(www.bizchicksrule.com)

Wow, am I ever jealous of Francoise Gri.

She was named by Fortune as one of the “International 50 Most Powerful Women in Business” and has made the list for the fifth consecutive year. This is quite an honor and exhibits an obviously stellar performance and track record by Francoise. Read more

(bizchicksrule.com)

What words inspire and motivate you? What words catapult you into action? Continuing off of the post made this morning about comfort zones, I’m curious to know what motivates you each day and gets you going for your career and your business.

Is it money…the promises of a big fat paycheck at the end of the week?

Are you motivated by the sheer intoxication of being in power at your company?

Are you inspired by your little ones, motivated to provide the best for them?

What are YOUR motivating words?

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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright

Don’t forget the Quickbooks give-a-way that Kristen is having. The contest ends Monday! Go to the post for details.

(www.bizchicksrule.com)

What are you most comfortable working at? If you’re like me, you only like to do things you’re familiar with, things that “feel right” and you don’t have to expend a whole lot of energy doing. After all, doing things that way seem to make the day go by much easier, much faster and with very little effort.

Seth Godin’s blog featured an inspiring article about the effort we place into doing various things throughout our day. It got me thinking about my business and facing those things in my business that seem challenging to me. Things like writing on topics outside of my niche interest that require me to look and think outside of my comfort zone. Things like learning new technology or taking the time to flesh out a new idea.

What are you comfort-challenged with in your day-to-day business? What can you do differently to pull more out of your business comfort zone?

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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright

P.S. Also, don’t forget Kristen’s cool new give-a-way that she’s having right here at Biz Chicks Rule. Go to her post for details. Good stuff!

(bizchicksrule.com)

Patti LaBelle is a phenomenal superstar and business woman in her own right. Her background spans over thirty years and she’s still going strong! Check out this live interview with her on the Today show. She has really got class and inspiration.

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Copyright - Bridget Wright

Biz Chicks Rule

Here I am, sitting in the car dealership’s office working (happily) along while my car is being serviced. I almost walked out of the house this morning without my laptop. I didn’t think I’d be away from my (home) office that long and I could do some work when I got back home. I’m glad I re-thought that idea and grabbed all of my work stuff before I left home. It turns out that the service department is slammed today and there’s about a three to four hour wait per person. I’m also glad that I’ve learned the art and importance of multi-tasking so that at the end of this long, expensive car-service episode, I can say that I’ve had a productive day (I hope). So, this whole thing sparked the post idea of sharing with our readers the importance of multi-tasking in your everyday lives…no matter where you are! Read more

Biz Chicks Rule

(Disclaimer: This post is NOT meant to ignite or offend any particular political party or opinion. It is simply meant to shed light on and analogize the correlation between politics, business and women)

Pimp -noun
1. a person, esp. a man, who solicits customers for a prostitute or a brothel, usually in return for a share of the earnings; pander; procurer.

[Image Source: sxc.hu]

Whenever a woman allows herself to be exploited in any manner or for any reason, she is selling out, or rather “pimped out” and her pimp gets a huge chunk of the revenue, giving her a small token. The pimp sees multiple benefits in having this woman do his bidding, finding the highest bidder for his wares (her). He convinces her that she is valuable, but the only way she will excel is if she lets him control guide her towards success.

But is it ok if she likes it?

Pimps have nothing to lose in the pimp-nating(?), but everything to gain. The pimp always fares well, coming out on top, while the pimp-ed does not, come out on, well, not on top. (clearing throat). Read more

Biz Chicks Rule

In this YouTube video from an interview with Sarah Palin when she was being considered as a candidate for the position of Vice-President, she sprinkles her interview with a few “ya know’s” and “kewl”, much to the amusement of the interviewer. I’m sooo disappointed, needless to say, in Mrs. Palin’s presentation. I’ve been somewhat brewing since the announcement on Thursday and have had to re-work my post on it several times, which is why it STILL hasn’t been posted. You know the old adage, “if you don’t have something nice to say…”

Kewl.

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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright

Biz Chicks Rule

Ideas are a dime a dozen right? Maybe not. Maybe they’re $10,000 for one.

Ideablob has a monthly contest each, well, month to see who can submit the BEST business idea ever. The winner wins $10K and all bragging rights. What would you do with your winnings if you had that kind of money?

Me? I’d dump the whole thing into a marketing campaign for my business(es) and reap the rewards. But of course, in order to win, I’d have to come up with a novel business idea. The devil is in the details, isn’t he?

Go here to find out more about the contest and to enter your business idea. I am. Good luck!
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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright

Biz Chicks Rule

I said no again today.

• No, I will not help with the PTO fundraiser.
• No, I will not serve on the community board to raise funds for a new park.
• No, I will not bring 2 dozen brownies to my son’s first grade class party.
• No, I do not have a “second” to chat.
• And, finally, no I do not want that credit card offer/lotto winnings/a free ice-cream maker/fill-in-the-blank.

I said no and it felt good.

[Photo Source: Getty Images]

Being in business, whether you’re a freelancer, work-from-home woman, corporate exec or a telecommuter, I’m sure you’ve found maybe three reasons just today as to why you should say “no.” It’s so easy to overcommit when you have a flexible schedule and everyone around you “needs” you. Yeah, right. What were they doing before us?

A couple of months ago I had a “situation” that occured in my professional life that made me realize just how overcommited I was and how badly I needed to scale back. There are/were soooo many things that I want to do in both my professional life and in my personal life, but I was always struggling with time and finding time to make all of these things happen. With a business, children, spouse and a household, achieving my own goals was growing farther and farther away from me and began to seem like only a distant dream. Have you ever wanted something so badly that you could almost feel it, as if you already had it?

One day it hit me that I was never going to achieve any of my goals if I didn’t
1) prioritize,
2) set goals (with timelines),
3) work towards those goals on a daily basis and
4) just…say…no.

Now number four was and has always been my challenge, but this summer all of that changed. No more nice girl here. Bridget stopped long enough to realize that the ONLY way that I was going to see any of my dreams come true was to perhaps fizzle everybody else’s dreams. Not being mean or anything, but I had to realize that the world will not come to an end if I am not the one serving as president of the PTO committee or if I am the soccer team mom. It just won’t.

In my realizations, I had to adjust a few things and let a few other things go. I was serving on too many non-revenue producing boards. I eliminated three of them in one fail swoop. I was writing and maintaining other blogs that weren’t lining up with my core business interests. I eliminated 4 of those and started focusing on my blog here at Biz Chicks Rule and at Corporate-Eye. I’m streamlining my Professional Speaking Blog and Church Marketing Blog. The last two you don’t see yet because I’m, well, streamlining them. (btw, anybody know of a good WordPress designer?)

That was the point of downsizing my life. I took on higher paying clients and eliminated the ones that paid below my target hourly rate. I figure I would fare better to place all of my energy into a client that paid $1000 month than I would 5 clients that paid $100 month. Simple math for me.

I also streamlined my personal life by not allowing my kids to participate in so many extra-curricular activities. That just creates more work for us moms. Since all three of them are in sports, I made a deal with them to take their activities seasonally. In other words, my cheerleader is currently cheering for football season and when that’s over, then my soccer player will pick up and play soccer in the spring. In the middle of that, my basketball player will dunk baskets at the top of the season in January. I will not find myself running all over town, carting children to various sporting events and activities. And besides folks, they’re only 11, 7 and 4. OK, now you see what I’m saying.

Overcommiting is quite harmful to you as a business woman because it can keep you from being focused on the things that really matter to you. Aside from the obviously important things like family and job, everything else should be secondary. Watch out for the “little” things that seem like harmless activities but can turn out to be time-eaters. I’m sure you can identify at least two things in your life right now that waste your time.

1.

2.

See? You can and should eliminate those immediately if you want to see productivity in your business. Chatty friends? Turn on the answering machine. Spouse wants you to run errands? Set certain days that you will do just that and help him understand that. Slow or non-productive days? Set daily goals and reward yourself when you accomplish them.

Take each thing that you have to do step by step, carefully planning where you want to be and what you want to do and it can happen for you. I am beginning to have more productive, fulfilling work days and I even feel quite accomplished at the end of the day when I am able to check things off of my list.

What are some areas that you struggle with “no” in? How can you change this to start seeing some of your goals come to life?
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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright

Biz Chicks Rule

Since blogging here at Biz Chicks Rule every week, I have met a ton of awesome business women! Some of you are savvy, fierce business gals, while others are methodical, careful and placid. And then there are the hil-a-rious ones who keep us on our toes while others of you have been quick to let us know what you think. Love it!

Just curious to see what kind of business women you all are and what you think about the Biz Chicks Rule blog. Let us know what you’ve liked, disliked, want to see more of, less of or even more of something that’s perhaps off-topic. Take the survey/poll to the right and let me know where you fall in the scheme of things. Thanks for your help!

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Copyright 2008 - Bridget Wright