I need to make a correction to yesterday’s post.  The co-founder of Ecademy is Thomas Power – not John David Mann.  There I feel better.

In my last two Blog posts, I’ve covered what sparked the vision for A Women’s Place and our mission to be a source of enrichment, encouragement and empowerment for women traveling through the 2nd half of life’s journey.

In this article post, I want to say something about the how of enriching, encouraging and empowering.  And I want to introduce why we believe it can be done through a virtual network of women coming together in community.

I think the best place to start is with a couple of examples from this past week. 

EXAMPLE 1: A new member, who is just launching her own vision and mission, has hit a number of “brick walls” in putting together an event for late fall.  She left me a voice mail message that I returned the following morning.

I could tell from her voice that things were not going well and I encouraged her to tell me a little of what was (or was not) happening.  At the close of our conversation, I invited her to join another member and me at a meeting next week in which we could brainstorm some ideas that might be helpful to her.  And that is what we are going to do.

EXAMPLE 2: An area businesswoman contacted me after a referral from one of our leadership members.  We shared conversation via phone; looked at each other’s websites and that was pretty much it. 

In conversation with the team member a week later, I learned that the business woman was really in need of making some quality connections to move her business forward.  Some of those connections I had in my “life-connections pouch” and began to share them with the team member.  Later, I emailed the information to our team member and copied it to the businesswoman. 

The businesswoman responded using the following words – “optimistic” and “positive”.  Her enthusiasm came off the virtual page, because someone with a different set of ‘connections’ had taken time to initiate some strategies that just might work for her AND was willing to make the initial contact to get the communication going! 

And that’s just what I did. 

Today, I talked with the team member who is closely linked (excuse the pun) to the very market segment the businesswoman needs to connect with – and I KNOW the ball will roll from there!

In both examples, several of us on the team were able to encourage and empower.  And next week, we’ll bring others – AWP members – into the process!

It’s just like dropping a pebble in the water!

Communication opened a door – connections were made and relationships began to take shape and form.  Each woman gained something from the encounter and will most likely gain more in time.  Each of us got some personal and professional need met – not the least of which is hope.  Hope that the future will be brighter – that the “brick walls” will tumble and somewhere there is a connection that will take business to a whole new level of success!

In retrospect, the platform that made this possible is www.awomensplace.org!  We were never truer to our vision and mission.

Another aspect of “how” that rests on the AWP platform is information, education and networking. 

For some women, information – the RIGHT information – enriches, encourages and/or empowers.  I’ve always said that “knowledge IS power”.  For others, it will be an educational event that will prompt an ‘ah-ha’ moment that might not have come otherwise. 

In my personal opinion, information and education – enrichment, encouragement and empowerment are the by-products of networking!  I gain some kernel of new information or knowledge that supports me at the point of life through which I am traveling at the time.  And I get it because I was networking with others!

This has turned out to be much longer than I wanted; so I’m going to stop now and move into “why” we chose this vehicle upon which to rest the AWP platform tomorrow.  And I’ll say a little more about networking and building community online!

Where I am today, it looks and feels a little like fall!  Whatever the weather, enjoy the journey of today!

  Linda S. Fitzgerald