This site is dedicated to building a new social image of women.
“A stereotypical image of an entrepreneur is a 20-something man. But I have as much energy as they do, if not more, because I also need to care about my family, and caring about one’s family is like growing another company,” — says Ksenia Belkina, a successful entrepreneur from Ukraine.
As it should be obvious by now, true entrepreneurship doesn’t have gender or age or skin color, but only a desire to create. And Ksenia’s story is another story that speaks to it.
I met Ksenia during a startup demo day where she was introducing her company Cardiomo and their unique product that helps people with heart diseases to monitor their health condition 24/7 and to predict possible complications in advance.
Continue reading “Interview With Ksenia Belkina, CEO and Co-founder of Cardiomo”
Career or family? Or, both? If we can have it all, then how? I’ve been thinking about it for long time by now and, honestly, I don’t know the answer. But what I do know is that there can’t be a single solution that would fit everybody at all the moments of their life. I also know that there should be a choice and the right to make the choice equally available for both men and women and recognized by the society.
This is a story of Ilona Bouzoukachvili, a devoted art teacher, a wife, and a mother of two, where she speaks about her approach to a “career or family” challenge which she recently faced and her decision.
This summer, I faced one of my most difficult career decisions. Continue reading “Career or Family: A Story of One Decision”
Vijaya Nene is a senior executive at one of the fastest growing life insurance companies in India. Sioux Messinger is a business owner and an executive coach with more than 20 years of experience. Recently, these two powerful women set on exploring the topic of women, power, and love.
Power and love is the ultimate combination. Real power is benevolent; it seeks to energize, equalize, and embolden others toward their most magnificent selves.
Dear High School Students,
We count on you to bring a very needed social change to our society. Not all at once, of course, rather one step at a time. Or, going with our topic, one prom at a time.
I’m talking about “gender”.
Continue reading “Choose Your Prom! – An Open Letter to High School Students”
Russian Orthodox bishop Kirill has suggested to ban abortions in Russia.
Do these people learn nothing? Do they open history books at all? Have they heard about critical thinking or, at least, common sense? Do they ever pause to think about how their bans influence people’s life?
Have you ever felt invisible? Excluded? Taken advantage of? Dr. Lois Frankel, a pioneer in business coaching and professional development, a well-known speaker and an author of several bestselling business books including Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office, speaks on micro-inequities at workplace and shares practical tips on how to make yourself visible again, as a person and as a leader.
As I travel the globe speaking with primarily women’s groups about the current state of workplace gender equity, I encounter mixed messages. Although most people agree that things are better than a decade or two ago, how much is that really saying? Continue reading “The Illusion of Inclusion”
A recent online campaign advocating open public discussions of sexual abuse attracted tens of thousands of participants, aroused lots of emotions, and created even more controversies. What did the campaign achieve? How can we evaluate people’s reaction to it? Can a campaign like #iamnotafraidtosayit help solve the problem of gender violence?
In my previous post about #iamnotafraidtosayit (#янебоюсьсказати), I shared reasons why I supported the campaign and told my personal story.
In this article, I want to analyze reaction to the campaign by reviewing some comments I personally came across. They don’t represent a whole spectrum of responses by any means, but they represent common opinions, in my view.
Every public action like #iamnotafraidtosayit is a test for a society. From a big picture perspective what happened was Continue reading “#IAmNotAfraidToSayIt – Reaction and Results”
A couple of weeks ago, a Ukrainian journalist, Nastya Melnychenko, published a post on her Facebook page hashtagged #яНеБоюсьСказати (#iamnotafraidtosayit), where she openly told stories of sexual abuse she experienced in her life.
If you are a girl and want to be cute, nice, and overall likable, it’s probably not your fault.
That’s how we are raised and learn to behave. To be fair, men also want to be likable (at least some of them 🙂 ). But for men, it seems to be a matter of choice and personal preferences. For women, such behavior is systematic and affects girls as young as five years old.
It’s summertime, and once again I see too many girls out there dressed 
as princesses. I can’t help but think that these girls are doomed to grow up more vulnerable and insecure than they otherwise would because
we teach them to place too much emphasis on their looks, – a risky asset that tends to deteriorate with time, – vs. giving priority to their character, hard work, and achievements.
Some girls do resist being turned into “cuties” and I applaud them; some, like me, get lucky to avoid the trap. In sharing my personal princess’ experience I chose to be humorous. But I know you’ll get the point.
