by Karima Mariama-Arthur, Esq. via blackenterprise.com
No doubt you are planning an extraordinary New Year brimming with all of the critical preparation necessary to enrich your mind, body, and spirit. As you streamline your focus and work to enrich your mind, consider the following “hot topic” books as you build out your career success library for 2018:
Lifestorming: Creating Meaning and Achievement in your Career and Life
by Alan Weiss and Marshall Goldsmith
Brief summary: A practical handbook for re-envisioning and redesigning every facet of your life. The authors provide extraordinary access into the thinking and behavior that can help you to achieve uncommon success with newfound confidence. The book’s format provides ample opportunities to delve deeply into your own psyche and do the necessary work through practical exercises focused on a concrete result.
Why you should read it: No matter the successes you’ve achieved in the past, there is always room for learning and growth. Lifestorming provides the context for igniting new possibilities and helps you remove roadblocks to success in every area of your life. It places readers in the driver’s seat and provides the tools needed to transform your life from the inside out.
Tools of the Titans: The Tactics, Routines, And Habits of Billionaires, Icons and World-Class Performers
by Tim Ferris
Brief summary: Tim Ferris has compiled more than 200 interviews from world-class performers in this compelling, not-so-little handbook. The interviews contain insights from guests ranging from revered thought leaders to well-known celebrities, athletes and more whose insights provide new ways of examining familiar challenges that we all face, plus the tools to find resolve.
Why you should read it: The book contains great stories, insights, and insider tips that can help anyone become more thoughtful about how they approach life, as well as embrace success at new levels. The anecdotes are compelling and provide the reader with the courage to look beyond challenges and find meaningful ways to apply the wisdom contained throughout.
Posts tagged as “black enterprise”
article by Courtney Connley via blackenterprise.com
As a University of Delaware finance major, Drew Hawkins recognized his love for stock markets and investing early.
After stumbling into the university’s career planning office, Hawkins was informed of a two-year unpaid internship with Morgan Stanley, then known as Dean Witter. He came on board as an intern in 1989 and as the cliché saying goes, ‘the rest is history.’
“I can remember my first couple of weeks where I saw things that intrigued me and some I found disappointing,” said Hawkins. “Number one, I didn’t see many African American financial advisors and I didn’t see that many African American clients.”
In an effort to change that dynamic, Hawkins worked his way up from intern, to financial advisor to eventually being named the first African American managing director in Morgan Stanley’s Wealth Management business in 2008. Now, as head of the company’s global sports and entertainment division, which has approximately $37 billion in assets, Hawkins opens up to BlackEnterprise.com about his journey to climbing the corporate ladder.
BlackEnterprise.com: Talk about your journey to climbing the ranks at Morgan Stanley.
Hawkins: My career started out as a financial advisor. I received a call from my regional director one day who said I want you to come into my office and take the assessment exam to consider going into management. While the thought of going into a management role where I give up my entrepreneurial hustle was not compelling, it was coming from someone I respected a lot and being in management gave me the opportunity to lead and bring others into the industry.
Are there any specific challenges you faced as an African American?
There are things that are unique with being a person of color in this industry. There were some [people] I could connect with from a management perspective and get sound advice, but still they could not speak to my experiences because they hadn’t walked in my shoes. I had the experience of being the first black managing director in Morgan Stanley’s Wealth Management business, and while I was excited to attain that title it was still a bit startling that in 2008 I was the first for that to occur. Fortunately, we’ve had a lot of others come in since then.
To read full article, go to: http://www.blackenterprise.com/career/drew-hawkins-intern-managing-director-morgan-stanley/
article by Robin White Goode via blackenterprise.com
Five-year-old Giavrielle Lightfoot is an accelerated learner.
“We thought something might be different about her because she was reading before she was 3,” says her mother, Genevievette Walker-Lightfoot. “We also thought she may have just memorized books the way little kids do.”
But when her mother read a book to her that she hadn’t read before, the not-yet-3-year-old read it.
At 2, Gia would say, “I need to play the violin.”
“I had taken her to children’s orchestras, and would have her listen to classical music on NPR. Finally I took her to a music store and let her look at a violin, but she kept saying, ‘I want to take it home. I want to take it home.’”
“I thought it was a little precocious giving a 2-year-old a violin,” Walker-Lightfoot says. “I told her she was too little. Even the smallest violin was too big for her. So we came back a year later and picked one out.” Gia was evaluated and soon started the Suzuki method at the Roberson School of Music. (The famous Suzuki method begins music lessons with the youngest children, even before they’re born.)
Gia’s interest wasn’t a passing phase. “She absolutely loves it,” Walker-Lightfoot says. “We’ve never had to argue with her about practicing. ‘Ode to Joy’ was her Christmas recital number.”
Walker-Lightfoot mentioned testing to her pediatrician, to verify that Gia is a gifted child, “but I wasn’t sure where that would lead.”
Walker-Lightfoot was reluctant because she, her husband, Johnathan, and their only child live in Howard County, Maryland, where children must be 5 by Sept. 1 in order to start school.
That hard and fast rule wouldn’t work for Gia, who was born in December. She was not only already reading, she knew her colors and could count. “From what I’ve read, if bright children aren’t challenged they can get disruptive—because they’re bored.”
The Lightfoots found an academic-focused Montessori school where youngsters can be taught the kindergarten curriculum if they’re 5 by Dec. 31, as long as they pass their work.
Gia is now thriving in an environment of diverse learners. In a class of 11, five students are East Indian, three are African American, one is biracial, one has a Spanish surname, and one is white. The Lightfoots intend to keep Gia in Montessori. They plan to transfer her to another school in the network that goes up to grade 5.
In a recent interview with Black Enterprise, feminist journalist and activist Gloria Steinem had some refreshing things to say about Black women’s progressive history in the fight for gender equality.
“I thought that [Black women] invented the feminist movement…I learned feminism disproportionately from Black women. ”
Steinem explained that in earlier years, surveys showed that African American women were twice as vocal and biased towards feminist issues and beliefs as their White counterparts. She also spoke on her personal practice of giving the floor to other young women (whether or not they self-identify as feminists) to address concerns for people of varying socioeconomic backgrounds. If she is challenged by younger Black women who say that feminism doesn’t speak to them, Steinem says:
“I don’t say anything. I listen because the point is that we help each other to get dignity and autonomy and freedom. We’re here to help each other.”
Steinem has a history of working with Black feminists. In 1972, Steinem founded Ms. Magazine with Dorothy Pitman-Hughes, the author and child welfare advocate. Steinem was also affiliated with the deceased lawyer Flo Kennedy and worked alongside Alice Walker, making Walker one of the earliest Black editors at Ms.
The famous feminist spoke on the issues of police brutality as well, noting the importance of equally employing women in the police force to calm racially tense situations.
“[W]e haven’t been raise with our masculinity to prove. All the studies show that if a woman cop arrives on the scene, she de-escalates the situation by her presence and a man cop escalates. So while we’re talking as we should about cops looking like the community, how come we don’t say they should be half women?”
Check out more Steinem’s insightful commentary here at Black Enterprise.
article by Monique John via hellobeautiful.com
This season on the ABC show “Shark Tank”, Drexel student Christopher Gray, Co-Founder of Scholly, an app to help college students find scholarships, walked away with $40,000 and two “Shark Tank personalities–FUBU founder Daymond John and Lori Greiner of QVC, as investors with a 15% stake in his company.
Gray’s aha moment occurred after he was awarded 34 scholarships for a total of $1.3 million. He then used his knowledge about the scholarship process to create Scholly. The Scholly app, available for 99-cents, sold 92,000 downloads before the showed aired. Anyone who is a fan of the show knows it doesn’t take long for the Sharks to dive into a unique concept and present an offer. But on this episode after hearing very little about the back end of his website and business model, Lori and Daymond offered him a deal he couldn’t refuse. With Scholly rated at No. 1 in the app store, Black Enterprise caught up with Gray to learn more about his entrepreneurial journey.
Since launching your Scholly, what has your journey been like leading to this point?
The journey has been surreal. I am only a senior in college and have had tremendous success. Being featured in national outlets and other accolades has been amazing. My top three highlights:
Since launching your Scholly, what has your journey been like leading to this point?
The journey has been surreal. I am only a senior in college and have had tremendous success. Being featured in national outlets and other accolades has been amazing. My top three highlights:
- Shark Tank Appearance
- Scholly Being Chosen as one of Inc. Magazine’s Top College Start Up
- I was selected as one of BET’s 30 Under 30
Have you always wanted to venture into entrepreneurship? If so, who has inspired you the most?
Yes, I have always wanted to be an entrepreneur since I was little. I have a lot of mentors who I look to for various things. Have a problem with choosing one!
Young African American college graduates say they are more responsibly committed to reaching financial goals than previous generations, according to a study released Tuesday by Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance. Seventy percent of African Americans age 18 to 34 said they were either “disciplined” or “highly disciplined” when it came to finances, compared to just 47 percent of those 35 and older. However, 40 percent of those 55 and older reported having financially prepared to live to age 95, as opposed to just nine percent for the 18 to 34 set.