Before Linda Cliatt-Wayman was the principal of Strawberry Mansion High School, she was the assistant superintendent overseeing all 52 public high schools in Philadelphia. In other words, to take the helm of Strawberry Mansion High, she demoted herself.
What’s more, she took the step down to work at a school that had the most-challenging-to-teach teenagers (three schools were being merged into one), in an impoverished and gang-ridden neighborhood. Read More
As you would expect of a popular blogger formerly known as MizFit, Carla Birnberg does not do her tweeting lying on the couch. She doesn’t even do it sitting at a desk.
“Unless I’m leading a Twitter chat, I’m either walking around my office, in a plank position or in a wall sit, using voice dictation,” says Birnberg, who recently rebranded herself using her real name. “It makes me a better tweeter—studies show that walking makes you more creative—and I feel better about my social media time because I’m not sedentary.” Read More
What do you do when you realize that the corporate life just isn’t your jam? When you’re Jolie Sikes or her big sister Amie, co-founders with their mom of Junk Gypsy, you hit the road, hightailing it out of Houston and Austin, respectively—and keep driving for 15 years.
Of course, they weren’t aimlessly roaming Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana. They were scouring flea markets and roadsides for discarded treasures that they could fix up and resell. “It was Mom’s idea and her $2,000 stash for the slot machines that we used at first,” says Sikes. “She said, ‘Let’s just go to Canton [where there’s a giant four-day flea market every month] with open minds and figure out what we can do.’” Read More
During a summer of inordinate hot air (from the election cycle as well as the heat outside), Mindy Kaling’s down-to-earthiness is a welcome cool breeze. When asked about being brave, one of the only women to create, produce, write and star in her own network series—and the only one to put her name in the show’s title—is quick to contextualize her courage. “Have I been brave?” Kaling asks. “I’m not sure—I hope so. Bravery to me takes its form in women like Gabrielle Giffords and Malala Yousafzai. I have learned so much from them.”
Here, Kaling, whose book Why Not Me? comes out in paperback next month, took a break from working on Season 5 of The Mindy Project (premieres October 4 on Hulu) to talk about the work lessons she has learned along her path. Read More
Whether you’re taking on a new challenge, rebounding from a disappointment or just powering through your day, repeating a mantra can help. We asked Conference for Women speakers and staff for their favorite sayings. Read them and repeat! Read More