Disclosure: I share snippets of my stories to help anyone who can relate or knows someone who would benefit from reading them. These are stories that have molded me into who I am today and ask for respectful comments and positive vibes only. Thank you
In honor of International Women’s Day, I’ll keep this blog post short and sweet in an attempt to inspire women AND men to adopt women’s ally ship as part of their daily lives.
One personal experience I constantly reflect on from very early on in my career is when I truly understood the difference between “doing my job” vs “doing my job with PURPOSE”. At the time, I was recruiting for a very special role at the company I worked for. After what felt like 30+ interviews, I came across a very special one. This candidate did not exactly fully meet the “desired job qualifications” at a glance but once the interview kicked off, the necessary skills were definitely there, especially the soft skills that are sometimes overlooked but carry so much importance in any job. When I interviewed this candidate, I immediately knew she was the perfect person for the role but in order for her to progress in her interviews, I knew she needed to learn how to:
- Better tailor her responses
- Learn to highlight her experiences in conjunction to the role she was interviewing for
- Elevate her confidence
Instead of ending the interview and calling it a day, my gut told me I needed to do more so I decided to spend some extra time coaching this candidate until she felt confident about her responses. At that moment, I knew I had witnessed first hand the wide performance gap between candidates who had the privilege to “professional development” resources during school versus those who had not. By providing this candidate with a few of those professionalism tips that everyone should have access to, it gave her the chance to take on an opportunity that she very well deserved. This new job rerouted her career and she went on to become a respectable leader in HR. Most recently, she has landed her first job in tech which has been a long dream of hers.
Looking back at this experience, all it required from my side, was a little extra of my time and the awareness to create impact. It’s the experiences like this that give me purpose in my career and in my life. As we celebrate International Women’s Day (today and everyday), I encourage you to think about moments when you can go the extra mile to support the amazing women around you because you never know how much one decision that comes from genuine positive intent, can impact the women surrounding you.
If you’ve made it this far, I’d also like to share a few ways for you to empower, support and create true ally ship with women around you:
I hope these 5 tips serve as a starting point to help you incorporate small acts of service when empowering other women around you while also encouraging you to activate your ally ship.
Xoxo,
Becky
BE an ally, BE a woman who supports women, BE empowering, BE supportive
