Passions: One Female Executive’s Double Life as a Monarch Maniac

istock_000003895319xsmall1by Tina Vasquez (Los Angeles)

 

Much like the Monarch butterflies she loves so dearly, Monika Maeckle, vice president of new media at a large media company, has a personal journey spans many different regions. Her parents are German immigrants, who, like so many others, came to this country in search of a better life. The butterfly enthusiast grew up in suburban Dallas, where she loved the outdoors.  “As a kid I spent a lot of time by a creek we called ‘the crashed up car.’ We’d have big, wild adventures. I’ve always been like this; I’ve always preferred the outdoors to anything else. I think it’s just a personality thing … well, that and the fact that mosquitoes don’t like me,” Maeckle said.  

 

A career in communications hasn’t really proven to be the ideal profession for a self-described “Monarch maniac” who loves the outdoors, as a majority of Maeckle’s time as vice president of new media is spent in an office working at a computer. It actually may be a blessing in disguise that Maeckle discovered her passion for Monarchs so late in life; making this discovery any sooner may have derailed the illustrious media and marketing career that took her far from “the crashed up car” in her Dallas neighborhood. After her first job as a reporter, she moved to New York for a copy editing position, which eventually led to a long stint in Costa Rica where she worked as a freelance writer while her husband was employed by Newsweek Magazine. Upon returning to the States, the couple wanted to get back in touch with nature and be more “outdoorsy,” which was impossible in New York City. 

 

Acquiring their Lucky Boy Ranch in Texas Hill Country has been one of the greatest things that could have ever happened to Maeckle, especially after she discovered it was located on the Monarch flight path.

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Queen of the City says a large Bah! to Age Discrimination

Early Morning View of Big BenOne doesn’t get to be a queen at too young an age these days (except for the exquisite Rania of Jordan, who is the beautiful exception that proves this august rule).

So, as your eyes and ears in London’s Square Mile, I find my regal self clocking up my working decades and wondering just why the world is so damnably ageist about us females of stature. There are no female TV anchors on any prime time channel much over the age of forty, and I’ve cudgelled my brains trying to find any female wielding power in the professions who hasn’t had to sacrifice what passes for ‘normal’ life to get to where she is.

If you do have a ‘career break’ and dare to pop out a baby or two, it’s quite likely that you will be able to on-ramp afterwards, and that’s encouraging, given that in the past maternity was a death knell. Today, however, you can work your proverbial butt off when you get back in to work, but it will likely not be a long-haul journey. This is where sexism loses traction to ageism: It’s as though business thinks you’re past it when you’ve only just got back on track.

Naturally I got to thinking about my own regal experience of, erm, what’s politely called ‘middle age’:

  • Since I turned forty (and even I started counting backwards from then) I have done the following:
  • Run a marathon (New York. Doesn’t get any better than that);
  • Climbed a mountain (Kilimanjaro. Ditto).
  • Launched four teenagers into secondary/tertiary education without having managed to murder a single one of them, in spite of massive provocation;
  • Carried on running a smallholding in the countryside/being a mom/wife/chief cook/laundress/nanny/chauffeuse/bank of last resort for small, impecunious people;
  • Fought a household bank name through the High Courts for flouting its Data Protection obligations. In person. Without legal representation;

And much, much more.

Gee. Just writing all that makes me think I wouldn’t mind a quiet life. Unsure if I’d know what to do with it, but I wouldn’t mind a bit of a try. Perhaps in the form of a nice, full-time, fulfilling, paying job? I’ve been multi-tasking for decades now, and it’s become second nature. Now I’m not being woken every night by howling offspring, I’m calmer, more energetic, and, dare I say it, wiser.

So the point is: Age shall not wither us. I am far more organised and time-efficient now than I could ever have been in my twenties and thirties. This is because I have been there and done manic work/life imbalance, usually with a small person clinging to me at the time. It teaches you phenomenal focus.

Businesses are missing a trick when they dismiss (or fail to hire) mature talent.  Look at the banks, as an example. If they’d had more mature workers who’d experienced more than one business cycle, d’you think they’d have piled all those eggs into the sub-prime basket? No. They wouldn’t. But if you look at the demographics of all the big research departments at bulge-bracket banks, I reckon the median age is thirty. Or under. Thirty-somethings are definitely spring chickens in a world where the older population is growing faster than its replacement.

This is a sexist remark: I believe women really are better at multitasking. My Consort is a brilliant analyst with a brain the size of the planet. But he can’t do more than one thing at a time without getting terribly stressed. Give him a scenario where he has to produce a report at the same time as feeding four under fives and emptying the dishwasher while de-flea-ing the dog (washing his hands included) is a recipe for meltdown.

Women just do it. Even if it means cleaning your teeth with the babe in a papoose while you sloosh out the shower and compose an article about Personal Injury Litigation all at the same time (I have done it, I promise). It teaches you to get priorities 100% ordered, and to make use of every nanosecond in every day. I know plenty managers who can’t do that…who are not hiring women ‘of a certain age’ in the numbers that you’d think they should.

So, when we multitaskers reach our post-baby years, where are we headed? We are so not ready for a rocking chair and the knitting that loomed over our grandmothers when they hit forty.

Employers should be beating a frenzied path to our doors. We aren’t going to go off and have kids all of a sudden. We’re reliable and unlikely to take sudden time off for chicken pox or the like. We’re uber-organised and hyper-efficient, and most of us have a good 20 years of decent work service still in us.

So why aren’t they clamouring for us?  I must say it puzzles me massively.

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Conference Focuses Spotlight on Challenges & Successes for Multicultural Women in Corporate America

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By Pamela Weinsaft (New York City)

In New York City last week, Working Mother Media hosted its annual Multicultural Women’s National Conference and Gala Awards Luncheon to honor 20 companies, including PwC, Goldman Sachs, KPMG, Citi, and American Express, as being the best companies for multicultural women.  The event, which took place over two jam-packed days, featured powerful speakers, including the inspiring Irshad Manji, NYU professor and director of the Moral Courage Project, as well as multiple workshop sessions designed to assist attendees in their continued development into resilient and innovative leaders.

One of the more popular sessions, however, was the lunch session entitled “What about the White Guys?” at which the mostly multicultural, 99% female audience got to be “flies on the wall” and “eavesdrop” on a conversation among several male executives.  Moderator Fenimore Fisher, the vice president of diversity initiatives at Wal-Mart/Sam’s Club, lead the discussion, posing probing questions to the white male panelists about their paths to embracing diversity, the importance of diversity in today’s workplace and the challenges multicultural women may still face in Corporate America.

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Playing the Corporate Chess Game: Mastering Strategies for Career Success

jcarterphoto1Contributed by Jessica Faye Carter

Success strategies in the corporate world bear a surprising resemblance to those employed in the game of chess. There’s a reason for this: corporate contexts and chess share certain commonalities.  Both are games of strategy and patience, of mental dexterity over physical strength, and combine offensive and defensive measures to achieve the desired outcome.  In other words, they’re both “mind” games, which require the employment of strategic efforts for advancement and winning.  These strategic efforts are often described as “corporate chess.”

Such strategies are of particular importance to the career development of professional women of color, because they have made markedly less progress in the workplace than their ethnic male and white female counterparts. According to Catalyst, women are 15.7% of corporate officers, but only 2% of them are women of color. 

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Four Tips for Becoming a Visionary in Challenging Times

jo-miller-headshot-smlContributed by Jo Miller, CEO, Women’s Leadership Coaching

During a recent women’s leadership webinar, I asked Krista Thomas, Vice President, Marketing and Communications for The Calais Initiative at Thomson Reuters, how a person should determine what their organization needs in these challenging economic times.  In addition to answering the question, she addressed a more intriguing issue – how to provide visionary leadership during challenging economic times:

1.   Don’t keep your head down / check in often

“You really can make a mistake by keeping your head down and staying quiet, because sometimes you get caught up in a stream of activity that really isn’t core or strategic to your company,” said Thomas.

“My policy is to check in often,” she added, “Make sure that the goals and the metrics that you’re measuring are still priority number one in executing on your goals for the company.  Also, don’t be afraid to raise your hand, go personally to your management, and really make sure you’re still on target.”

2.    Be adaptive and go with the flow

“It can be tempting in troubling times like this to get flustered and frustrated and be upset when things go off-plan, or when the plan changes.  You may not necessarily always be in the loop.  If you’re not at that senior level, you may not know when some of the strategies change, which can happen in real time.”

She continued, “The key is to be able to be flexible, to demonstrate your ability to not get stuck in the old thinking when the thinking has changed.  Check in, know what’s going on, know where others’ thoughts are going, and show that flexibility. Show your adaptability and ability to go with the flow.”

3.    Move toward the next opportunity

“Things are going to be chaotic, especially in this economy. We saw this when ‘Web 1.0’ imploded all around us.  The way to survive was to look for the next opportunity and walk towards that as opposed to being afraid,” she explained.

4.    Create an environment of calmness and creativity

 In a final point, Thomas emphasized the importance of generating new ideas. “Nothing is more helpful in a difficult time than creativity.  If you’ve got creativity and you can bring problem solving or people skills, you’ll help mitigate other people on the team being upset. If you’re one of those people who can come in and calm people down, and get them re-focused on new priorities, you’re very valuable right now.”

Since 1998 Jo Miller, CEO of Women’s Leadership Coaching, has developed and implemented coaching programs that have benefited women worldwide. Jo created the Women’s Leadership Coaching Inc. leadership coaching system, and has logged many thousands of hours coaching women who are in executive and management positions, or aspire to be.  She was named one of Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal’s 40 people to watch under the age of 40 in 2006, and one of Silicon Valley’s Women of Influence in 2008.

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Ask-A-Career-Coach: How Do You Maintain Career Momentum?

jobsearchContributed by Caroline Ceniza-Levine of SixFigureStart

A lot of jobseekers get caught up following one lead at a time.  Then, if that lead doesn’t work out, their job search starts from the very beginning all over again.  For employed jobseekers, this same phenomenon is present with people who focus solely on their current role without maintaining ties to other departments, to colleagues outside the company or to colleagues in different industries.  Then, if something happens to that current job, the once gainfully employed person is caught unawares.  In both cases, there is a loss of momentum that negatively impacts the job search and career.  Here’s how to maintain career momentum:

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Law Firm Gender Diversity Efforts Not Enough to Ensure Meaningful Inclusion of Women of Color

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Young lawyerby Pamela Weinsaft (New York City)

As we’ve previously reported, women in law firms have traditionally lacked the advancement opportunities their male counterparts enjoy due to inadequate access to plum assignments, a dearth of sponsors and mentors, and competing demands of work and family life.  In recent years, progressive firms have taken an aggressive stance, establishing women’s initiatives and internal policies in an effort to level the playing field for female attorneys in the firms.  But, according to Catalyst’s study released last week, while those efforts have, in fact, improved the conditions for women in general, these efforts have been significantly less successful in improving the development, advancement and retention of women of color.

According to Kathy Giscombe, Ph.D., Vice President, Women of Color Research at Catalyst, “The study shows that women of color feel very excluded within the environment of the law firms.” As a result, women of color are leaving their law firms en masse –75% of women of color associates leave their firm by the 5th year of practice, with that number jumping to 86% by the 7th year, as per the American Bar Association figures referenced in the report.

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Voice of Experience: Lynne Doughtie, National Managing Partner for Advisory Services, KPMG

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Lynne DoughtieLynne Doughtie, KPMG’s National Managing Partner for Advisory Services, had one goal when she entered the firm upon graduating with an accounting degree from Virginia Tech: she wanted to be an audit partner serving banking clients out of KPMG’s Richmond office.  But, ten years out, due to a major consolidation effort going on within the banking industry, that goal was becoming more elusive each day.  “That was a really difficult time for me because, within a two-year time period, one after the other, my banking clients were disappearing.  So by the time I was ready to get promoted to partner, I had no clients. That was a huge crossroads for me.” 

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In Case You Missed It: Business News Round-up

Martin Mitchel of CTGContributed by Martin Mitchell of the Corporate Training Group

In case you were too busy to have kept up with all the news, contributor Martin Mitchell has gathered some important market events from last week to help you start this week well informed:

Economic Backdrop

  • Chairman of the Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke made his biannual speech to the House financial services committee. As he considers when to implement an increase in interest rates, he stated that the current low rates will persist for an ‘extended period’. If interest rates are increased too soon, the nascent recovery could peter out. If they are raised too late, inflation could take hold.
  • Figures released on the manufacturing industry in the UK suggested that it remains deep in recession. The latest CBI quarterly survey reported that companies’ order books fell at their fastest rate in 17 years.
  • This was further underlined by GDP figures for the UK that showed a 5.6% contraction in the economy in the year to June.

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Queen of the City: The Equality Bill as the Bright Spot (Other Than the Weather) Amidst all the Doom and Gloom

Early Morning View of Big BenWe’re basking in a sporadic heat-wave in the Square Mile as I type. It’s OK for the ladies of the City when the sun blazes, but those poor deluded men have to self-strangle with suits and neckties on some of the hottest days of the year. You have to pity them.

Yeah, we used to have Dress Down Fridays, but these days it’s as likely to see a banker in casuals as it is to catch sight of a Dodo – the world’s a much less relaxed place, especially in the financial district. Sartorially, it’s much more Brooks Brothers than Gap, and the more somber, the better, too. As a barometer of the money world’s health and happiness, the more uptight the dressing, the worse things are. So it seems that the City’s mixing its messages: we’re all told that the Worst Is Over, but the attire is sending a different message entirely.

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