After teaching another fab group of writers up at the Woodhull Institute (welcome, Writers 10!), and whooping it up in Princeton with my WomenGirlsLadies panel last week (thank you Amada! thank you Chloe!), I’m ready to announce the next gig.  Here tis:

Everything You Need to Know about Blogging and Why: Do you want a more interactive online presence for your organization or your own work?  Interested in attracting new (and younger!) audiences to your cause?  This interactive workshop will demystify the blogosphere, explain why blogging is central to one’s digital platform these days, and teach you how to start a blog of your own.

The workshop will be offered as part of the National Council for Research on Women’s Annual Conference.  More info on all that right here.

Know anyone who’d be right for this?!  My latest venture… Thanks for passing it on!

SUMMER INTERN POSITION
She Reads / She Writes, an emerging women-owned, online-based start-up, seeks tech-savvy MBA student or recent MBA graduate to begin work 10 hours/week.  Excellent opportunity to acquire hands-on experience in early-stage entrepreneurship, working closely with creative, energetic team of author/entrepreneurs to create preparatory materials for angel investors.  Position begins in June 2009 and continues through August 2009, with the possibility of expanding into Fall.  Internship is unpaid, however intern may be asked to continue with the Company after formal internship period ends.

Company description:
She Reads / She Writes is a young company seeking to create an online destination for literary women.  Created by writers, the site will offer a new way for women readers and writers to form communities, read, write and share content, and lead the way in creating a new paradigm for publishing in a Web 3.0 world.

Traditional publishing houses can no longer afford to promote and support authors as they once did.  Web 2.0 has resulted in an abundance of content and a lack of oversight.  The result is a new Wild West, in which readers sort through millions of voices to find writing worth reading, and writers are isolated, self-funded solopreneurs.

She Reads / She Writes will leverage the existing power of women readers and writers as both producers and consumers of books to create a portal for literary women, one where quality writers are supported and hungry readers receive guided access to the literary content they seek.   Through curated content, social networking, and the latest in content delivery vehicles, readers will receive personal recommendations, access to authors, community, guidance for book groups, and content they can read in forms that fit their lifestyles.  Writers, in turn, will receive networking with peers, services and support (such as instruction in new media forms), classes and coaching on topics related to their craft, and access to readers.

The social networking aspect of the site is in private beta; launch expected in January 2010.

Kamy Wicoff, Founder and CEO, runs a literary salon for women writers in New York City.  She is currently working with Deborah Siegel, author, blogger and principal at Girl w/Pen Consulting, to launch the Company.

She Reads / She Writes operates out of New York City.

Responsibilities will include:

•    Market research assistance
•    Business plan development
•    Financial modeling
•    Assistance in preparing presentations for angel investors
•    Tech support

Qualifications:

•    Strong analytical skills, with prior finance experience (coursework, professional, or proven interest) preferred
•    Knowledge of research tools and methods used to evaluate competing markets; financial modeling and presentation skills
•    Entourage, Apps, Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking expertise
•    Mac proficiency, Excel, Powerpoint
•    Detail-oriented and strong organization skills

Perks:

•    A unique apprenticeship in early-stage entrepreneurship
•    Opportunity to work side-by-side with top management
•    Experience completing business plan
•    Networking with prominent women writers and introduction to the world of publishing

Application information:

Please send a cover letter and resume to Kamy Wicoff (kwicoff@yahoo.com) by June 8, 2009.  While She Reads / She Writes is a for-profit company, the team believes strongly in the mission of helping women writers succeed.  We are looking to work with individuals who share this passion.

It’s been a quiet-ish week over here at GWP as we’re all recovering from the long weekend. Plus, these twins inside me have been kicking my ass and I’ve been falling behind on this and that here and there–forgive me!  But I wanted to let you know where I’ll be, just in case you’ll be there too:

Friday – Woodhull Nonfiction Writing Retreat
Saturday – Princeton Alumni Weekend, with my intergenerational feminist “Women, Girls, and Ladies” panel

(You can catch the WGLs next at the Brooklyn Museum on June 20 for a special Father’s Day weekend appearance, on the subject of “Dads, Dudes, and Doing It.” More on that soon..)

Have a good rest of the week, everyone!

A post Marco wrote the other week over at Open Salon got primo real estate on the front page of Salon, but I’m just getting to it now.  In his May 7 post, “The Objectification of Emma Watson,” Marco takes issue with the sexification of the actress who plays Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter movies.  He writes:

Over and over the ritual is reenacted: Lisa Bonet, Drew Barrymore, Alyssa Milano, Scarlett Johansson. Early raves for a child’s or precociously young actor’s emotional range or resonance, then the steady drumbeat of questionable roles and/or increasingly suggestive magazine covers. Occasionally an actor navigates her sexuality with depth and an almost tactical creativity, as did Christina Ricci; she made smart choices so that her sexualized image always functioned as a shorthand for her unusual and challenging roles. But more typically, an uncompromising talent (i.e. Parker Posey) will fall by the wayside to be appreciated by ever smaller audiences for her efforts if she doesn’t “fall into line.”

It’s not too late for Watson, though. Interview is offbeat enough to be a blip in an actor’s career, and this issue is early enough in the season to be a vague memory by the time the next Potter is released. But the choices she makes now and in the immediate wake of the Potter series may very well determine whether she will be ultimately be known for her body of work, or just, well, her (toned/decrepit/buffed/doubled/ Photoshopped/objectified) body.

Nicely put, dude.

Was Wall Street’s crash due, in part, to an overload of testosterone?

More and more, people are saying YES.  And on Tuesday, The Financial Times connected the dots and called for 30% women on all corporate boards.  Says the FT, “If there is ever a time for women to make a decisive breakthrough in corporate boardrooms, it is surely now. Many boards, especially in financial services, are in flux after the testosterone-fueled excesses that led to financial disaster. There is a desperate need to rebuild trust, more easily achieved if boards better reflect customers and the public.”

On June 24 over at Bloomberg here in NYC, the National Council for Research on Women will be launching a new piece of research looking at reasons and solutions for why there are so few women managing money.  The report (which I’ve seen, and believe me, it’s GOOD) puts the issue in a broader context to look at on the lack of women in positions of leadership and power at financial services firms more generally.  (Read more about the forthcoming paper–which Purse Pundit is at the center of–here.)

Testosterone may have been just one cause among many for the massive failures wrought by the financial industry.  But is sure is nice to see this issue getting some serious play.

The one, the only Daphne Uviller (who coedited Only Child with me) had a great piece in yesterday’s City Section of the NYTimes — part of the series “Her Tales of the City”.  Daph’s essay is a great lead in to her latest book, a novel called Super in the City, which came out a few months ago.  Do check it out: “The Boiler that Broke Her Heart.”

(YOU GO, COED!)

I’ll be teaching next at Woodhull’s Raise Your Voice: Non-fiction Writers’ Retreat.  If you haven’t been to one of these and have wanted to, here’s your next chance!

WHEN: Friday, May 29 at 12:00pm – Sunday, May 31 at 6:00pm
WHERE: Ancramdale, NY

WHAT I’M TEACHING THERE (the third person description):

How to write a book proposal: In this module, instructor Deborah Siegel will teach the group how to take a subject about which they are passionate and generate from it an exciting, marketable, serious non-fiction book proposal. She will cover the proposal itself, the chapter outline, the bio, and the marketing section. (This module, like the op-ed and the feature article, simply expand and develop the core skills of the outline section). Deborah will then walk the participants through the cycle of submission to an agent; the agent’s submission of the proposal to multiple houses; the bidding process; the signing of the contract; the writing cycle; the editing and copy editing and fact checking cycle; the publishing cycle and the publicity phase of the hardback non-fiction book. She will show participants what the common mistakes are that writers make in crafting book proposals and will demonstrate the difference between an unpublishable and a highly commercial book proposal both of which are based on an identical subject.

To see more details and sign up, click here, or follow the Facebook link:http://www.facebook.com/n/?event.php&eid=76369983156&mid=77cad7G1e120b00G1ae0659G7

Is the recession upping the ante on birth control and/or abortion?  Two writers in my authors group ask the question this week.  Check out Lauren Sandler over at The Big Money: No Way Baby – Are Market Forces the Ultimate Contraception? And Annie Murphy Paul over at Double X: Is the Recession Causing More Abortions?

And then, there are those, like (ahem) me, going entirely the other direction…

I wrote about being preggers with twins!

Why do some men support gender diversity in leadership while others REALLY DON’T? Catalyst asks this question through a new body of research evaluating men’s involvement with gender diversity in a report released today titled, Engaging Men In Gender Initiatives: What Change Agents Need To Know. The study tells us a lot about men’s advocacy for gender equality at work.

Straight from the release:

Bringing men into the conversation of diversity is in a company’s best interest and is paramount to creating equality in business leadership. “The preponderance of men in leadership means their efforts are necessary to advance change in the workplace,” said Ilene H. Lang, President & CEO of Catalyst. “Research continues to show that diversity well-managed yields more innovation and is tied to enhanced financial performance − factors good for all employees.”

When asked about what keeps men from supporting gender initiatives, some men who were interviewed for the study pointed to a “zero-sum” mentality – a belief that gains for women necessarily mean losses for men. Companies may inadvertently encourage this line of thinking by instituting practices that increase competition between employees and put the focus on the individual first above the organization as a whole. A shift away from this “win or lose” mentality to a recognition that everybody benefits from gender equality can lead men to become greater advocates of change.

What are some characteristics that make men advocates for gender equality? The report finds that men who are seen as champions of diversity have a strong sense of fairness. Men who were committed to the ideal of fairness were found to have more personal concerns about issues of equality in general and were more aware of gender bias in the workplace and likely to take action.

Men identified as taking action on gender diversity indicated factors that may work as roadblocks to becoming champions of equality. These obstacles included two barriers to men’s engagement: fear of losing status or of being seen as part of the problem, and apathy – a sense that issues of gender do not concern men. Organizations can take steps to help remove these barriers and engage men in initiatives to promote gender equality by appealing to men’s sense of fairness, providing men with women mentors, exposing men to male leaders who champion inclusion, and inviting men into the discussion through male-only and male/female groups. In addition, research shows that men gain significant personal benefits such as better health, freedom to be themselves, and the ability to share financial responsibilities with a spouse or partner when working in a place free of gender bias.

Amen to all that, I say.  You can download a pdf version of study here.