I recently attended an Entrepreneur’s Conference hosted by Harvard Business School.  The sessions were high-quality and there were ample opportunities to network with other business owners, investment banks, and potential investors.  Overall, it was a great day.  However, I was shocked by the attendee demographics: Despite the fact some 40% of businesses are owned by women entrepreneurs and a large number by minorities, attendees of this conference were predominantly white men.  I would estimate that of the 1000 or so people I saw, 5% were women, and less than 1% were minorities.  Most attendees were from Ivy League schools.  The panel sessions were stiff and the Q&As, formal.  Moreover, blue suits and ties were the dress code – quite an uncommon sight these days in post-bubble Orange County, California. During the opening keynote address, I had the sudden realization I was sitting smack in the middle of a meeting of the proverbial “Old Boys Club”.   I have been to these meetings before, but, since opting out of my executive career to join the “Mommy Track”, my club membership has lapsed so I failed to recognize the signs this was one of THOSE gatherings. 

Most professional women have experienced, and to some extent, penetrated the ivy (league) walls of the Club at some point.  Successful entry requires looking and acting as much like everyone else as possible.  This is not the place for discussions about work-life balance, corporate diversity, or the challenges of working motherhood.  Yet it is important to be part of this, because this is where businesses get funded and where life-long professional contacts are made.  The “Old Boys Club” works, so we can’t be blamed for aspiring to join.

However, it is in this context that I have so much admiration for what WorkitMom’s founders are trying to achieve: Building a community of professional moms so we can help each other achieve strong careers, healthy families, and meaningful personal lives.   It all made me think, “What if I could help design the ideal “Old Girls Club”?  Here is what it might include:

• Membership would of course be open to the top performers from any school or profession, not just the Ivy League
• The dress code would include bright colors and fun, flexible fabrics (Baby drool included!)
• Meetings would be held outdoors or somewhere with access to fresh air, healthy food, and comfortable, conversational seating
• Childcare would be available
• Topics of discussion would include work-life balance, a diversity of thoughts and ideas, and the search for meaning
• We could help each other get access to capital, sit on each other’s boards, and tap our network for a good carpet installer.

I’ll bet the boys would wanna join too.

I have been asked to write about my experiences as a former executive mom turned entrepreneur and to share some of the case studies I see every day of executives who job-share senior management roles.  My company, Career Partners, plays matchmaker for companies trying to retain great talent – professional moms who need more balance or retiring baby boomers who want more of a life.  As niche executive recruiters, we go beyond keywords and pedigree: We employ personality technology to build ideal work teams and we train companies to leverage job-sharing for executive roles.  We also support the job-share teams throughout the process with certified executive coaches.  We launched last August and are already seeing lots of demand for our services from both candidates and employers.

Here is a bit of my background: I started my professional career in sales for a technology reseller in Toronto, Canada. When my husband and I moved to Los Angeles, (after backpacking through Europe where we eloped) I took another sales role for a technology distributor. I moved from sales to product management and eventually to marketing, where I really found my niche. Ultimately, I served as a marketing vice-president for an international telecom company. While my career trajectory was going according to plan, my life with two (and eventually three) children was unexpectedly challenging. For awhile I did the travel and the 70+ hour workweeks; then one day, exhausted, I left my full time career to get better “balance”. I consulted part time, was an at-home mother, served the local community, and completed an MBA. No less tired, but certainly more fulfilled, I shunned the idea of returning to the “corporate rat-race”. An executive coach helped guide me to my current venture, which I hope to grow into a $100 million business within 15 years. For now, all of the members of my executive team telecommute and work flexible hours.

My dream is for every one of us to job-share, eventually.I believe job-sharing is our best chance at long-term work flexibility because it can be done in any position, at any level, and it provides benefits to both the employer and the employees. Employers get the ideal collaboration of two people’s background and experience, built-in backup, full-time coverage for the role, refreshed executives, lower absenteeism, loyalty, and a succession-planning tool, while employees get the opportunity to continue doing mainstream, meaningful work, with half the travel, in fewer hours per week. Executives have successfully shared senior roles in the past: My job now is to make this more widespread.

When I was working full time, I thought asking for the flexibility I needed or participating in work-life balance programs would be career-limiting. I know now that if the business proposition is right, getting what we need can be a benefit to employers and have a positive bottom line impact. By writing this column, sharing experiences and eliciting your comments, I hope to remove some of the isolation we executive moms feel and spread around, with confidence, the message “We truly CAN have it all”.