Theme One: Teach a Woman to Fish, Save the World
This argument is a given among leaders now: empowering women and girls globally is crucial to global security, ending violence, and lifting countries out of poverty. This year, almost 32% of the commitments from public and private entities at the Clinton Global Initiative directly impacted women and girls through classroom education, health education, micro finance and other teaching tactics. It’s crucial, lifesaving work.

CGI is a public private partnership, but the heavy lifting in creating such programs has been done by NGOs, governments and other charitable entities, according to Dr. Isobel Coleman from the Council on Foreign Relations. She says if you add up all the money spent on women by NGOs and other non-profit organizations it’s somewhere under $5 billion dollars. This is significant money but pales compared to the estimated $1 trillion alone of investment capital wanting to invest in socially responsible business. Dr. Coleman notes, it is crucial to enlist the private sector in this empowerment to really make change.

At CGI, Andrew Kassoy, Co-founder, B Lab said there are 60-70 million consumers who WANT to buy from good companies. And many companies, whether explicitly socially responsible in their charter or not, have the intention to have a positive impact on society. But it’s tough to make money and it’s hard for socially responsible businesses to scale. Many explicitly pro-women businesses are in this spot.

Theme Two: Women are Power Consumers, Hence They Have Power
Nearly every US-focused public conversation will touch on women’s sheer might as consumers of goods and services. Organizations usually seize women’s purchasing power as proof of the strength of women’s voices in the marketplace. I’m not sure this translates. And frankly, if I hear this statistic again, I’m going to scream: women drive 85% of household purchases. Women are the “Chief Household Officers.” Women are the power consumers…you know the story.

This information is accurate, valuable and hey, I make my living largely from it. But it’s not enough to change the balance of power and improve the global plight of women. I’ve written before how the single-minded emphasis on women’s role as power consumer is the new Feminine Mystique. I don’t see much evidence that women’s predominance as consumers of packaged goods, etc. translates into our larger power.

Theme Three: If Things Are Really Going to Change, Women Need More Access to Capital

Empowering women as producers of economic wealth is the hardest part of the equation to solve. There is incredible work being done globally and in the US in the micro-finance sector, but women need access to capital beyond the micro scale. There are two examples I want to highlight below of how this can be done at scale.

Wal-Mart’s recent commitment to empower women is an example of bringing socially responsible business to scale but also of an organization committing to tackle the hardest question behind women’s lack of global equity.

In a strong new women’s empowerment initiative, Wal-Mart has taken the lead doubling sourcing from women suppliers, source $20 billion from women owned businesses. They promise to track and measure their actual spending with women suppliers worldwide and hold themselves accountable. This includes large and small batch producers of goods and services.

Wal-Mart also pledges to work with more women professional services providers, such as lawyers, ad agencies, accountants and technology firms. Yes, Wal-Mart has a tough record when it comes to championing women in the workplace. But ultimately, it’s empowering women as key producers in the multi-billion dollar Wal-Mart supply chain. The vision, according to Executive Vice President for Corporate Affairs Leslie Dach, is to bring about a “global marketplace where women’s contributions are really and truly valued…Helping women live better will make Wal-Mart a stronger business.”

It’s not micro, and while it’s a PR campaign, there are real numbers behind it.

And yes, in a press conference to announce the initiative, he noted women are the majority of Wal-Mart shoppers. But I’ll forgive him that one.

Second, there’s great energy afoot to increase the number of women on corporate boards of directors. The average Fortune 500 company board is only 16% women. This means corporate decisions that affect us in the US and all over the world are 84% made by men. Doesn’t that figure put the “82% of purchases are made by women” figure into a stark new light?

At a launch for the new non-profit organization 2020Women on Boards, both MA State Treasurer Steve Grossman and CEO of PAX Worldwide Joe Keefe, who runs a mutual fund featuring only companies that invest in gender equality, drummed home this simple and powerful point: women hold more power than we think. Not only are many women individual investors in mutual funds, but our pension funds, unions and employers are among the largest holders of company shares. Every year, we are sent proxy forms and we usually throw them out or check the boxes suggested. But these boxes approve Boards of Directors, and we can use our proxy votes to change things; we need to read them, and scout them for gender diversity. There are also several new databases that host the information of thousands of qualified women Board candidates. This is a powerful way to change the ratio and get more women on Boards.

Because it’s all about numbers, and all about scale.

Disclosure: I did consulting work for Wal-Mart at a past job in 2005.

I thought, “you can’t be the only one,” so I decided to write a quick piece for my sisters in anxiety out there. You see, BlogHer is a little like high school. And if for some reason you were not popular in high school, or you were angsty, or you didn’t have people to sit with at lunch or didn’t get invited to cool parties, you might have flashbacks at BlogHer Con. I went to girls high school, and it was vicious at times. Whenever I walk into a room full of women I’ll have a bout of social anxiety. Do they like me? Am I awkward and not worth knowing?

It’s not BlogHer’s fault. The three founders are the most wonderful, down to earth women you’ll ever meet. The women I know from my blogging community are my true friends, my role models and mentors, my colleagues and even my clients. BlogHer has enriched my life in ways I never thought would be possible.

But get any posse of women together (let alone several thousand) and dynamics will ensue. Not to mention that many attendees are selling themselves, making connections, working it hard…and it can get intimidating. Every party you’re not invited to, every elite piece of swag you don’t get, every person who doesn’t know your name. You will meet people more famous/rich/full of Twitter followers than you. It wears on a person, even an adult with a wonderful life back home.

So here is my guide if events like this make you anxious. Every time you feel a twinge, say to yourself:

I’m just here to learn. If I have fun and meet people while I’m here, that’s great. But this is just a learning experience. I’m going to observe, and that’s all. I’m along for the ride.

I try to let go of whatever agenda I had…because if you hang out and observe at BlogHer, you never know where you’ll end up.

If this isn’t enough, think of all the people who love you back home. Think how wonderful it is to be an adult, to make your own rules and your own friends and not care if people like you all the time.

Then, have a glass of wine, smile, and open yourself to the experience.

See you there!

The parade of thinkers, revolutionaries and world-crafters was as diverse as those who are leading change. And honestly, I believe it was women’s role in the uprisings in the Middle East this spring that inspired such diversity at this year’s conference in lower Manhattan. This doesn’t mean to sugarcoat the events or outcomes in the Middle East, but to acknowledge the very true public role of women there.

Because the medium is the message, we need to always look critically at who is up on the big stage driving discussion at major conferences. It’s who you see who sets the agenda, and if you have worked in the technology or media space for some time, you know that a constant refrain from producers is, “I wanted to invite more women, but I just couldn’t find them.”

Even the inimitable Kara Swisher just wrote “about how all the often touchy-feely men entrepreneurs of the hottest Web 2.0 companies ha[ve] a glaring problem. While most of them have women as a majority of their customers, they could not seem to find even one qualified woman for any of their boards. This makes it a struggle even in programming our D: All Things Digital conferences. We have featured almost every significant female tech exec we could.”

At the PDF Conference, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand was the most senior U.S. elected official to speak. Senator Gillibrand spoke to the crowd about her commitment to using the Internet to make politicians (including herself) more accountable to voters. Amid other speakers’ vivid snapshots of the revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia, Senator Gillibrand referred to the drive for more transparency in the U.S. Congress as “a quiet touch of revolution.” For example, Gillibrand will publish her Federal Election Commission campaign finance disclosures online, in easily searchable electronic format. She also put all her earmark requests online so voters can see what money she is requesting.

Gillibrand drew praise from the Sunlight Foundation’s Ellen Miller for voluntary disclosures she makes already, including her schedule of official meetings, voting record, and federal funding requests.

New York’s Junior Senator also touched on the issue of accessibility. She said we need to make sure all Americans have access to the internet, and she is working on increasing funding for rural broadband access.

Gillibrand is 44, not quite a Digital Native but of the generation that recognizes digital issues are paramount to American competitiveness and that Internet facility and access are key. It’s a far cry from a highlight of the conference in 2008, when digital strategist Tracy Russo asked of then presidential-candidate John McCain “how can a person who doesn’t know how to operate a computer be the kind of leader we need to move us forward and fulfill the potential all of our tomorrows hold?”

Three years later, in the aftermath of the economic collapse, the revolutions in the Middle East and social media’s role in each, I can’t imagine a viable U.S. leader admitting, as McCain did, that he doesn’t “really do computers” (insert Anthony Weiner comparison here).

Keep reading at BlogHer.com

At this new crossroads of my life, I find myself reflective, and grateful that I work for the organization that I do. I have always been the queen of flexibility.

I needed it: my husband always traveled, and I was essentially a single parent Monday through Friday. I used it: worked compressed workweeks, part time schedules, had daily flex leave for school conferences, paused my career, reentered the workforce. I valued it: I am one of the 87% of people who consider having flexibility to be extremely important when (if) looking for a new job. And I believe that having that flexibility allowed me to be a good parent and a good worker, while always aspiring to positions of more responsibility.

Confession 1: I thought that when I was at this point in my life, I would not need workplace flexibility anymore.

Confession 2: I need it more than ever. Why? Because I have learned, after being in the workforce for 30 years, that in order for me to the best worker, and reach my highest potential and productivity, I need to be whole in my life.

On a personal note, in order for me to be whole in my life, I need, and want to continue to be there for my daughters. I want to be able to move my older daughter into her first apartment, and go to Home Depot and Target, and construct the do-it-yourself furniture. I want to be able to take my younger daughter out to lunch in NYC this summer and hear all about her first corporate work experience. I want to visit my daughters during the year, (both of them are a 3 hour flight away) and be able to leave on a Thursday night, work remotely on Friday, and not have to jam a visit into a 48-hour weekend, because I am confined by the traditional work schedule of being in the office till 5:00 on a Friday and back in the office at 9:00 on Monday.

Is this selfish? Maybe. Who benefits? Definitely me, but I would also argue that my employer benefits just as much. I am loyal (been here 12 years!) and hard working; I’ve never missed a deliverable, and have supported my co-workers when they have needed to take time off for their personal lives. So, I am one of the lucky ones; I have had access to flexibility without jeopardy to my career or advancement.

As I travel around the country for the When Work Works initiative, and speak to different audiences, a key message I deliver is that workplace flexibility must work for the employer first, and then the employee. I am forever learning that workplace flexibility is needed and wanted by individuals for so many different reasons, and organizations are creating so many innovative solutions to this need, that yield positive business results .

So, I ask readers to share- What stage of life are you in? Do you need workplace flexibility? What types of flexibility would best fit your needs at this stage in your life? How would workplace flexibility help make you whole? And, are you one of the lucky ones? Do you have flexibility in your organization?

It’s a profound honor to be a part of ONE’s Mom Advisory Committee and to recognize Mother’s Day here today with all of you.

I’m a mom of four from Pittsburgh, Penn., and I co-run a website for mothers called The Motherhood. We’ve learned many truths about mothers through our community, but these three remind me the most of what we are focusing on with ONE:

1. Even though mothers often carry the burdens of the world, they do so on strong shoulders.
2. Moms have an unmatched ability to “make it happen.”
3. A mothers’ DNA carries within it the mantra, “leave everything better than you found it.”

In other words, mothers make the world go around.

We witness it all the time. Ordinary moms, every day, see a need — and without hesitation do what they can to make a difference in that need. That is why I love formally bringing moms into ONE, with all that represents and everything it will help make happen.

Maria Mchele Mwasonge of Tanzania is a powerful inspiration to me as we move forward.

Maria and her five kids used to sleep on a rag that covered the floor, but that all changed when Maria was trained how to grow sweet potatoes.

From her small potato farm, Maria has built a thriving business. Now her children go to school and the family lives in a new home. Other farmers have learned from Maria how she grows the most nutrient-rich plants, and in the process local health clinics report that malnutrition in the area’s young children has dropped.

Even when she sleeps, Maria said, she thinks about her potatoes.

(If you haven’t already, be sure to read the ONE report “Africa’s Future is Female,” which includes Maria’s story.)

An age-old description of mothers popped into my head when I read about Maria: “She is a tree of life to them.”

“Them” is certainly her children, but when it comes to mothers, many times “them” means everyone she can help or lift up in her own way.

Today at 1 PM ET, The Motherhood will be hosting a live, text-based talk with the ONE Campaign and Every Mother Counts to celebrate mothers everywhere. Please join us and share what inspires you about mothers and learn more about what we can do to help mothers and kids around the globe who need us.

We hope to see you there!

PS. This amazing video by Former First Lady Laura Bush is a beautiful reminder that for moms, one child is every child. I hope it motivates you as much as it did me!

Follow Cooper on Twitter: @coopermunroe

If I asked you if you work “mother’s hours,” what would come to mind?

It turns out “mother’s hours” is a term of art used to refer to jobs that provide the flexibility around family priorities. It can mean working a compressed day, or working from home while making time to attend a kid’s event during the workday. I’m sure it’s been used with derision more than once. I don’t care. I worked mother’s hours before I had kids, and I’ll do it after they leave home, I hope. It’s how I function best.

Working at home gets a bad rap. People don’t help when they use airquotes when talking about “working” at home, like they’re really watching TV all day. If you do this, please stop. It doesn’t help the millions of us who do work at home and do a damn fine job of it.

It’s true some managers don’t believe their people really work when they are at home, but the research shows the other extreme: people overwork. Ironically, in the digital age, many remote workers report they can’t shut off. They may feel a need to prove they’re actually working when they are home; they might even work more than they would at the office because they feel a need to overcompensate and thank their employer for “letting” them work from home.

Research from Northeastern University finds role transitions are especially challenging for people who work at home. Humans like to compartmentalize: We put work in one domain, and family in another. When you work at home, you will be in your home environment and you will face distraction during the day. A dirty kitchen, lonely cat, sick kid or leaky faucet can be your ruin if you let it. Working at home takes discipline and a keen sense of purpose.

When I tell people I work at home, they always ask me, “How do you make sure your kids don’t bother you”? I always say, first, I have childcare. Working at home while you’re watching the kids isn’t working, unless you run a daycare. My colleague Leanne Chase has a good solution for her home office: “I have two signs for my daughter. She can’t read yet, so I put a sign up. One sign has a smiley face – which means she can knock on mommy’s door. There is also a smiley face with a cross through it, which means she has to go to the nanny or daddy unless there’s a fire.”

It’s important to create what Dr. Jay Mulki calls “segmentation” when you work at home. You need the barriers between your work self and your home self. Many create rituals that allow for these barriers, even if they are symbolic. Why? Because in a world where work is undefined, we’re creating, in the words of Northeastern University researcher Kim Eddleston, new “temporal, spatial and psychological boundaries” to manage the transition from home to work, even if we don’t leave our home to begin work.

Recent research on remote workers and telecommuters brings all sorts of new rituals to light. For instance, if you don’t commute into work each day, how do you make the transition to start your workday? For some, it’s going out for a cup of coffee. Some complete the school run, then return home to work. I bet a lot of people walk the dog. I might start the day early, doing “check-in” work — check my email inbox, review my schedule, do billing or administrative tasks — while still in my pajamas or workout clothes. But I’ll hold phone calls, writing or doing any serious thinking work until I am dressed in some semblance of grown-up clothes, and my face has to be made-up, or at least moisturized.

For many who hold “mothers’ hours,” there’s an evening back-to-work ritual, as well. Put the kids to bed, log on. Watch the evening news, then pick up again.

Many of us, and not just mothers, structure a workday that meets our needs. But work is still work, and we’re creating a new set of rituals to create a semblance of a workday with a beginning, middle and end. About a third of American workers have flexible schedules. Only 11 percent of wage and salaried employees currently work from home, but almost all employees would like the ability to occasionally work at home. Big companies like BlueCross Blue Shield are heavily investing in the at-home workforce, and then there’s a whole “tribe” of people like me who work for ourselves and work at home. With mobile technology, the number of non-traditional information workers will only increase.

But even when you’ve forgone the traditional nine-to-five, a routine is important to most of us. Otherwise, work doesn’t feel like work. And that’s not always a good thing.

***
Thanks to the New England Work and Family Association for access to this research on engaging the remote and telecommuting workforce.

Really good, balanced article. But am I the only one feeling guilt here?

And then there’s the guilt. Morra Aarons-Mele, 34, owner of Women Online, a digital marketing firm, tries not to mind when her toddler says his nanny’s name before hers. (Aarons-Mele just had a second baby, by the way, and they’re trying to figure out a raise for nanny Joanna Szukala.)

What really wrenches her gut, though, is an admittedly self-imposed feeling that the high cost is her burden – she preferred a nanny to provide stability for the kids and flexibility for herself and her husband, since they both have demanding jobs that require frequent travel away from the Medford home. “Every time we look at how much child care costs, I feel guilty about it,” says Aarons-Mele, “even though it’s investing in the future for me to work.”

I recently taught a digital skills workshop for graduate students at Harvard’s Kennedy School. A guest in the audience, who was about 45, raised her hand and said, “Well, you’re all so young. What about women like me? Is there a space for us in social media”?

The twentysomethings in the audience immediately supported her with comments like, “My mom is my Facebook friend!” The truth is, the fastest growing demographic group on Facebook is women over 55. And in almost every age group, Facebook is growing faster with women than men. Women are over 56% of Facebook’s audience, and 45% of Facebook’s US audience is now 26 years old or older.

For mid-career women, becoming social network savvy is serious business. Whether you’re working for a large company or for yourself, you need to establish a digital brand. Women Online will be ready to help at the Conference for Women with our interactive session, “Using Social Media to Establish Your Brand.” In the meantime, here is some food for thought about why it’s so crucial you engage online:

- You’ll get access to new networks. Research shows that women’s social and professional networks look different than men’s, and this can hurt us professionally. Women tend to have fewer weak ties, more all-female reference groups, and more contacts who are peers, less who are superiors. As the network scholar Howard Aldrich wrote, after work, “men head for cocktails [or golf], women head for the dry cleaner.” Online media fundamentally changes this equation. You can be at home and still engage in the virtual cocktail party.

- A digital brand is portable and permanent. Women can lose out professionally because most of us take some time out of the paid workforce to raise children. If you take time off to have a baby or opt-out of a career ladder progression, your online presence can still grow and burnish your professional reputation. Your online brand is layoff proof and it can grow with you as your expertise grows. For all generations, jumping in and out of the traditional workforce is “the new normal” according to Ellen Galinsky and the Families and Work Institute. Keeping up a strong professional profile online allows you to stay engaged even if you’re not officially working.

- Establish your expertise and credentials. Digital publishing and creating a strong digital brand allows you to establish expertise in your field while bypassing traditional gatekeepers or barriers to success. Google rank plus links to your work=credentials in the digital age. Again, research shows women feel the need to be more credentialed before assuming positions of power. Strong use of social media allows us to build credentials without breaking into traditional networks (if we’re part of those networks, even better—we can link out to more women).

- Strong community ties. We get by with a little help from them…online friends build social capital, plus they’re a wonderful addition to life. Online community can help busy women feel connected, listened to, and recharged, on our terms and at the time of day that works for us.

Learn more at the Conference: please join my colleague Susan Getgood at “Using Social Media to Build Your Brand.”

Morra Aarons Mele is the founder of Conference Sponsor Women Online, a digital PR and marketing firm (www.wearewomenonline.com). She is an Internet marketer who has been working with women online since 1999. She helped Hillary Clinton log on for her first Internet chat, and launched Wal-Mart’s first blog. She has written for BlogHer.com, Huffington Post, MomsRising and Guardian.co.uk and has covered events from the White House to the campaign trail to Harvard Law School in her role as a blogger on women, politics, and work. Morra is the author of “Women and Leadership in the Digital Age,” part of the upcoming Sage Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership.

Her husband, her story, was so sordid. But Elizabeth Edwards’ is a woman of such articulateness, it’s hard for me to group her in with her slimy husband. I’ve reposted our interview below.

I had the honor of interviewing Elizabeth Edwards last week in Cambridge. I said, “I’m going to interview you for BlogHer.” She said, “thanks for doing that,” and I said “your fan base on BlogHer is beyond” and she said, “these are my people.” So, “people”…

Does the media cover elections as if candidates were Hollywood celebrities, bestowing coverage on who’ll make the best copy and sell most?

Elizabeth Edwards thinks so. When she spoke at Harvard’s Kennedy School last week the thrust of her public address was this: campaign coverage focuses less on substance and more on personality. In a race dominated by two “mega-celebrities,” she used Senator Joe Biden as an example of media slight that created an avalanche of negative effects on one “by any measure a serious candidate.” Biden had but one appearance on the front page of the New York Times. There were more news articles about Elizabeth than about ten of the presidential candidates! The “narrative template” of the media’s choosing was an African American man and a woman. And the media went there, and the result was sky-high ratings for election news.

“Who got to decide this?” she asked about the media’s anointment of certain candidates over others. “Whoever decided this probably also decided that Fred Thompson was a serious candidate for president.” She pleaded for less Britney Spears, who even graced the Atlantic Monthly’s cover, and more dissection of critical issues like health policy. Instead we get “strobe light” journalism to make the sound bite. You have to craft a “zinger,” she noted. Mrs. Edwards can master the zinger but she is a truly thoughtful person and I wish she were running for president. So much for journalistic objectivity, there, but I’m no journalist.

I wanted to talk to Elizabeth about civic life, since she is a true civic leader, not just a political leader. I asked her, “what happens after Election Day? We’ve seen it before- there’s a huge surge, excitement, people vote and then…what would you say to young progressives about how to keep people involved”?

One of the things that John and I tried…OneCorps. As you’re working, you’re out there, meeting with the other volunteers. We need to think about this post-Election period and where will people turn their energies. Our hope was that people would turn their energies to their communities. We hoped people would turn towards a potential candidate, great potential candidate… say “how can we help them” In particular try thinking about it outside the progressive community- thinking, ‘I’m gonna do an anti-poverty project and I’m gonna go to that Baptist Church and see if they want to do it with us and build the bonds there’…and maybe doing something else that would appeal to another group. People get used to working with one another to make the communities better and stronger. We try to do it through OneCorps, it helps, people feel like they’re part of a bigger network if we have something [formal]. Whoever is the candidate, win or lose, one of the things they should do is build that operation into something that’s more civic-minded. The problem is that the way you do that is you use your email list, and the email list is a commodity that civic organizations are unable to afford. One of the things I want us to be able to do is to donate the list to OneCorps…

Politicians have a political agenda, so it’s important to incorporate those who aren’t running again. But “if people understood their own power and their own ability to change their communities…. It’s especially important if McCain wins the election because he’s against government activity that supports the work of organizations like OneCorps.

Let’s talk about why women don’t run for office, and how moms especially can get engaged in civic life so we can start thinking about running?

I think one of the reasons- and not having considered running- or not seriously considered running myself- I think money is really important. EMILY’s list is really important. We are unlikely to have-this is historical- the donor base that men are likely to have. I know we’re used to juggling home and work, and politics is more demanding than most jobs, in terms of the time it’s going to take, at least to do it well. It often also requires being in Washington [DC] away from family, or being in the State Capital. Your family has to be ok with that…The women who are in Washington have launched a move to Washington, particularly the ones with children. Men, it’s much more split. McCain is an example…very often the wives and the children stay at home in the home district or the home state and the official moves to Washington. Women have a much bigger family decision to make.

Me: Is there any solution or is that how it is?

That’s how it is. I think there are just some things we have to say, that’s how it is. ….the way I’d like to improve it is I’d like to see the men to feel the same responsibility! I don’t want it to move in the other direction…I kind of think families ought to live together- that’s one of the things that makes us a family. Certainly as much as our blood makes us a family, living together makes us a family.

I don’t think we feel hesitation anymore whether we can be effective advocates, whether we can be effective candidates. I think it’s lifestyle that keeps us from running [for office]….If we had public financing we’d have a lot more people engaged.

We talked a lot about the effect of money on our elected officials.

There are certain things you wish you could do sort of “candid camera” and we could follow people around congress…to everything…they could go to the bathroom themselves but that’s it. And people couldn’t arrange their schedule…to meet with “Mothers of Dead Soldiers” or things like that all day long. The distance we now have from them, the lack of transparency, we don’t have that connection. We get it back maybe a little bit during campaign season but…

[after Election Day}

“But everyone goes home. I think that’s what it’s gonna be. Even if Obama wins…Hillary has exhibited a toughness that has quieted some people’s concerns that she’s a woman. Obama has appealed to people as this gentle, thoughtful man. People want to see the toughness too.

So I asked her about the role of soaring rhetoric in this election cycle:

“It’s getting people excited and that’s really great. It’s also raising people’s expectations perhaps unrealistically. Jimmy Carter was a really nice man, with a really good heart…but what he didn’t have was the capacity to change the rhetoric of his vision into action. And as a matter of fact, the sort of naïve way in which he had approached it meant he faced even more hurdles than someone who was practiced

What do you think of the whole “bitch is the new black” approach- is that an effective strategy?

“No…I am concerned with the way in which the percentage of women voting for Hillary, the percentage of African Americans voting for Obama, will change. I’m afraid—as many Democrats are—of disaffection in these groups when their candidate is no longer in the race. Because the appeal has been made— not so much by the candidates— but certainly by surrogates and others—this pitch has been made that this is important, for your gender, for your race. In a way it is important for them. But I’m concerned about the disaffection when the candidate is no longer in the race. That’s the real argument for the forced marriage between them, is the possibility of disaffection.

I actually disagree with Elizabeth on this point. I don’t think if Hillary doesn’t win the nomination that women voters will feel disaffected. I think new precedents have been set and the bar’s been moved. Do you? I do wish for a ticket with both Obama and Clinton.

I closed with asking Elizabeth about her civic role in coming years. She said until she can’t make anymore contributions, people will keep hearing from her. I know she said she hasn’t seriously considered running for office but I encourage her to re-think. We need her.

For more recent Elizabeth Edwards news:

Kate Phillips covers Elizabeth’s speech at the Kennedy School, including her fantastically moving answer to the eternal question about criticism about having cancer, young kids, and staying on the campaign trail: New York Times Caucus Blog

Click here to watch Edwards’ public address and Q and A.

At the BlogHer Conference in New York City this weekend, I co-hosted a panel to discuss how bloggers can use their powerful voices to rally for more effective family-friendly workplace policies. You can read a summary of the panel here.

The whole conference was imbued with discussions about work-life. I spoke with several women from large corporations who enjoyed flexibility and great policies, but spoke of a fear of stigma if they took full advantage. I spoke with a lot of small business owners who supported care policies but found it difficult to manage both financially and logistically when their employees took leaves. Of course, when you get 2,400 ambitious women together you’re going to discuss our struggles to achieve work life fit! But I had several a-ha moments during the two day event.

1) The most urgent point that emerged during my BlogHer session was something I had not thought much about- but once it was raised, it instantly hit a nerve. An audience member raised the issue of what she referred to as the “ghettoized female teleworker.” The audience instantly jumped on this topic- again, not surprising in a room full of information workers. How do you manage to both work remotely and stay in the game? Does working from home diminish an employers’ sense of your ambition?

Another audience member asked, “What ARE the steps to convincing the world/companies/men believe that being at home isn’t “sitting at home eating bonbons?”

I shared some of my own tips: the first is to charge what you’re worth, and not diminish your salary even though you work remotely. The second is to be professional: hold calls and meetings on a quality phone line, be available, and pretend like you’re in the office when you talk to colleagues. Never make jokes about being in your pajamas! Finally, make time for face-time, even if it’s periodic.

“We need to shift the perception that telecommuters are lazy, undressed, and off the grid.”  Another audience member suggested remote workers are even more available than office workers, since homeworkers are usually online. This, however, brings challenges too. Which leads me to point two.

2) In my session, we opened with the question: how many of you work flexibly? Almost every single hand went up. Indeed, at a breakfast with several senior women PepsiCo executives at the BlogHer Conference, The Chief Communications Officer of all of PepsiCo, Chief Marketing Officer of Gatorade, and VP of Global Design and Development all agreed they could take the time they needed for family. That’s not the issue: the issue is the unrelenting lack of boundaries that means any time they take away from the office needs to be “made up” at odd hours.

Gatorade CMO Sarah Robb O’Hagan referred to this as her personal “watchout”: everyone works flexible schedules, but they also work through the weekends. For professionals and professional services workers, the issue is not flexibility. It’s managing our own and others’ expectations of the sheer amount of time we spending working, if not necessarily at work.

3) From a public policy perspective, we had an interesting discussion (see CNN’s Eric Kuhn on the meeting here) with Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. Anita Jackson of MomsRising.org asked the Senator to share her thoughts on how to finally bring family friendly practices to every American business. Gillibrand started to reply with a rote answer on how businesses have to recognize that family friendly policies are good for business. I pushed the Senator: “you can’t just put the onus on companies and expect them to change everything.” She then shifted from platititudes to discussing her program to provide tax credits for employers to provide child care incentives.

Everyone knows that in an ideal world, on site childcare would be fabulous. But that will not happen anytime soon. Tax credits for large and small businesses who help provide free resource and referrals for childcare is different, and a more workable approach. For example, Senator Gillibrand supports a proposal to allow employers to deduct 20 percent of the costs for childcare resources and referral services. Currently employers can deduct only 10 percent of those costs. Senator Gillibrand also supports increasing the maximum deduction from $150,000 to $225,000.

For more on Gillibrand’s family friendly policies, click here. Tax credits alone won’t do much. But this specific policy focus reminded me that we must consider what Chrysula Winegar calls the “trinity” of elements that will bring about change: “It’s the holy trinity of individual knowledge and responsibility, corporate culture and policy and careful base-line legislation.”