Point A to B 

Points of Interest. Shortest Point. Get the Point.

Sacrifice to Gain Balance?

By Karen Laimite
Membership Outreach

Taken from A Little Piece of Sunshine

A home, a career, a family, a husband, friends and children...they are all things I expected to have in my adult life but as a child little did I know how much I would have to sacrifice to make those expectations a reality. I've blogged about balance before, see Every New Experience but every week seems to bring a new challenge.

You sacrifice time spent with your family and friends to build the career you always sought. You sacrifice a pay cheque to make up for lost time with those friends and family. You sacrifice space and social time to save up for that down payment for that first house. It's all a necessary learning curve but the more I experience this sacrifice the more motivated I become to find that balance in life. 

Enter Dale Stevenson's EdgeWalking Workshop. I am super excited to attend this event on Jan. 18th. When Dale did a mini version of this at the Women in Social Business Forum, participants were cheering each other on. I was amazed how much everyone was getting out of it and the excitement they were exhibiting from trying to gain balance. This New Year's Resolution is going to get done!

It's so interesting how one realization leads to piecing together your life vision. Be aware of what is happening in your environment, embrace the chaos, make necessary sacrifices and create the life you expected. And come to the Workshop!

Point A to B 

Points of Interest. Shortest Point. Get the Point.

The Big Tick: Leadership Simplified

post by Tina Crouse  
President, Women in Leadership

From Download Clipart

There's a raging debate on LinkedIn on a Theory of Leadership. My take is to keep things simple: Leaders should do what no one else can and bring others with them. We can find examples of poor leadership and examples of poor outcomes but those do not negate leadership skills; they merely pose as an answer to a subjective experience of whether someone 'liked' it or not. For me, it doesn't change the fact that leadership was present and it was exercized otherwise nothing would have happened. So, does this definition tick your box?

The whole discussion around defining 'leadership' has expanded over the last few years and there is still a lot of subjective experience and judgment. Does the CEO who increased profits by slashing 30% of its staff deserve a leadership medal? Do politicians grinding government to a halt show leadership by proving that yes, government can be brought to its knees? Do elected and non-elected dictators (rigged elections) show leadership by maintaining their positions? Are any of these things new? No? Do you see leadership in any of these examples?

I would like to engage you, yes you the reader, to shape leadership anew. Can we find examples of where people have never tread before? We can in tech like Elon Musk and Richard Branson. Do people realize how many times they have failed or how many years have passed before an idea could be actioned? Is failure a component of leadership and would you support someone who has failed many times in order to try something new?

You are part of leadership. Regardless of whether you follow or lead, you are helping to define what leadership is. I invite you to comment on what it is (or could be) by refraining from what it is not - bad, criminal, injurious, harmful. Bad examples are easy to come by: I'm asking you to add to the body of what leadership can be. Good Luck. Bonne Chance. The discussion rages on.

Point A to B 

Points of Interest. Shortest Point. Get the Point.

post by Tina Crouse
President, WIL Ottawa 

Photo: Authentic Parenting

Funny How We Changed the Rules By Picking Up Our Toys and Going Home

The business world is full of criticisms of women: we don’t go after capital or go into debt; we don’t stay at our post (we actually take maternity leave and don’t come back); we don’t play the game. Yep, heard it before; men’s rules and the demand that we follow them. But with the uptick in female-led businesses exploding all over the world and people coming to realize the value of having women AND men work together and the positive impact on the bottom line, well, I’d say the rules are changing. Finally.

Interestingly, these changing rules are spreading, even into places that are considered sacrosanct like investment.  So while I stated that women don’t go after investment, there is a new kind on offer, the type that comes with understanding, mentoring, coaching, SYMPATHY and yes, money. Women held out for the good stuff and it’s arrived (see Forbes article Accelerate Women Now )

I like this shift. Those old rules weren’t made for us; they didn’t make sense and they made us uncomfortable, so a lot of us wouldn’t play and sure enough, the other team got tired of playing by themselves. Now this is not to say that all the other players are on onboard; many like the old game where they made the rules and got to win most of the time. We also have to remember that there were a lot of women who had to change sides and learn the game inside out in order to succeed within those rules. Luckily, those women then decided to help the rest of us. And, here we are.

STATS  

• Over the last 20 years, Canada has seen a 200-percent increase in the number of women-owned firms. 
• In 2001, nearly half (47 percent) of all small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Canada had at least one female owner 
• Firms with at least one female owner employed 2.6 million people producing annual commercial revenues of $72 billion.  

I say, ‘Let’s Keep Going’. Why not? We’re finally rounding 3^rd and we’ve got 2 more on base: our daughters and our sisters. Surely, we’ll win the game this time.

Point A to B 

Points of Interest. Shortest Point. Get the Point.

post by Tina Crouse
President, WIL Ottawa

 from www.strongwomenblog.com

Are You on the Edge? 

So Who Isn't?

How many of us really have it together so that we can say, "Nope, I don't need any help and stress, me? no way." If this were the case, there would not be such a high use of anti-anxiety medications nor would this be the number one topic of conversation for mothers, female employees, even charities because they can't find volunteers for their efforts. It isn't that women no longer care about things, we just don't have good ways of assessing where our energies belong and who deserves it. The lines of our lives are blurred and are actually bleeding one area into another: worker time; family time; personal time; emotional time; health time. Most repeated noun? Time. Think you can make more of it? Not likely.

Sometimes the discomfort is useful, even meaningful. We can change once we are aware, once we have tools. And yes, sometimes all that is required is a vacation but we all know that 'life waits at home', so if everything is still there behind the front door, what to do?

Women in Leadership Ottawa has teamed up with Dale Stevenson of The Leadership Group to help you get off balance even further but NOT to head into chaos or burn-out. We want you to regain your balance, to learn your edges and to gain comfort in your life.  On Saturday November 30th, WIL Ottawa will be presenting Dale's workshop 'EdgeWalking'. This full version will be 2.5 hrs and will be interactive, physical and a grade above anything else that you've attempted to help gain balance in your life. Participants from the mini version held at Canada's 1st Women in Social Business Forum were excited and audible about their enthusiasm for Dale and her exercises and many women asked for more. 

If you'd like to register for EdgeWalking, use the eventbrite link here. Knowing one's edges can mean so much in a busy life and as a leadership tool, who wouldn't want to know where to draw the line and feel good about it? 

Imagine being out on the ledge and knowing that you won't fall off. Imagine that the answer is knowing that you could move it. Take a couple hours and find out.

Point A to B 

Points of Interest. Shortest Point. Get the Point.

Social Finance + Social Enterprise 
For Ontario and all of Canada

By Michelle Guevara
Government Liaison

From SocialFinance.ca

In November 2012, the Canadian government put out an open call to Canadians to bring forward their most innovative ideas to tackle pressing social issues.  Over 150 individuals and organizations from across the country submitted ideas.

15 of these submissions were selected to be profiled in a report that was unveiled at Women in Leadership’s Women in Social Business Forum May 2013. The summary report, entitled 'Harnessing the Power of Social Finance' highlights ways in which social finance tools and structures can be utilized.  



But what can social finance be used for? Many, many issues.

Youth, Health, Aboriginal people,  Housing/Homelessness, People with disabilities, Public Safety, the Unemployed, Seniors, New Canadians.

With support at the federal level, the provincial Government of Ontario also sees a need to support the growing field by specifically investing in social enterprises; businesses that couple profit with social benefits. Impact a Social Enterprise Strategy for Ontario  outlines the steps the government will take to support social enterprises in the province, accelerate their growth and establish Ontario as a global leader in the area of social enterprise.

With all this government attention, how much is happening?

Currently, there are 10,000 social enterprises in the province of Ontario alone. In the world of social finance, Canada is catching up to the front runners; the U.K. and the U.S. with Australia close behind. And where is social finance and social enterprise catching on the fastest? Developing countries. 

The world is changing; people can see a way to make a living and help other's at the same time. At Women in Leadership, we think it's about time.