What?
Kinetic: Women setting things in motion. This is an invite only community of professional women who come together to help one another achieve their potential. Each month the group meets to share stories, advice and discuss topics of interest--usually centered around women's issues.
Who?
Immigrants Building Businesses with Nora Abousteit, serial entrepreneur and Founder of CraftJam, and Mariquel Waingarten, Co-Founder and CMO of Hickies a footwear accessory company, discuss what it’s like to be an immigrant entrepreneur in America. Why they chose to leave their country to build a business in the US, what it’s like to be a mom and an entrepreneur, and how their community of friends made it all possible.
From C-Suite to Non-Profit: Empowering Women Everywhere with Judy Spitz, Founding Program Director of WiTNY – Women in Technology and Entrepreneurship in New York, left her role as CIO of Verizon in 2011 to build a non-for-profit with a mission to "facilitate, encourage, and enable a significant increase in the participation of women in both higher education and entrepreneurship in fields related to technology in the New York market."
Why?
This group is intentionally kept small because it is important for everyone's voices to be heard. We end the session with going around expressing one ask. There is a record of this and we then follow up with ways we can help everyone. There are so many learnings that have come out of these conversations but notably one's on leading and being a manager have stuck with me.
Most interesting takeaway:
• Michael McCabe’s theory on millennials: Everyone’s first relationship is with parents. The theory is that people bring the model of their parent-child relationship into the workplace. Before (baby boomers), parents were authority figures and your goal (as a child) was to get parental approval. Now kids see parents as the fulfillers of their dreams. They build my world to be fulfilled. As a result, this generation looks to bosses and says “how can you make me feel fulfilled”.
Authenticity matters and storytelling is your greatest asset. It is a journey with a beginning, middle and end, where you can bring your entire team with you. We must keep in mind the different types of leaders:
• Those who lead from the front and others follow
• Those who lead from the back and find the right talent and pushes everyone up the mountain
• Those who lead from in between and everyone moves with you
These are all very different approaches but the key is to use the one that is most authentic to you otherwise no one will believe your facade.
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