Hundreds of thousands of people each month search on Google for “work from home jobs” (yes, I checked.) “Work from home” is one of the most popular searches right here on Workitmom.com and sites that claim to list work from home jobs get tons of traffic (whether they are actually listing good opportunities or not is another question all together.) I, personally, get many emails each week from our members asking if I could suggest jobs they can do from home.

Why do so many moms want to work from home? (I know that many non-moms do too, but we’re a community for moms, so let’s talk about ourselves, shall we?)

Let me start with somewhat of a confession: I kind of hate working from home. Read the rest of this entry »

The last time the economy was in a downward spin cycle I was working for a small start-up. I could see the writing on the wall a few weeks before we all got our layoff notices and one of the main indicators of my impending job loss was the way my boss began to avoid me. I’d come by his office and suddenly he’d remember a meeting he was late for. I would run into him in the hallway and he’d say he had a call he had to take. Lesson learned: Your boss avoiding you is a good indicator that you might be losing your job soon.

But let’s say you’re not there yet, your boss is as friendly as ever and your company hasn’t yet joined the growing list of those announcing layoffs. Is there anything you can do to reduce your chances of getting fired?

I think so, and I say this not as some fancy career expert but as someone who has worked with large and small companies and have fired my share of people, unfortunately. A few ideas: Read the rest of this entry »

Not that you would remember but several weeks ago I wrote about mistakes I’ve made as a mom and promised to share some mistakes I’ve made in other areas of my life. I continue to think that we — women, moms — need to share our mistakes and talk about them publicly more often because it will help us all realize that (1) our mistakes don’t mean the end of the world and (2) there is no such thing as a superwoman.

So here goes, some mistakes I’ve made in my career: Read the rest of this entry »

The other day I got an email from a woman who recently graduated from my alma mater. She found my contact info through the alumni database and was asking if I could spend a few minutes talking with her about my career path. Of course I said yes — yes, I want to help, but who doesn’t like to feel like Miss Smarty Pants for a while?

We’d scheduled a call and I started thinking about things I wanted to make sure to tell her. Don’t go into venture capital before having some operating experience. Consulting is a great way to learn how to process information quickly and to become a whiz with financial spreadsheets, but don’t stay for too long. If you’re thinking of joining a start-up do your homework on the team (they should be smart, hardworking, and fun to spend 18 hours a day with) and the financial plan for the company.

And then I started to think about all the things I wanted to make sure to NOT tell her, the cliche career advice I often got when I graduated from college, or truly bad career advice, that I also got and in most cases didn’t realise was bad until years later. I thought I’d share some of it with you and see what you think — is it bad advice and what other horrible career advice have you received?

1. As a woman, you will have to work harder than guys to get the same recognition at work. Read the rest of this entry »

Last week all of these happened to me so yes, this is a vent. I hope you’ll join me in the comments.

So here goes, in no particular order…

1. Canceling a meeting 10 minutes before the scheduled time. In my case, by email, which I was lucky to check before getting out of my car to go to the meeting. Read the rest of this entry »

One day when I have a bit of extra cash lying around I am going to commission a study about all the things women are doing right at work. For now, we have yet another bit of research to suggest that we’re sometimes our own enemies when it comes to breaking the glass ceiling.

The study, which has now been published in a book called The Psychology of Sales Reluctance, was conducted by Shannon Goodson, a behavioral scientist who compared 11,000 professional women with 16,000 professional men from 34 countries. Goodson found that women are significantly less likely than men to tout their achievements and contributions at work and believe that self-promotion is “socially unacceptable”, “unlady-like” and “morally suspect”. Read the rest of this entry »

I never hide the fact that I love to work and I am extremely passionate about what I am doing right now. But you know, work is work, and sometimes it’s tough to get through my long workday. So over time I’ve found a few ways to make my workdays a bit more pleasant and thought I’d share them here:

1. Start each day by doing something that energizes you. In an ideal world, I’d work out in the morning, before work. Read the rest of this entry »

My answer is yes, but I’ve quit many of my jobs the absolute wrong way.

What made me think to write this post was a call I got from someone I’d worked with in my prior life. This guy is a VP at a software company where I used to be on the board and he was calling to get my advice on the best way to leave his job. He got offered an amazing opportunity at another company and has decided to move on, but wanted to make sure he was going about it the right way. The team is small and a lot depends on him, the CEO has a lot of trust in him, and he has visibility to board level.

My few points of advice were: Read the rest of this entry »

I know, you’re thinking “OK, Nataly, why don’t you tell us how you really feel about networking?”

But in all seriousness, I feel that networking is a task that we — and yes, by this huge generalization, I mean we = women — overlook most often and don’t do enough of in our careers, businesses, and life in general. I know this from my personal experiences and from those of my female colleagues and friends. I am sure there are plenty of reasons for it, but this post isn’t about that. It is about what I’ve learned about networking and my desire to encourage you to make it a regular part of our routine, whatever your career or business might be. Believe me when I say it’s really good for you.

My 5 golden rules of networking:

Rule #1: If you want to succeed in your business, your career, or your life, you MUST network.

My first job out of college was for a huge consulting firm famous for the way it invested in training its business analysts. They put us through tons of training — financial analysis, client management, presentation skills, and much more — but we were never taught about networking. My next job was in strategy for a small company, where I had a great boss who taught me about business, running companies, and sales and marketing — but I don’t remember him saying anything about networking. When I took a job in venture capital my boss told me that to find new deals I had to network, but that was it. In my 10+ year career, no-one ever taught me about networking but I so much wish someone had.

I learned the importance of networking only when I decided to start my own company (Work It, Mom!, of course). My partner, Victoria, and I were introduced by someone I worked with and after a year of business lunches we decided to start a company together. When it came time to find our great team of bloggers, I started reaching out to several whose personal blogs I liked and always asked if there were others they’d recommend. I have a great group of extremely sharp and experienced people to whom I go for advice about growing my own company and I’ve met them all through networking. Networking means connecting with people, creating relationships, and expanding the circle of people to whom you can go for advice, support, career direction, job leads, and answers to specific questions. I don’t know a single person successful person who doesn’t make networking part of their daily life.

Rule #2: The best time to network is when you don’t need anything. Read the rest of this entry »

A friend of mine recently got a pathetically low raise at work after having a spectacular year there. Sure, the economy is in bad shape, but her company did great and she contributed to the performance. She’s been there a few years and she knows for a fact that two of her colleagues — both men — received higher raises for similar performance. When she told me, I immediately said that she has to talk to her boss and negotiate for a better package. “Be confident in your work and your abilities, and go in there knowing that what you’re asking for is right,” I said, in my most convincing voice.

I stand behind my advice, but I’d be lying if I pretended that I’ve always followed it in my career. In truth, when I read articles about things women do at work that make it more difficult for them to earn more money or attain leadership roles, I nod not only because I’ve seen this type of behavior but also because I’ve been guilty of it. And I thought this would be as good a time as any to come clean about (at least) three stereotypes about women at work that I helped prove right: Read the rest of this entry »