professional success and be a factor in her helping other women entrepreneurs launch their business dreams.
Read MoreDespite the drolly delivered good news that Punxsutawney Phil predicts an early spring, I entered February still mourning basketball great Kobe Bryant, who died along with his daughter and seven others in a helicopter crash on January 26. I can’t get this tragic loss of life, loss of potential, and loss of a history-making African American athlete off of my mind. I begin my Sum column this week with condolences to the families of all who perished.
Read MoreYou can definitely find scores of reasons to attend Take The Lead’s “Power Up: Igniting The Intentional Leader Within” conference later this month in Scottsdale, Az. What you can’t find is a reason not to attend. Gloria Feldt, co-founder and president of Take The Lead, will be revealing for the first time to conference attendees leadership power tools she has been developing.
Read MoreAs the global digital communications director for Ford Motor Company, Gwen Jimmere had a company car that was a baby blue Mustang convertible, passes to the Super Bowl and paid travel around the world. But it was not what she wanted ultimately wanted to do.
Read MoreThe good news if you are a woman working in healthcare, architecture, engineering, education and a few other industries is that pay equity is the norm when your organization has pay transparency. The bad news is if you are a female in food services, retail, customer service, transportation and a few more male-dominated fields, you will likely be paid less than men doing the same job.
Read MoreLeap Day is one day added to the calendar every four years “as a corrective measure,” because the earth’s orbit is not precisely completed in 365 days. Take The Lead is jumping on that opportunity on Leap Day this year for its own corrective measures moving the workplace and culture toward gender parity in leadership with the “Power Up: Igniting the Intentional Leader Within” conference February 28-29 in Scottsdale, Az.
Read MoreLast week I wrote about tripping over a pebble while hiking and breaking my wrist. Since then, I’ve been thinking about how it’s never the mountains that trip you up. It’s the pebbles on the path. Things you can’t see coming even though they are right in front of you. Impediments that don’t catch your eye because they’re so small that you are unaware of them, or you’re vaguely aware and pay no attention.
Read MoreStacey Engle, president of Fierce Conversations, understands perfectly the double meaning of the word. “Fierce to me is what you think of when someone is fiercely loyal, passionate, caring, courageous and getting to the heart of something.” She adds, “Someone can also interpret fierce as aggressive or too intense.” The two interpretations offer the opportunity to address what it means to be effective.
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