An autonomous worker is an incredible asset. They are happier, more productive, loyal, more creative, and they experience greater wellbeing. Autonomous workers are the types of employees you want in your business. Yet, true workplace autonomy is surprisingly uncommon.
But I am so much more. For years, I've made that persona my professional armor, but if not just a publicist, then who am I? I am the mom of 2 boys, aged 22 and 2, the wife of an incarcerated man and a first-generation Caribbean-American who was born, raised, and still resides in Bushwick, Brooklyn.
Since starting my entrepreneurship journey almost three years ago, running my own PR agency from all over the world, my weekends disappeared. I replaced brunch and lazy mornings with crafting media pitches, strategies, and research. Sure, I enjoyed my weekends and did fun things, but work was still a priority. When you are a business owner, the stakes are high, and taking a full day off (let alone two) seems wrong. There is always something more that can be done and life becomes an endless cycle of to-do lists. Then COVID-19 disrupted the world
The day I started writing this essay, I got in a spat with my husband while I was baking brownies with the kids. He didn't understand why I had doubled the recipe. Despite the fact that I announced this fact multiple times, because I wanted to make them thick like I did as a child. As soon as I poured the batter into the pan, he came in and said, "Oooh, that's going to be so thick! Shouldn't we split the batter into two pans?" I saw red; I lashed out on him telling him how dare he question my nostalgia brownies and why not just say, "Thank you for doing this with the kids and I can't wait to eat them"? He looked at me like I was crazy.
The coronavirus outbreak has required everyone to abruptly adjust their entire lives with little to no warning or time for preparation. Schools across the country closed in a matter of days, many businesses were suddenly forced to work from home until further notice, and individuals everywhere were left wondering how to get the basic daily necessities. As the founder and CEO of a company as well as the mother to a young boy, creating and sticking to this new normal has been quite an adjustment and doing it from multiple angles has been nothing short of a challenge.
Having a successful career and a happy home life can prove to be a difficult goal for a lot of working mothers, but Yale-educated and Columbia-trained plastic surgeon Dr. Lara Devgan proves that through determination, hard work, and a lot of organization, working moms really can have the best of both worlds.
The word balance connotes images of a scale where the two sides are equal in weight in order to have equilibrium. As a working mother of 2 children who runs a Branding and Marketing Agency, is very committed to daily exercise, and juggles a handful of other professional and personal commitments, I've learned to accept that balance doesn't really exist. (And I know I am NOT alone!) The elusive work-life balance is BS.
If you don't have a history of being paired with wonderfully knowledgeable and encouraging supervisors, you're not alone. According to the latest research from Gallup, only 18 percent of U.S. managers were scored as having "high talent" in leadership skills.