Yes, women hold up more than half of the sky. And male allies can collaborate efficiently and fairly for everyone to benefit under the full sky.
David Smith, PhD, and W. Brad Johnson, PhD, co-authors, co-founders of Workplace Allies since 2018, and co-winners of this year’s Alex Barbanell Leading Man Award from Take The Lead, have spent their professional lives focusing on gender parity in the workplace. And their personal lives have had much to do with their collaborative mindsets.
Read MoreIssue 2854— August 4, 2025
ChatGPT, when asked to help write a piece about women and confidence asserted that women “naturally have less confidence than men.”
REALLY? Naturally?
My 2 1/2-year-old great granddaughter has tons of confidence. She is loud. She takes up space. She runs fast and love things that go fast. She takes risks. That’s because nobody has yet told her she shouldn’t be confident.
Read MoreThe daughter of Haitian immigrants, Michelle Genece Patterson, grew up on Blueberry Hill Lane in Sudbury, Mass., a suburb of Boston that she describes as “idyllic, but very much a dissonance culturally and experientially as we were the only family of color.”
Her father was a native of LaGonave, an island of Haiti, where there was no electricity or running water, and her mother was from Port Au Prince. It was their tenacity in moving from Haiti to New York City to Boston, that was a “key pivotal turning point for me,” Patterson says.
The speech class Aly Palmer took her junior year at the University of Maryland where she was studying liberal arts, shifted her life completely.
The award-winning singer, songwriter, producer, performer, artist, activist, philanthropist and founder known globally for her work in the musical trio, BETTY, says, “That feeling of being on stage, feeling something important was happening, is when my entire life changed.”
Read MoreIssue 2853— July 21, 2025
Each year on August 26, we observe Women’s Equality Day—a date that commemorates the certification of the 19th Amendment in 1920, which granted [some] women the constitutional right to vote in the United States.
The name sounds triumphant, the reality is far more complicated. If we’re being honest, it should really be called Women’s INequality Day—a sobering reminder of how far we still have to go.
Read MoreIt’s red carpet season known for awards and applause given to so many deserving winners across entertainment and business arenas.
At Take The Lead, it is also time to celebrate the Power Tool Champions, those entrepreneurs and individuals who will be honored at the Power Up 2025 Concert & Conference with the theme of Courage To Lead. The awards will be given on Women’s Equality Day in Washington, D.C. to deserving entrepreneurs, founders and creators making real change in their lives and the world.
Read MoreIssue 2852— July 15, 2025
When you are confronted with disruption or chaos, which of these is your reaction?
1. I ❤️ to create chaos & run away.
2. I embrace chaos to advance new ideas and achieve my goals 🏆.
3. It stresses me but I calm myself down 😌 and press on.
4. I hide under my desk until it passes.
5. I put my head in the sand and pretend it isn’t happening.
If you are already in a leadership role, the obligation to calm the waves for others, providing a unifying optimistic vision of where the organization needs to go next, weighs heavily on your shoulders.
Read MoreNow more than ever each one of us needs the courage to lead.
In a difficult, divisive cultural environment and a complicated economy, leaders identifying as women face silencing, resistance and erasure as funds disappear and companies, organizations and brands recalibrate to maintain.
In organizations experiencing growth, leaders, colleagues, supporters and collaborators need to define ways to strengthen systems for success and encourage everyone in the network to expand by defining today’s evolving winning strategies.
This year’s Power Up Conference 2025 from Take The Lead held on Women’s Equality Day with the theme, Courage To Lead, offers such strategies, solutions, accolades, insights and learnings from an extraordinary group of experts and leaders in order to assist anyone looking to lead with dynamic innovation and intelligent energy.
Read MoreTwo years after the 50th anniversary of the publication of Erica Jong’s iconic novel, Fear of Flying, and three years after the overturning of Roe v. Wade with the Supreme Court of the United States’ Dobbs decision, Molly Jong-Fast is telling the story of her mother, feminism, fame and what her generation is dealing with today politically and culturally.
Both anniversaries are connected as in 1973 was the launch of Jong’s book and also the year of the Roe V. Wade SCOTUS decision that legalized abortion, a right that held for 49 years.
Read MoreIssue 2851— July 1, 2025
You know I talk a lot about power—not as something to seize, but something to embrace. Power as presence. As voice. As vision. The power TO, not over.
That’s why I’m so thrilled to share a rare experience that brings all of that to life in a way words alone never could.
On August 25 in Washington, DC, we’re hosting an intimate VIP dinner and concert with internationally acclaimed composer and pianist Dame Marina Arsenijević.
Read MoreIn a stunning demonstration of their ability to collaborate and connect effectively across cultures, time and geography, these two co-authors met only once in person 11 years ago, after following each other’s successful global marketing careers from afar.
And then they spent years writing a book together—remotely— with an ocean between them.
Read MoreIssue 2850— June 23, 2025
You feel it.
The air is thick—not just with summer heat but with anxiety, injustice, and uncertainty.
Wars. Layoffs. Leaders assassinated. Families torn apart. Rights rolled back. Bombardment from the news cycle that leaves us breathless.
I don’t know about you, but I find myself flipping the news on to stay informed—and off to stay sane.
Read More
