On February 1st, Shari Storm, a member of Rotary Club of Emerald City since 2006, addressed the Rotary Club of Nashua regarding her book, Motherhood is the New MBA: Using Your Parenting Skills to be a Better Boss. Shari spent 16 years as an executive at a credit union. She is now the CEO of a consulting company called Category 6. Her book, Motherhood is the New MBA: Using Your Parenting Skills to be a Better Boss, was published by St. Martin’s Press. With almost 20,000 copies sold, it has been translated and published in China and was purchased for publication in Brazil.
Shari speaks around the country on a variety of topics. You can also see her TEDx talk on her website, www.sharistorm.com. Shari grew up in sunny Kennewick and now lives in Edmonds, WA with her movie-making husband, three teenage daughters and a dog named Cedar.
The title of one of her books is, “Motherhood the New MBA”. Shari discussed how sports and the military metaphors should not be used to model your business practices. These concepts do not speak to women in business. Many of these metaphors lack compassion if modeled after military or sports examples.
She then talked about physical disruption while we are working in the “pandemic” era. Home rooms are small, children are disruptive and pets may also be a distraction. We are confronted by “unique” stressors. Many people say we are all in the same boat. Not so… we are all in the same storm. Everything that was up is now down and…. everything that was down is now up!
We must learn to celebrate our successes. Highlight Magazine was one of her best examples of how to celebrate employee success. Apple Computer also celebrated their employees’ success. An employee leaving an Apple Store for Junior College was given a grand sendoff by her fellow workers.
She also recommends we start new rituals for our employees. When this whole pandemic is over, she plans to ask employers, “how did you treat your employees during the pandemic?”