Shame on You Wal-Mart

It should come as no surprise to anyone that women are the reason businesses like Wal-Mart are managing to thrive in spite of a weak economy. Women are always shopping for great deals and Wal-Mart has gone out of its way to convince us it is the place to: "Save money. Live better."

But the question here is are the women who work at Wal-Mart really living better? Maybe not---according to an article in BusinessWeek---which states that women account for nearly 80 percent of all shoppers but more than 70 percent of its senior leaders are men.

To add insult to injury, in 2001, six female Wal-Mart employees filed a sex-discrimination lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco against Wal-Mart Stores. The suit, Dukes v. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., gained class certification in 2004 as the largest such suit ever filed against a private employer, affecting more than 2million female employees. In the suit, female employees alleged that they were denied opportunities for advancement and paid less than men doing similar work.

This is an image the Company's new CEO is hoping to change. At a shareholder's meeting today, Mike Duke pledged to work on developing female leaders by launching a "global women's council." This 14-member group aims to increase the percentage of women in management roles at Wal-Mart.

Sadly, Wal-Mart isn't the only Company who has a poor track record when it comes to hiring top female executives. But until women start speaking more with their pocketbooks, behaviors like this will continue no matter how many "global councils" are put together.

The Weak Job Market Hits Home

On Friday, my husband got the telephone call we hoped would never happen--at least not now. He was informed by his Employer that his employment contract as a Computer Security Analyst with the Department of the Treasury was being terminated immediately.

My husband has been with the DOT for several years--was great at his job--but now is forced to join thousands of other baby boomers who are being forced to re-invent themselves.

The good news is he will finally be able to officially move to North Carolina. We've had a commuter marriage since we got married three years ago. Not having an official job is bad news, no doubt, but we are refusing to focus our attention on that.

Here are some tips we hope will help others in the same boat:

1. Don't Let Fear Control You
Some people opt to do nothing when becoming unemployed and instead just worry. It's appropriate to be concerned, but we know we have to start making the necessary moves to ensure our comfort and survival.

2. Never underestimate the power of networking
My husband is not a social networker but he has started a Facebook and Twitter page. It's important to talk with people who may be able to help you and follow any leads that come your way. Connecting with others will help you to get another job. Send out resumes, and keep your contacts alive.

3. Find emotional support
There are numerous groups for the newly unemployed, many with counselors and job coaching. You don't need to tough it out alone.

4. Don't spend too much time alone
You will need time to grieve to move on, but you can't find a new job if you remain isolated.

5. Consider starting your own business (my personal tip)
This may be the perfect chance to reinvent yourself and start a small business. But if you're going to go from being an employee to being an entrepreneur, you must be sure your heart is in it--meaning you have a passion for what you want to do. Also, you have to ask yourself where is the money going to come from for your initial business investment.

In my husband's case, he has been dabbling with real estate investments so now might be a good time for him to take a closer look at how he can make this a full-time endeavor.

We will survive!

Summer Break

My daughter has officially completed her first year of college. Now she is back home for summer--but it will be ME who will be taking a much needed break.

That's right. After acting as primary caregiver for her two-year-old son, I have relinquished my duties so she can step back into the "mommy" role. That means I no longer have to get up in the middle of the night when I hear my grandson cry out that he needs to go potty. I can sleep later in the morning without having to worry about making sure he gets to daycare before 9:30am. And I won't have to rush to pick him up by 4:30--especially if I'm in a meeting that ran long. I'll be able to spend countless hours on Twitter if I want to and more importantly, hubby and I will get to spend some quality "we" time, which has been next to impossible with our grandson hanging on to our every move.

Are you a grandparent who has given up your retirement or your own plans in order to take on the diapers, daycare, teacher conferences, and everything else that comes along with raising children? Many baby boomers, like me, are stepping in to raise their grandchildren when the children's own parents are not able or willing to do so. According to the U.S. Census, over 2.4 million grandparents have responsibility for their grandchildren. I consider my contribution as an investment in her future.

Taking care of her son has become my daughter's summer job. Nope, there is no pay involved but the rewards she and my grandson will receive will be more valuable than all the money in the world!

Has the True Sentiment Gone Out of Mother's Day?

Mary Baldwin College alumna Anna Jarvis was the driving force behind the creation of Mother’s Day. But she would not be pleased at all with Mother’s Day as it is celebrated in 2009, according to a source at her alma mater.

“Miss Jarvis thought Mother’s Day should be a day you spend with your mother, or a day when you do something special for her like fix her dinner or repair her broken stairs,” says William Pollard, archivist at Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, VA. “It was not supposed to be a day where you buy her something.”

Pollard says Jarvis wanted to keep Mother’s Day non-commercial--a battle she knew she had lost by the time of her death in 1948.

To understand how the day became nationally celebrated it’s important to know a bit about Anna Jarvis. She was graduated from Augusta Female Seminary, which is now Mary Baldwin College, in 1883 and moved back home with her parents. In 1905, Anna’s mother passed away. After her mother’s death, Jarvis spent years sending letters to public officials urging them to set aside a day to honor mothers.

In 1914, that day came. President Woodrow Wilson, whose birthplace was just across the street from Mary Baldwin College, signed the proclamation formally establishing Mother’s Day.

Over the years, however, Anna Jarvis became bitter with the commercialization of Mother’s Day.

She has been quoted as saying: “Mother’s Day has nothing to do with candy. Candy is junk. You give your mother a box of candy and then go home and eat most of it yourself, or else you give her hard candy that breaks her teeth or dentures.”

“Flowers are about half-dead by the time they’re delivered,” said Jarvis. “It’s really a shame to waste flowers for Mother’s Day. Florists have made millions of dollars out of my idea and they don’t deserve it.”

So what do you think? What is the best way to honor our Mothers on Mother's Day?

Get Your Business Praise On

Today is Monday. For those of you who still work in Corporate America, it is the beginning of your work week. When I worked in Corporate America I struggled on Mondays because I knew I would have to put up with a lot of craziness including breaking news, ill-advised decisions and co-workers with bad attitudes.

So do you know what I would do? I would pop in my favorite gospel CD and get my praise on before I went into work. It was like a buffer between me and the evil forces of the newsroom.

Even though I'm now my own boss, I still live in the world and still have to deal with others. So let me share how I still get my OFFICE PRAISE on through prayer and meditation.


O - Oh Lord, help me not to OFFEND anybody today
F - FREEZE my tongue, if somebody says something out of the way
F - Fill me with Your grace, so that I might stay cool
I - I'm trying to do right, but I ain't nobody's fool
C - Cause me to humble myself, before I get fired
E - Even a saint like me sometimes gets tired

P - PRAISE your name, because You've saved me, many times before
R - RISE up in me before I get in the door
A - All Mighty One, You know I need you close
I - INSPIRE me to be kind, if not to all, to most....No...To ALL!!
S - SHOW me how to be an example of Your love, not hate
E - Even me Lord, I hope it's not too late

'Today I ask God to meet me at the office door, and sit with me all day'

Discipline and Grandchildren

While my daughter is away at college, I am the primary caregiver for her two-year-old son. This means I am responsible for everything involving his life---including discipline.

Just like my daughter did when she was little, my grandson constantly tests his boundries to see how much he can get away with. I am a firm believer that children need limits and boundaries. They also need to understand there are consequences for bad behavior.

The challenge lies in making sure parents and grandparents are on one accord when it comes to discipline. For example, if a parent does not believe in spanking and you, as a grandparent do believe in spanking, how do you handle that? I personally agree with an article I read on the grandparents.com website, which indicates the guardian who has home-field advantage has the rights over discipline.

So what do you say? Do grandparents have rights when it comes to discipline? Or should they simply adhere to the "time-out" policy and leave the real punishment to the parent(s)?

Parents, Sex and Their Kids

Drugs, Sex, Rock & Roll & Woodstock: Those are some of the tags associated with my baby boomer generation. Now, here we are 40 years later dealing with some of the same things with our own children and grandchildren. But what is so shocking is the fact that the kids engaging in these risky behaviors are getting younger and younger. Just this morning, I came across an article this morning that startled me.

The article indicates that middle school youth are engaging in sexual intercourse as early as age 12, according to a study by researchers at The University of Texas School of Public Health.

Results from this study are published in the April issue of Journal of School Health.

Researchers examined sexual risk behaviors among middle school students in a large southeastern U.S. urban public school district. The say the study shows that although most seventh graders are not engaging in sexual risk behaviors, a small percentage are putting themselves at risk.

In the study, sexual intercourse was defined as vaginal, oral or anal sex. According to their research, by age 12, 12 percent of students had already engaged in vaginal sex, 7.9 percent in oral sex, 6.5 percent in anal sex and 4 percent in all three types of intercourse.

Researchers say these findings are alarming because youth who start having sex before age 14 are much more likely to have multiple lifetime sexual partners, use alcohol or drugs before sex and have unprotected sex, all of which puts them at greater risk for getting a sexually transmitted disease (STD) or becoming pregnant.

The study found one-third of sexually active students reported engaging in vaginal or anal sex without a condom within the past three months, and one-fourth had four or more partners. The more experienced students in all three types of intercourse were more likely to be male and African-American.

So I ask you, parents and grandparents, who or what is the blame for this outrageous, risky behavior among our youth? What can be done to prevent it?