2023 marks 103 years since women were legally allowed to vote in the United States and 107 years since women were provided suffrage in the Western provinces of Canada.
It’s been about 3 weeks since many women celebrated Women’s Equality Day.
This day marks a significant turning point in the history of the struggle for equal treatment of women and women’s rights. In acknowledgment, we decided to look at some of the most successful women in business and how they made their millions (or in some cases, billions!).
The barriers to progress for women in the workforce are troubling.
How organizations deal with these barriers in the future will determine how our societies progress. After all, why would you want to ignore nearly half of the world’s workforce?
It’s time to celebrate the achievements of those who are paving the way for our future female leaders, CEO’s, scientists, bankers, journalists and media moguls.
In this info-graphic, we’ll show you some interesting facts about the current state of women in the workplace, gender equality and the pay gap. We’ll also give you some lesser known facts about the inspirational women we’ve chosen to profile, with information on their most prolific achievements.
If you’re in need of some girl power or motivation, then look no further than these business women who broke the mold. For the Silo, Angus Kirk.
Just because you have the days off, it doesn’t mean you need to leave town. There’s no mob of townsfolk chasing you out of town with pitchforks just because you’re “technically on vacation”. Sometimes, you just don’t have the money, energy and/or desire to go anywhere. Sometimes, when you get a week or two off work, all you really want to do is relax.
Go for it: have yourself a staycation. But if you are going to commit to the staycation, to really sink your teeth into relaxing, you need to follow a few simple steps. In this article, let’s look at a few tips you should follow if you want to squeeze the most relaxation out of your time off work.
Set Up an “Out of Office” Reply
If relaxation is like a balloon lazily floating in the air, work emails are the needle that’s going to pop it. Over and over and over again. They are constant, daily reminders of a stress you are supposed to leave behind, where it belongs – at work. Do yourself a favor and, after you finish your last day before vacation, quickly set up an out of office auto-reply. That lets co-workers and clients know that you are on vacation, and you don’t want to be reached save for the most urgent matter.
Log off Social Media
Social media is a fun sinkhole to fall into, but once you climb back out you might notice that you don’t feel all that good. That’s because people on social media tend to put their best face on, posting themselves doing fun activities, joyously traveling, eating magnificent meals… and nobody ever posts the bad stuff. Over time, this can cause you to unfairly compare yourself to those idealized accounts. And, as the saying goes, “comparison is the thief of joy”. It’s best to stay away, especially while relaxing!
Try a Little Legal Cannabis
Cannabis is legal in a lot of states, as well as in Canada, so why not partake? Even if you’re not much of a smoker, there are delicious cannabis infused treats you can try, or CBD-infused cannabis tea you can sip on. The chemical compounds in cannabis (CBD especially) have been shown to reduce stress and relieve pain.
No one’s advocating for you to spend your entire staycation smoking on the couch, but a bit of edibles or tea can help you fully, psychologically disconnect from the stresses of work.
Pick Up a Hobby
If you find that idle hands don’t really look good on you, pick up a hobby you’ve always wanted to try. Try painting an abstract portrait, or cooking an elaborate Thai meal. Try taking a drop-in pottery class or fixing up a car engine. Everyone has at least one hobby they want to try but haven’t.
Binge Watch a Show
Finally, take advantage of the current stream-site ubiquity and get involved in a good show. Everyone at the office has been talking your ear off about finally watching Deadwood or The Wire? Put the matter to rest and just watch the darn shows.
Who needs to get on an expensive plane, pay for an expensive room and sit on a crowded beach in order to relax? Not you. Follow these easy tips and you’ll be relaxing right away. For the Silo, Mila Urosevic.
Not all ideas are ‘shot down’ by an intimidating boss- Albert Einstein’s formal letter paved the way to American atom bomb research.
Everyone says they want innovation in their organization, but when an ambitious employee offers it to a Boss or CEO, for example, the idea is often shot down, says Neal Thornberry, Ph.D., faculty director for innovation initiatives at the Naval Postgraduate School in California.
“Senior leaders often miss the value-creating potential of a new concept because they either don’t take the time to really listen and delve into it, or the innovating employee presents it in the wrong way,” says Thornberry, who recently published “Innovation Judo,” (www.NealThornberry.com), based on his years of experience teaching innovation at Babson College and advising an array of corporate clients, from the Ford Co. and IBM to Cisco Systems.
Neal Thornberry: ” Innovation should be presented as opportunities, not ideas. Opportunities have gravitas while ideas do not!”
Thornberry outlines a template for innovation that works:
1 Intention: Once the “why” is answered, leaders have the beginnings of a legitimate roadmap to innovation’s fruition. This is no small task and requires some soul searching.
“I once worked with an executive committee, and I got six different ideas for what ‘innovation’ meant,” he says. “One wanted new products, another focused on creative cost-cutting, and the president wanted a more innovative culture. The group needed to agree on their intent before anything else.”
2 Infrastructure: This is where you designate who is responsible for what. It’s tough, because the average employee will not risk new responsibility and potential risk without incentive. Some companies create units specifically focused on innovation, while others try to change the company culture in order to foster innovation throughout. “Creating a culture takes too long,” Thornberry says. “Don’t wait for that.”
3 Investigation: What do you know about the problem? IDEO may be the world’s premier organization for investigating innovative solutions. Suffice to say that the organization doesn’t skimp on collecting and analyzing data. At this point, data collection is crucial, whereas brainstorming often proves to be a waste of time if the participants come in with the same ideas, knowledge and opinions that they had last week with no new learning in their pockets.
4 Ideation: The fourth step is also the most fun and, unfortunately, is the part many companies leap to. This is dangerous because you may uncover many exciting and good ideas, but if the right context and focus aren’t provided up front, and team members cannot get on the same page, then a company is wasting its time. That is why intent must be the first step for any company seeking to increase innovation. Innovation should be viewed as a set of tools or processes, and not a destination.
If you’re gonna ‘demo’ your idea you better have practiced and perfected your routine before showing your boss-
5 Identification: Here’s where the rubber meets the road on innovation. Whereas the previous step was creative, now logic and subtraction must be applied to focus on a result. Again, ideas are great, but they must be grounded in reality. An entrepreneurial attitude is required here, one that enables the winnowing of ideas, leaving only those with real value-creating potential.
“Innovation without the entrepreneurial mindset is fun but folly,” Thornberry notes.
6 Infection: Does anyone care about what you’ve come up with? Will excitement spread during this infection phase? Now is the time to find out. Pilot testing, experimentation and speaking directly with potential customers begin to give you an idea of how innovative and valuable an idea is. This phase is part selling, part research and part science. If people can’t feel, touch or experience your new idea in part or whole, they probably won’t get it. This is where the innovator has a chance to reshape their idea into an opportunity, mitigate risk, assess resistance and build allies for their endeavor.
7 Implementation/Integration: While many talk about this final phase, they often fail to address the integration part. Implementation refers to tactics that are employed in order to put an idea into practice. This is actually a perilous phase because, in order for implementation to be successful, the idea must first be successfully integrated with other activities in the business and aligned with strategy. An innovation, despite its support from the top, can still fail if a department cannot work with it.
For the Silo, Neil Thornberry.
Working 9 to 5? Think about the best times to approach your boss.
Neal Thornberry, Ph.D., is the founder and CEO of IMSTRAT, LLC a consulting firm that specializes in helping private and public sector organizations develop innovation strategies. A respected thought leader in innovation, Thornberry is a highly sought-after international speaker and consultant. He also serves as the faculty director for innovation initiatives at the Center for Executive Education at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif. Thornberry, author of “InnovationJudo:Disarming Roadblocks & Blockheads on the Path to Creativity”, holds a doctorate in organizational psychology and specializes in innovation, corporate entrepreneurship, leadership and organizational transformation.
Being broke sucks and you don’t have to come from a wealthy family, have the next billion-dollar idea or work 18-hour days to become rich, says self-made millionaire Mike Finley. In fact, you don’t have to be extraordinary in any of the headline-grabbing ways. What you need is the self-awareness to avoid wasting Financial Happiness.
“Money used wisely can give you financial security ”
Finley lists 10 of the most common money traps that lead to consumers going broke:
1- Making the appearance of wealth one of your top priorities by acquiring more stuff. The material trappings of a faux lifestyle, as seen in magazines and advertisements, are not good term happiness.
2- Working a job you hate, and spending your free time buying happiness. Instead, find fulfilling work Monday through Friday so you are not compensating for your misery with expensive habits during the weekend.
Even worse than living paycheck to paycheck- advance loan on your paycheck.
3- Living paycheck to paycheck and not worrying about saving money. Don’t live for today, as if that’s all that matters. Have you already achieved all of your dreams by this moment? If not, embrace hope and plan for tomorrow. (Appreciating your life today doesn’t require unnecessary expenditures.)
4- Stopping your education when someone hands you a diploma; never reading a book on personal finance. Just about any expert will tell you that the most reliable way out of poverty is education. Diplomas shouldn’t be the end of learning; they should be a milestone in a lifetime of acquiring wisdom.
5- Playing the lottery as often as possible. While you’re at it, hitting the casino! Magical thinking, especially when it comes to money, is a dangerous way to seek financial security.
6- Running up your credit cards and making the minimum payments whenever possible. Paying interest on stuff you really don’t need is a tragic waste of money.
7- When you come into some free money, spending it. Feeling like you deserve it. By that logic, you’re saying that a future version of you doesn’t deserve the money, which can be multiplied with wise investments.
8- Buying the biggest wedding and the biggest ring so everyone can see just how fabulous you really are. Nothing says “Let’s start our future together” like blowing your entire savings on one evening.
9- Treating those “amazing” celebrities and “successful” athletes as role models. Trying to be just like them whenever possible. As far as we know, there’s only one you the universe has ever known. Don’t dilute your unique individuality by chasing an image.
10- Blaming others for your problems in life. Repeat after me: I am not a victim. The victim mentality is an attempt to rationalize poor habits and bad decision-making.
“If you’re feeling uncomfortable with your financial situation, don’t just sit there in a malaise of ‘If only I had more money,’ ” Finley says. “Instead, use it as motivation for a better life; that’s why the discomfort is there.”
Like most North Americans, Mike Finley was raised with no education in personal finances. Joining the Army out of high school, he realized he didn’t understand money management and began the task of educating himself. After 26 years in the service, during which he practiced the principles he learned, he retired a millionaire. Finley is the author of “Financial Happine$$,” and teaches a popular financial literacy class at the University of Northern Iowa. For the Silo, Jarrod Barker.
