Happy holidays to everyone in our community of members and clients and friends! We are grateful for your trust and support as we continue to make work work for women! Enjoy the holiday season!!
Category: Uncategorized
Empowering Working Mothers: The Impact of Giving Back
The holiday season is a time to reflect on the challenges and triumphs of the past year. For many working mothers, these challenges include balancing career ambitions, family responsibilities, and financial stability. At The Second Shift, we understand that the ability to work and support a family often depends on access to critical resources that enable women to show up for their families and jobs.
This year, we’re highlighting organizations that address essential needs for working mothers and their families. From childcare essentials to body autonomy, these nonprofits help ensure that women have the tools to build a better future for themselves and their loved ones.
Every Mother Counts
For many working mothers, access to healthcare is fundamental to their ability to work and care for their families. Every Mother Counts is dedicated to making pregnancy and childbirth safe for all mothers, helping ensure that women are healthy enough to return to work and provide for their children. By supporting maternal health globally, this organization empowers women to thrive as parents and professionals.
Baby2Baby
Necessities like diapers, clothing, and hygiene items can make or break a working mother’s ability to stay in the workforce. Baby2Baby ensures that low-income families have what they need to care for their children, allowing mothers to focus on maintaining jobs without the constant worry of providing essentials. When families have access to resources, working moms can better balance their roles at home and work.
Dress for Success
Confidence and professional attire are crucial for women reentering the workforce or advancing their careers. Dress for Success provides working mothers with professional clothing, career coaching, and a support network, ensuring they have the tools to secure better opportunities. Economic independence starts with showing up—and Dress for Success ensures women can do so with confidence.
Coalition for the Homeless
A stable home is essential for working mothers to succeed. The Coalition for the Homeless provides housing support, job training, and advocacy for families experiencing homelessness. By helping families secure stable housing, this organization enables working mothers to focus on their jobs and provide financial security for their children.
Donate to Coalition for the Homeless
National Network of Abortion Funds
Access to reproductive healthcare is a cornerstone of economic stability for women. The National Network of Abortion Funds ensures that women have the freedom to make decisions about their bodies and futures. Working mothers’ ability to plan and make choices that align with their life circumstances is critical to maintaining their careers and their families’ well-being.
Donate to the National Network of Abortion Funds
When we invest in women—whether through healthcare, housing, clothing, or family essentials—we empower them to stay in the workforce and provide for their families. This holiday season, let’s show our support for working mothers by giving to these incredible organizations that make it possible for women to succeed at home and work.
Together, we can create a brighter, more equitable future for working families everywhere.
The Tell with Amy Griffin
Congrats to Amy Griffin – day 1 supporter of The Second Shift and women everywhere.
#womenempowerment #womeninbusiness #midlifewomen
WIE SUITE Masterclass
Thanks The WIE Suite for inviting Jenny Galluzzo to lead a Masterclass on Shift Forward- our career transitions workshop.
Read more here: https://lnkd.in/ewtvRAc8
to learn more about switching careers or jobs, changing your mindset to move forward toward your career goals, to smoothly re- enter the workforce: https://lnkd.in/etJAYFtD
#careertransition #workingwomen
#womeninbusiness
Featured Member: Angela Shank
Tell us your work story : Who are you and what do you do?
I am an Associate Certified Coach and ICF accredited specializing in Relationship Coaching.
What is your proudest professional accomplishment?
Creating a successful full time coaching business within one year of certification
What is the hardest challenge you’ve faced, work-wise?
Understanding where to get clients, what clients are really looking for and how I could be an expert in that field
What advice do you have for other women looking to make a career change but are afraid or lack confidence?
Build on your strengths and manage your weaknesses
How do you negotiate the balance between life and work when you are the one setting the boundaries?
When i’m not working i’m not working – I stay in the present moment
How do you make work work for you?
Making a list of my top 3 priorities everyday and accomplishing them
If you would like to be considered for Featured Member spotlight please fill out this form:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/featuredmemberquestionnaire
Mastering Parental Leave In Real Time
Big News– Kiirsten (Kiki to us) is about to have a baby!! It’s the first Second Shift employee to have a baby and go out on family leave. In full transparency, this has been a moment of both fear and excitement for all of us. Kiki is an invaluable team member and her role in client and member success and operations is enmeshed in all areas of our company.
Theoretically, we have a deep understanding of parental leave having placed numerous fill-in roles and as the creators of the Let’s Be Human: Welcoming Parenthood (And All That Comes With It) platform to train managers and employees on successfully executing parental leave. So, as self-proclaimed experts, we realized this was a unique opportunity to put our program to work on ourselves. Kemp and Kiki have had the most work to do– from Kemp creating our leave policy to Kiirsten training others to do her job with confidence–here is what they discovered:
Kiirsten’s insights as the employee going on leave:
Plan in reverse. A pearl of wisdom gifted to me was to cross the t’s by week 36 of pregnancy instead of my estimated due date. I shared the news with my team on the early side, but even if you choose to wait: research your company, state, and federal benefits and start crafting a guideline for covering responsibilities during your parental leave. Time flies and the formalities of time off may include multiple components in your organization like management, an HR department, a PEO, and more – in addition to navigating job coverage.
Go for confidence, calm, and creativity. Designing an empowered and resourceful parental leave roadmap gave our team a chance to zoom out from the daily workflow and lent me an opportunity to look at how to make my position, processes, and projects transparent and teachable. Questions I considered included: how do I sharpen my business for the benefit of the business; who will hold my role and what does an effective training model look like; what do I want my return to feel like? By discussing mutual expectations around this life/career stage, it infuses a sense of stability in what could feel like a world of swirling personal and professional unknowns.
Think about the future. Consider whether you may be mid-project as you temporarily exit stage left, as well as what will be happening within your company and industry around the approximate time you return to work. Will your leave begin during a product launch you’ve been working on all year or will you be re-entering work during fundraising or event season? It was important to me to invest the time to look ahead at the business calendar and strategic goals to arrange for team-wide success and a low-stress return.
Kemp’s Insights from the employer perspective:
Educate Yourself. Review applicable law with your HR professional or employment counsel to make sure your policy is compliant. States such as California have specific obligations for employers regarding employee leave,
Plan ahead! Spend time with your employee to determine (1) what are mission critical responsibilities? (2) What employees can cover for her? (3) Do we need to hire a (Second Shift) contractor to provide coverage? Have her create a document outlining key coverage needs while she is out.
Be Creative and Compromise. Implement policies that work for your business. How long? Paid vs. unpaid leave? Small businesses often can’t offer the level of leave benefits as larger companies but we can offer flexibility, work from home options, and individual support. Be creative and make her feel valued.
We are still in the before stage of Kiki’s leave and will update you as this journey progresses. If you would like more information about Let’s Be Human and our parental leave platform please reach out to info@thesecondshift.com.
Mentorship Program
The Second Shift is excited to announce the opportunity to book 1-1 coaching/mentorship sessions with founder Jenny Galluzzo.
With this Mentorship offering you can book:
- Private 1-1 Zoom Consultations with Second Shift Co-Founder Jenny Galluzzo
- Get expert advice for: LinkedIn Review, resume review, career guidance and support, access to wider TSS network for personal introductions to boost your career path or pivot and enhance your networking engagement
- Have Jenny do your personal TSS vetting and introductory call
Rate
TSS Member: $125 / 30 minutes and $200 / 60 minutes
Everyone Else: $175 / 30 minutes and $250 / 60 minutes
Book:
Book a Mentorship session with Jenny by booking time on her calendar through this link!
Success Story: Dear Annabelle!
The Client:
Dear Annabelle is a line of luxury stationary and paper products started by Marcie Pantzer, a dear friend of our co-founder Jenny Galluzzo and an investor in The Second Shift. When she launched her line in 2018 she came to us to find a graphic designer to work with. and we knew we had to find her a superstar. Julie Teninbaum was the perfect choice– she is a seasoned pro with a whimsical and fun vibe who is also a pleasure to work with. Four years later their design collaboration is still going strong!
The Quote:
When I decided to launch Dear Annabelle, I knew that one of the most important hires would be a dependable, creative and wildly talented graphic designer. My business wasn’t financially ready to hire a full-time graphic designer so the Second Shift was a perfect option for me. Through the platform I was introduced to nearly a dozen vetted designers and was able to find one who was a fit personally and creatively. Being able to outsource such an important role to a trusted resource helped me grow quickly and financially responsibly.
The Hire:
From the start, Jenny, Gina and Kemp imagined this community into being: rooting for women like me; reminding me I could still be relevant and ambitious — and that this wasn’t contradictory to being a mother. Through the years, I have won several pitches, and also lost a few that I wish I’d gotten. I’ve passed over a few I would have liked but was too busy with other projects to fit them in. But I always appreciate when new notifications appear in my inbox, for the possibilities they offer. When I was linked with Marcie Pantzer of Dear Annabelle in 2018, I loved her aesthetic and feel so lucky that 4 years later, we are still working together.
Marcie’s taste is impeccable, and she has created a sumptuous line of stationery products that is, at times, quirky and refined (a winning combination). I was originally brought on to help design and layout stationery and presentation materials, which I still do. Over time, though, we have also worked together on expansions of her lines: wrapping paper, place cards, gift tags and more. We work well together, back and forth, mainly over email, which I love because it’s I have time-commitments (mostly kid-related) which cut into my day. I value her judgement, her attention to detail and her on-target communication.
If you want to hire a Second Shift member and have your own success story please reach out to info@thesecondshift.com
Resume Tips and Tricks for Success with Michelle Diamond
Michelle Diamond of Diamond Executive Resume has spend more than a decade as an expert resume and bio writer with a 98% success rate. She generously offered her time to help her fellow Second Shift members learn how to make their own resumes shine.
You can watch the entire talk here.
If you are interested in hiring Michelle you can find her at Diamond Executive Resumes.
Create the Mindset to Achieve Your Dreams!
Dr Samantha Boardman is a Positive Psychiatrist who focuses on wellbeing and the creation of health and success. She is the author of Everyday Vitality and a weekly newsletter, The Dose. Our webinar had some tech glitches… but we learned a lot about how mindset affects personal and professional outcomes.
Here are the biggest takeaways:
- What you do everyday affects how you feel and your behavior affects your mental and emotional vitality.
- Write down three things that you value most in your life and how you actually spend your time. The gap between is what you need to focus on. Spend your free time creating more overlap so your values are aligned with your actual day to day.
- Go delight hunting every day– do things that are wellsprings of vitality and will boost your confidence and uplift your sprit
- The three actions you can take every day to increase your happiness are: make meaningful connections, have experiences that challenge you, contribute in some way to something outside of yourself that makes you feel good.
You can watch the entire webinar here!