Letter to My Future Self
Featuring Liberty Mutual Insurance
Many of us have experienced the sense of excitement that comes from attending a conference. The amazing speakers, helpful breakout sessions and spontaneous conversations—all contribute to the buzz of new ideas and possibilities you feel. Indeed, 78 percent of Women’s Conference attendees reported feeling more optimistic about the future after attending the event.
So how do you sustain that inspiration? At the Texas Conference for Women last November, Liberty Mutual hosted “Letters to Our Future Selves” in their booth. Attendees wrote a letter to themselves describing their goals, aspirations and learnings. They will receive their letters six months after the conference.
In the meantime, we asked four women who work at Liberty Mutual in Texas to share a piece of advice that helps them be their best self at work. Read More
Mediterranean Fusion: Your Favorite Ethnic Dishes Just Got Heart-Healthier!
By Lorena Asebedo Kaplen
Registered Dietitian, H-E-B
No doubt, diet and culture play a major role in what we eat and the food decisions we make every day. But with so many different cuisines and foods from all over the world available to us, we can embrace other cultures while creating a sense of community. In fact, with cuisine fusions and their endless combinations of flavors, the possibilities are limitless! Read More
Handling Setbacks and Building ‘Resilient Muscle’
By Patricia F. Brown, VP Underwriting Global Retail Markets, Liberty Mutual Insurance
I am often asked two questions: “What has led to your success in the commercial insurance industry?” and “How have you overcome setbacks/challenges?
My personal experience of growing up in the South, having parents and siblings who experienced Jim Crow and being the daughter of a Tuskegee Airmen set the foundation of who I am today. The richness of my childhood experiences and my belief systems have had an undeniable impact on me both personally and professionally. Moreover, my professional journey as an African-American woman has included both lows and highs. Read More
5 Ways to Find Your Spark in 2019
By Kim Read, SVP, Operations, RetailMeNot
All too often, we start the year with clarity only to lose our focus and intention in the “go, go, go” of everyday life. So as this year draws to a close and you pause and reflect with an eye toward 2019, it’s a good idea also to think about how you’re going to stay directed and energized. Here is what has worked for me. Read More
Holiday Survival Tips from Simple Habit’s Founder
A Stanford B school dropout, Yunha Kim is on her second startup—and like most things that meet a real need, it’s genius. Called Simple Habit, the app is a “Spotify” for meditation, meaning it’s a platform for different experts to share their bite-size meditations and audio therapy sessions.
Kim had her Eureka moment after turning to meditation apps to cope with the stress of running her first company. “I got pretty tired of hearing the same voice over and over again,” she recalls. “It occurred to me that to listen to a new singer, I don’t go to another app. I go to a platform like Spotify, where I can find new artists as well as my favorites.”
Flash forward less than three years, and Kim has a huge hit on her hands. “Simple Habit has helped more than 2.8 million people relieve stress and anxiety, with an average of 30,000 new users joining the platform every week,” she says. What’s more, she just closed $10 million in her series A, after raising $2.8 million from seed investors.
Her advice for newbie entrepreneurs? “Taking care of yourself is critical,” Kim says. “When you’re building a business from scratch, you are the number one resource you have. You will work long days, and stress is inevitable, so it’s important to take a little time each day to step away, breathe and reset.”
Here, Kim’s four tips—and her Simple Habit audio recommendations—for surviving the holidays: Read More
Real Advice for Women Seeking Mentors and Allies
If your mentors all look like you, you have a mentor problem. Same goes if they all have similar backgrounds and work histories or if you have only one—or none.
“Your mentors should be a diverse network,” says David Smith, an expert on gender workplace issues and co-author of Athena Rising: How and Why Men Should Mentor Women. “If they’re not, you’re missing out on key perspectives and information, and you’re probably not being challenged enough in your thinking.”
Of course, for women in male-dominated fields such as the military (Smith’s background), the problem isn’t having too many mentors who look like you (i.e., female). The problem is having a mentor, period. Read More
Reese Witherspoon Empowers Women to Be the Hero of Their Own Story
Reese Witherspoon doesn’t dislike the word likable. The actress who started making movies when she was 14 and won an Oscar when she was 29 just considers herself to have closed the door on roles where she is mostly sunny and likable.
“I felt very lucky to be in the room and to be in control to a certain degree of the characters I was playing,” Reese, now 42, told the audience of 7,500 at the Texas Conference for Women in November. “But as I got older, I had enough of staying in my lane, in a place that felt comfortable for everybody and was someone else’s definition of what makes a woman likable. Women are complicated. They’re complex. They’re dynamic. Those are the women I want to see on the screen.” Read More
Beauty Truth-Teller Paula Begoun on Being an Entrepreneur, Hiring and Handling Stress
By Bryan Barron, for Paula’s Choice Skincare
Work for Paula Begoun, founder of Paula’s Choice Skincare and Beautypedia.com, and you will laugh a lot. You’ll also become used to her straight-shooting ways. “I’m blatantly honest to a fault,” she says.
Indeed, her truth-telling is her commodity and specialty. Combined with a passion for beauty products, it has resulted in 21 bestselling books on beauty and regular appearances on CNN, “The Today Show,” “The Dr. Oz Show” and “The View”, to name a few places—as well as her product review site Beautypedia.com and her global skincare company PaulasChoice.com.
It all began 35 years ago, when Paula was struggling with acne and eczema. She resolved to find a solution and began studying product labels, formulations and skin physiology. She discovered why everything she had been using on her skin either made it worse or didn’t help at all—and felt that her information could help so many other people, too.
Now Paula travels the globe speaking to women about truths and myths in beauty. “I love my job,” she says. Here, she shares more about entrepreneurship, work regrets, stress —and yes, her favorite products. Read More
5 Tips to Feel More Comfortable at Networking Events
This is one thing Alice Rutkowski, an executive communication and presence coach who has worked with more than 8,000 executives over the past 20-some years, wishes everyone knew:
Body language reflects what you believe about yourself and others.
“Consciously and unconsciously, we are reading others and they are reading us all the time,” says Rutkowski, vice president of executive development at Sagin. “For example, whether you’re sitting or standing, crossing your legs can convey nervousness. It puts your body out of alignment, and being unbalanced isn’t conducive to feeling confident—and people can see that.” Read More
Never Limit Yourself Out of Fear
By Jennifer Adams, CEO and Founder, Jennifer Adams Brands
What’s the most important life lesson I’ve learned? As the grateful owner of a flourishing home textile and furnishings business today, I’d say that the road to success is not always a straight path. My journey has been full of twists and turns—and what I call “moments of serendipity.” Read More