18th Annual WPO Chicago Summit 2021 a Smashing Success!

©Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

Thank you for attending our 18th Annual WPO Chicago Summit hosted via Zoom September 9, 2021.  We had a wonderful program and learned how to boost a brand for yourself and for your business.  In addition, we had a chance to get to know one another better to deepen our WPO relationships, which we all value.   

We thank SimplyBe. CEO Jessica Zweig for her keynote presentation and Bryan Carter for his fine assistance.

 

We thank all of our sponsors who support WPO.   

Special thanks to our virtual host Foley & Lardner – Chicago members Lauren Loew and Ellen Wheeler.

Much appreciation to our WPO Chicago Steering Committee members: Karolyn Raphael, President, Winger Marketing (Chicago I), AJ Goehle, CEO, Luci Creative (Chicago I) and Genevieve Custer Weeks, Founder, Tutu School Franchises (Chicago II). Without their help, this program would not have been possible.  

Lastly, a shout out to designer Laura Fairman for her great work on the graphic!

Looking forward to next year's Summit and meanwhile, stay in good touch!

3 Ways to Handle Competition

According to Ilisa Kaufman, Psy.D., a Miami-based psychologist, there are three ways a person can handle competition, or rather “perceived competition.” 

They either:

1. Rise
2. Rant – or
3. Remove

Depending upon how a person responds, it might impact their functioning in general, especially social interactions.

Read on to learn how you can win when competing for success.

SBA Resources for Women Business Owners

SBA Administrator Isabella Casillas Guzman recently outlined her agency’s resources for women small business owners to survive and thrive amid the COVID-19 pandemic, including SBA's Women’s Business Center network of 136 centers located across the country.

The number of women entrepreneurs grows to unprecedented levels and shows no sign of stopping, as the younger generations eschew their reliance on corporations for lifelong employment and as immigrants, who are risk-takers by nature, start their own businesses.

SBA’s efforts are aimed at bridging the lending gap between male-owned and women-owned firms.

Connect to More

Wells Fargo is starting a new wave of support through Connect to More, a business mentoring partnership with the Nasdaq Entrepreneurial Center. 

This new effort will focus on mentoring 500 women-owned businesses throughout the next 12 months. The businesses will receive access to expertise and specialized resources. The Nasdaq Entrepreneurial Center will provide women entrepreneurs support through its Milestone Mapping Coaching Circles.

Read on to learn more.

Attend Our 18th Annual WPO Chicago Summit 9/9/21 and Boost Your Brand (Virtual)

 

If you are a WPO Chapter Chair, member or sponsor, you are cordially invited to our 18th Annual WPO Chicago Summit on 9/9/21 (virtual).  Our theme this year is Combat the Great Resignation by Boosting Your Brand and Becoming the Best Place to Work.

In this high-energy, powerful content-filled workshop, SimplyBe. CEO and founder Jessica Zweig will discuss the brand behind the brand and how to elevate your external brand by strengthening the internal branding of yourself, your business, and your employees.

In addition, she will dive into the ways you can create a culture, and a work environment that your employees love and never want to leave – all while creating a brand that stands for something bigger than the bottom line and allows your business to become the best place to work.

We will then break into smaller facilitated e-groups to brainstorm together on ways we can begin doing this right now for our organizations.

To learn more and to register, email Laurel Delaney (ldelaney(at)globetrade.com), WPO Chicago Chapter Chair. Looking forward to your participation!

Join Us for the 18th Annual WPO Chicago Summit (9/9/21)

Building a Community

How do you build a community of raving fans to your business? All it takes is understanding what you do best, what your passion is, what impact you make, and how you share your message with the world.

Check out four steps to building a community of raving fans.

Women Business Owners Are Reacting to the New World of Work with Renewed Confidence and Adaptability

The Mastercard Index of Women Entrepreneurs – 2020 Report provides world-leading analysis on how women in business are progressing globally, highlighting the socioeconomic factors propelling and inhibiting their success, and providing a performance ranking for the 58 economies measured.

Read the entire report, which shows women business owners are reacting to the new world of work with renewed confidence and adaptability.

Prime For Growth

Building the right kind of clientele is not simply a matter of looking for the right kind of prospects and selling them. It’s an ongoing process of constantly sharpening your internal operations, knowing what kinds of clients you are best suited to handle, and steadily upgrading your client base. If you will do all those things, you can build a solid and profitable clientele—one that will provide security for the long run.

Here are four crucial factors to look at before you prospect.

The Importance of B CORP Status by CEO Michelle Hayward of Bluedog Design

Michelle Hayward (pictured), founder and CEO of Bluedog Design asks, "Are you B CORP curious?"  She adds,  "Start-ups to multi-national companies are striving for certification. What is it and what are the benefits?"

In her latest article for Enterprising Women Magazine, Michelle (a WPO Platinum member), shares her insights on what it takes to become a B CORP and why it matters.

Access: https://enterprisingwomen.com/ewdigital/enterprisingwomensummer2021/74/

 

From a Fresh Idea to a Successful Company

As a 12-year-old, Kavita Shukla drank water believed to be contaminated. Because of her grandmother's quick homemade remedy, she didn't get sick. Since then, Shukla has devoted her life to figuring out why the remedy worked and how to replicate and advance its effects to mitigate world hunger.

She went on to receive a patent on her product, FreshPaper, a natural kitchen hack that keeps fruits and veggies fresh, and established her company, The Fresh Grow Company.  One of the questions asked of Shukla:

What advice do you have for those who want to bring their own big ideas to market?

I think putting my idea in the hands of people that could really use it and give me feedback and who shared it with others was transformative. So, I would encourage entrepreneurs and inventors to just take the first step and to share their ideas with the people that could benefit from them.

Read the entire inspiring interview here.

Block Off Your Morning and Plan How You Are Going to Handle Your Inevitable Cyberattack

Have you hired your first Chief Risk Officer (CRO)?  You might want to start considering.  This is the new robbery.  Here's a crash course on protecting your company from ransomware, deep fakes, and other cybersecurity threats.  It starts with addressing 4 critical questions that you need to answer.

Remap Fear Into Opportunity

Ali Kriegsman, co-founder of Bulletin online marketplace, chronicles her entrepreneurial journey – warts and all – in her debut book, “How to Build a Goddamn Empire,” which details her path from corporate employee to pivoting and scaling a major business. The book features stories and advice from 30 other female founders who built companies of various sizes and stages.

Learn more about how to push past fear and remap it into opportunity.

"I might be the first, but I’m not going to be the last," says President Terry Wheatley

This week marks a big moment for Vintage Wine Estates. Not only is the wine producer going public with a $690 million IPO, but the company’s president Terry Wheatley will also be making history as the first woman to take an American multi-hundred-million-dollar producer public.

 "I might be the first, but I’m not going to be the last," says Terry Wheatley, President, Vintage Wine Estates.

She goes on to say:

“I look at my career and the time spent to get where I’ve gotten, and I’m mentoring young women now. Their careers are accelerating so much faster. There aren’t the hurdles that I had coming through the industry and when I describe them to them, they’re, I don’t want to say surprised and shocked, but some of the wars that I’ve been through, they don’t have to fight those battles. We fought them for them, so now their careers are accelerating I think twice as fast or three times as fast as what mine did. So, I won’t be the last woman taking a company, a multimillion-dollar company public. There will be more after me and probably in a rapid pace because more and more women are rising to the C-suite level.”

Read the entire article here.

Breaking Gender Barriers and Building Thriving Businesses

A case study by Rosabeth Moss Kanter, the Ernest L. Arbuckle Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, examines what it takes to break gender barriers and build thriving businesses in an emerging startup hub.

About the case study and Professor Kanter

The challenges of creating an inclusive entrepreneurial ecosystem can be seen through the stories of four women—two of them Black, one Latinx, and one white—who launched new enterprises in Miami with an eye to diversifying tech jobs in the future. According to a recent case study by Rosabeth Moss Kanter, the Ernest L. Arbuckle Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School, their experiences permit an inside look at pushing past barriers.

Read the entire article here.

How to Tell If You or Someone Else Will Make a Great Leader (Within 5 Minutes)?

Answering these 10 questions (honestly) with "often" or "almost always" would certainly indicate that you or someone else may be fit to lead at a high level.

Who Is the Minority Group of Business Owners in the USA?

Well what do you know.  White men are now the minority of business owners in the United States.  Read on to learn more.

How Mentorships and Peer Groups (Like WPO) Can Make a Difference

Women Presidents' Organization Los Angeles 1 Chapter member and CEO and President of Marketing Maven Lindsey Carnett (pictured) writes a wonderful article about the importance of mentors and peer groups for support and expertise to women business owners.

The big call to action from Lindsey?  "Remember – it is very rewarding as a mentor. And do not keep WPO to yourself. Spread the word to those qualified women who can be stronger with the support of fellow business owners through a proven peer group."

Read the entire article here.

How to Generate $1 Billion a Day in Revenue

©2019 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

Gosh I wonder what it would be like to generate $1 billion a day in revenue and what it would take to support it (e.g., people, products, processes and so forth).  Well, Apple can give you a glimpse of how it is done, what products are selling, and whether the momentum is sustainable.  Learn from the big guy.  Oh, here's a glimpse of what Apple CEO Tim Cook said:

Cook said on a conference call with analysts that all five of the best-selling smartphones in the U.S. during the quarter were iPhones. The top two sellers in China were iPhones. Four of the top six in Japan were iPhones. The top four in the U.K., iPhones. The top six in Australia, iPhones.

Another interesting detail.  They apparently are not experiencing any global supply chain issues.

What's your best-selling product or service offering?  Think you can take it to $1 billion a day in revenue?

Read on.

Women Business Owners Survive and Thrive During Global Pandemic

More than half of women business owners are the breadwinners in their families. 

Among women of color, it’s an even greater share — 65% — and these breadwinning entrepreneurs are being disproportionately affected by the pandemic, according to a report by small business platform Gusto and the National Association of Women Business Owners, which polled about 1,200 women business owners.

And here's the deal.  The hardships breadwinning women entrepreneurs have faced during the Covid-19 pandemic have led to a $1 billion drop in spending on children, a recent report estimates.

Learn more about what these women business owners have had to do to survive and thrive during the global pandemic.

Financial Freedom Is a State of Mind

According to Tony Robbins, financial freedom is not just about money.

“We all want to be truly free,” Robbins writes in The Path. “Free to do more of what we want, when we want, and to share it with those we love. Free to live with passion, with generosity, with gratitude and with peace of mind. This is financial freedom. It’s not an amount of money; it’s a state of mind.”

Check out his 8 steps to financial freedom.

Finding a Mentor or Experienced Adviser

Connecting and networking with experienced advisers can help your business grow.  To find a mentor, you need to open your eyes and ears.  Oftentimes, they can be right in front of you – even in your own WPO chapter.

While getting a mentor may seem like common sense, there's a gap between knowing a best practice and putting that knowledge to use. 

Forbes indicates that 76 percent of people think mentoring is important, but only 37 percent currently have a mentor. Having a mentor increases the chances of success and helps avoid the costly mistakes of entrepreneurship [and business ownership.]

Learn the common, costly mistakes a mentor can help your business avoid or mitigate, where to find mentors, how to be a good mentee, and where to turn for additional resources.

Bluedog Design #1 for Best Places to Work in 2021 by Crain's Chicago Business

Culture matters.  Just ask founder and CEO of Bluedog Design, Michelle Hayward (pictured), who just earned the #1 spot as the Best Places to Work in 2021 by Crain's Chicago Business.  We are busting our buttons with pride because Michelle is a force for good and also a WPO Platinum member.  We are thrilled for her and her team on earning this extraordinary achievement.

It takes creativity, hard work, tremendous effort and 'intent' to achieve this honor, especially during such a harrowing time in our lives.

Congrats to Michelle Hayward and her team.  Great leaders inspire others to become great, too.  Lead on! 

Learn more.

How to Push Forward When You Are Tired

What sustains your work, especially when you are tired?

Have a look at 4 women who talk straight on what keeps them moving forward – from making an impact, to remembering your why, to listening to music, to connecting with new people.

Read on.

Jump-Start Emotional Engagement Among Your Employees

Financial results are an outcome, not a root driver for employee performance. A growing body of evidence tells us that overemphasizing financial targets erodes morale and undermines long-term strategy. 

When a leader spends the majority of their airtime on a “make the numbers” narrative, it creates a transactional relationship with their employees, making them more likely to create transactional relationships with their teammates and customers.

Learn how you can jump-start emotional engagement among your employees, keep your focus on building belief in the larger purpose of the work.

12 Ways to Spark Motivation

At Sara Moniuszko's latest article for USA Today, she starts with, "Feeling unmotivated?  You're not alone!"

She goes on to say that with the one-year anniversary of pandemic lockdowns in the United States and no definitive end to the pandemic in sight, many are struggling now more than ever to spark and maintain motivation.

Sara rounded up 12 ways you can try to spark some motivation, whether for work or play.  Test if they work for you.

Let's Sharpen Our Business Leadership Skills Post COVID-19

Let's reexamine the way we lead our businesses and our people, and redefine strength itself. 

COVID-19 has ushered in a new template we should be following when recruiting our managers and team leaders. Those with highly developed “soft skills” will be the ones who take our organizations into the future.

Read on to learn what leadership looks like post COVID-19.  It requires real change.

How to Stand Out in Someone's Inbox

You may think storytelling would come in handy if you’re preparing for a presentation, but Lee Lazarus and Janine Kurnoff, founders of The Presentation Company and co-authors of the book Everyday Business Storytelling, say it can also help your email get answered.

The challenge with email is to cut through the noise and stand out in someone’s inbox.  Here's how to do it.

Are You Experiencing COVID-somnia?

With March being National Sleep Awareness Month, we thought it only fitting to talk about how sleep is so hard to come by, especially during a global pandemic. 

In fact, so many people have been having trouble catching zzz's that scientists and reporters have coined this widespread sleeplessness "COVID-somnia." And as we approach the one-year mark (or "coronavirsary") this month, stress and uncertainty might very well continue to wreak havoc on our shut-eye.

These three nonfiction sleep books might help you come up with some practicable and effective sleep solutions so you can better manage your business and your personal life.

Reach Your Greatest Potential By Strengthening Your Mental Muscle

Reaching your greatest potential doesn’t require you to work harder by adding desirable habits to your already busy life. Instead you can work smarter by eliminating the routines that erode effectiveness and siphon off mental strength. 

Here are the 13 things mentally strong people don’t do.

The Story of Presidents' Day

It all began in 1800.  Following the death of George Washington in 1799, his February 22 birthday became a perennial day of remembrance. 

While Washington’s birthday was an unofficial observance for most of the 1800s, it was not until the late 1870s that it became a federal holiday.  Senator Stephen Wallace Dorsey of Arkansas was the first to propose the measure, and in 1879 President Rutherford B. Hayes signed it into law – the first to celebrate the life of an individual American.   Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, signed into law in 1983, was the second.

Read on to find out the story of Presidents' Day and who championed to shift the celebration of several federal holidays from specific dates to a series of predetermined Mondays.

What Common Traits Are Essential for Business Ownership Success?

There's a reason why successful female business owners like WPO members are, well, successful.  They are able to overcome the many challenges facing them in order to start their own companies. 

But how? As the article says, no two women are alike—they all have their own stories, but these are some of the common traits found among successful women who started their own businesses.

What's the Biggest Change You've Ever Made?

What's the biggest change you've ever made and what impact did it have?  Meanwhile, here's what four CEOs said.

Women Entrepreneurs Elevate Their Businesses With Access to SBA's New Platform

SBA recently launched Ascent, a brand new free e-learning platform that provides help with issues ranging from hazard pay to how to create a profit and loss statement. 

The agency partnered with the White House, the U.S. Department of Labor's Women's Bureau, and the U.S. Department of the Treasury to develop the new tool.

When you get to a million dollars in annual revenue, pay a visit to the Women Presidents' Organization.  And when you need help going global, try out Women Entrepreneurs Grow Global®.  All these great organizations are here to serve your growth needs.

Learn more about Ascent.

Turn Your Ideas Into a Project that Feels Fun and Manageable

It’s the start of a new year (2021), which means setting goals and making resolutions. If that includes being more creative or finding time to work on passion projects, you’re not alone. 

Facebook creative director Ji Lee believes that side projects are critical to staying inspired and not getting burned out by work, especially when working from home.

Check out her ideas here because doing is everything.

How to Support Women Entrepreneurs In 2021 and Beyond

Supporting women entrepreneurs isn't something we should do just one day a year – Women's Entrepreneurship Day.  Here are seven practical ways we can celebrate and support female founders year-round.  We like No. 5:

Join a women’s entrepreneur organization [like the Women Presidents' Organization].  Hundreds of networking organizations support women in business and female entrepreneurs. Many are funded exclusively by membership dues, and joining them supports their mission.

Happy New Year! Let's Show Our Leadership Resiliency, Adaptability, and Strength in 2021

Only the tough will survive and thrive through 2021, so let's get started!  No need to set resolutions this year because we learned the hard way that sometimes curve balls come our way (COVID-19) and the only way to dodge or navigate through them is to figure out a new plan.

A handful of experts came up with 7 alternatives to setting resolutions for 2021 that will boost our confidence, happiness, and productivity throughout the year.

Check them out.  Meanwhile, let's show and practice our leadership resiliency, adaptability and strength in 2021.  Oh, and did I forget to tell you to be kind and help others?  Try.

Find Your North Star in 2021 from WPO Chicago

©2020 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

Best wishes for a life you were meant to live in 2021:  happy, healthy, productive and prosperous.  It starts by finding your own North star.

Season's Greetings From WPO Chicago!

©2020 Laurel J. Delaney.  All rights reserved.

Wishing you a happy holiday season and a wonderful (much better) new year.

The Light At the End of the Tunnel on the Global Pandemic

According to Bill Gates, the health emergency could end during the spring of next 2021.

"For the spring, the numbers are going to change drastically and it will be possible to return to normality," commented the tycoon [Bill Gates] during an interview for NBC. He also thanked people to become aware of the importance of wearing a mask and other necessary care for decrease the number of infections.

Read more about what else Gates said on predicting the end of the global pandemic.

She Roots Out Racism in the Construction Industry

Deryl McKissack is the fifth generation in her family to carry on the building business tradition. The roots of her firm date back to the 18th century.  

As a 59-year-old Black woman and the founder and CEO of the Washington, D.C.-based architecture, engineering, and construction management firm McKissack & McKissack, Deryl's seen racism and sexism firsthand.  

Her firm is a 2020 Inc. Best in Business honoree and she is a leading voice combating bias in her industry.  

Read more about how she built her business with $30 million in revenue – and with a mission to root out racism in the construction industry.

Give Women Business Owners What They Need

Covid-19 has exposed the deep inequities women business owners continue to face, despite the economic dynamism they contribute to our country.

Women-run businesses make up 40 percent of all businesses in the country and their revenues invigorate our local economies. Last year alone women-owned businesses generated $1 trillion in revenues.

Winter has come and the crisis is far from over.  Let's give women business owners what they need.

Draw On Your Backup Plan

The U.S. recently broke a single-day record, with more than 160,000 new coronavirus cases. California became the second state with more than one million confirmed cases, joining Texas. And perilously, more Americans are now being hospitalized for Covid-19 than at any other point during the pandemic.

What's in store for small businesses?  A lot of uncertainty continues in the weeks and months ahead.  Draw on your backup plan:  new product or service launch, different strategy, more competitive pricing.  Whatever it takes to finish strong, do it.

Plot Your Company's Strategy in COVID Era and Beyond

Christian Stadler writes about strategy for Forbes and says, "If companies take an honest look at their strategic plans last year, how many factored in COVID-19?"  He goes on to say, "AI and forecasting work well for existing customers and markets in stable environments. Regardless of whether we get a vaccine or not, the era we are entering now is not one of them."

Read on to learn 3 ways Stadler believes a world characterized by volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity (VUCA) calls for new ways to plot the future.

Build Resilience

A recent report by the Entrepreneurs Network, in conjunction with Barclays, shows that female-founded equity-backed businesses were twice as likely to have faced significant disruptions — such closed premises or a delayed product launch — than businesses founded by men.

"If we want a complete recovery from this recession, we need to see as many entrepreneurs as possible innovate and create new jobs,” says Aria Babu, author of the report. “This means we cannot afford to keep barriers which prevent female entrepreneurs from realizing their full talents.”

Read more how startups by female founders are the most affected by the pandemic. 

Stay Positive

Stay positive.  Why?  Because negativity can have toxic effects on you and your business.

In fact, Christine's [Porath's] research has shown over and over that we falter when exposed to negativity or rudeness. Witnessing rudeness interferes with our working memory and decreases our performance. Mere exposure to rude words reduces our ability to process and recall information. We tend to shut down, stop communicating, and cease being helpful to others. Dysfunctional and aggressive thoughts (and sometimes actions) skyrocket.

Learn more about how to thrive when everything feels terrible.

How to Prepare Your Business for the Next Crisis

Faced with the worst recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s and a global economy that’s expected to have shrunk by 4.4% by the end of the year, a team at PwC have come up with a five-point plan to ensure businesses are not caught napping by the next global crisis.

PwC says:

1. The global economy is expected to shrink by 4.4% by the end of the year.
2. Businesses need to be better prepared for the next crisis.
3. A new five-point plan to achieve this includes conquering our fear of AI and data analytics.
4. It also includes finding a way for people and machines to work in harmony.

Read more about the 5 things businesses could do right now to prepare for the next crisis.

Suddenly the World Wanted Only One Product

As business owners know, speed and agility are it.  If you don't have those traits going for you, well, let's just say 2020 has crushed you.  

Case in point:  Etsy is a U.S.-based e-commerce company best known for connecting individual crafters and artisans directly with consumers. But when CEO Josh Silverman heard in early April that face masks would be a key component of the general public’s fight against the coronavirus pandemic, he mobilized sellers — fast. 

Within days of the release of public health guidelines, Etsy had more than 20,000 sellers with masks ready for purchase. As Silverman put it, “It’s as if we woke up and it was suddenly Cyber Monday, but everyone in the world wanted only one product, and it was a product that basically didn’t exist two weeks before.”

Read on to see how this ties back into the importance of speed and agility to survive in 2020 and thrive in 2021.

Don't Let People Speak Over You

USA Vice President Mike Pence interrupted Senator Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee for his current job, a total of ten times over the course of their recent debate, double the times that Harris interrupted him. 

Pence’s interruptions at the debate, however, were seen by many as a particularly obvious example of the way gender and interruption often interact, especially in the workplace, something that was noted by Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Twitter.

This episode just further drives home the point:  Don't let people speak over you, especially when you have the floor.

Read more:  'Mr. Vice President, I'm Speaking.' What Research Says About Men Interrupting Women—And How to Stop It

Men Have It Easier

More than half of female small business owners say men have it easier.  Fifty-four percent of women-owned businesses feared they’d have to permanently shut their doors because of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to new research.

The study, commissioned by Groupon and conducted by OnePoll, aimed to understand how women small business owners are meeting the challenges COVID-19 presents.

Learn more here.