3,2,1 iRelaunch

What are the 5 most important phases of your relaunch and how can you best break them down into actionable steps to ensure your success? Join iRelaunch Chair and Co-Founder Carol Fishman Cohen as Jill Kravetz, iRelaunch CEO talks to her about the foundation of the iRelaunch Return to Work Roadmap.

Join Carol and Oliver Schinkten, LinkedIn Staff Author, Business, Education & eLearning for this informative episode detailing how relaunchers can best use all that LinkedIn offers. Whether it’s learning how to portray yourself in your Profile, using LinkedIn Learning resources to build your confidence and skills, expanding your networking opportunities, or maximizing the Newsfeed, Oliver and Carol explain how LinkedIn can help you send the message you want potential employers to see.

If you’ve ever considered relaunching in a new career but feel discouraged by the lengthy training and interviewing path ahead, you’ll find this podcast with Diane Lindsey-Adler inspiring. A successful marketing professional with Revlon, Diane took a 7-year career break to raise her children. The serious food allergies her second child suffered with led Diane to independently study nutrition and how it affects the body. With the encouragement of her husband and friends, Diane turned her love and dedication to help her daughter into a successful new career path she loves.

Recently retired from her position as Special Advisor on Gender Diversity for the Certified Financial Planner Board, Eleanor Blayney, a long-time advocate for women in financial planning, speaks with Carol about the role of Certified Financial Planners in providing 360-degree guidance in personal financial management. She and Carol discuss the “Financial Planner Re-entry Initiative,” a program developed by The CFP Board Center for Financial Planning in partnership with iRelaunch, that connects firms in the financial planning sector with experienced professionals seeking to reenter the workforce after a career break by establishing return-to-work internships. https://www.cfp.net/career-center/resources-for-job-seekers/financial-planner-reentry-initiative Tune in to hear how relaunchers can be particularly attractive candidates in this professional re-entry opportunity.

In this episode, Carol speaks with Pat Hedley, author of “Meet 100 People: A How-to Guide to the Career and Life Edge Everyone's Missing.” https://www.amazon.com/Meet-100-People-How-Everyones/dp/0998651508 A relauncher herself, Pat shares specific tips about the importance of being proactive and consistent about networking and how you can become more successful with a request for help. Inspired to write “Meet 100 People” when a relauncher friend credited Pat’s advice to reinvigorating her network and landing the job, this episode includes exact language on how to ask for help, guidance about using vulnerability to your advantage, and the single most important thing you can do to maintain the support of your contact.

Maureen Byrne, a Product Manager at MobileIron, relaunched after a 10-year career break raising her three children. Despite stellar credentials including a master’s degree in software engineering, work experience in the field prior to her career break, website development during her break, iOS development classes at Stanford, and Toastmasters training, Maureen candidly describes her initial return to work as a time filled with self-doubt and “fear of exposure.” Hear how Maureen learned to appreciate the perspective she gained from her career break, how it became a part of what she brings to the table as an employee, and how she “found her voice” after relaunching.

How can relaunchers ensure they are making the best impression while networking, at a professional conference, and even in an interview? Today’s guest, Julie Holunga, executive coach and founder of Chinook Executive Solutions, http://chinookexecutivesolutions.com/, asserts that relaunchers should be deliberate about the words they use – presenting themselves with confidence and thereby projecting confidence about themselves onto others. Noting mirror-neuron studies that suggest that our body language and vocabulary have a mirror effect on those with whom we interact, Julie provides numerous examples of weak vocabulary and replacement words that will help employers focus on what you are, not what you’re not.

In this special episode, Carol speaks with LinkedIn Instructor Oliver Schinkten. Author of more than 35 LinkedIn courses, Oliver remarks on how relaunchers can most effectively use the LinkedIn “Summary” section, suggestions for using the “Headline” strategically, and listing volunteer work. Oliver will be a speaker at the upcoming iRelaunch Return to Work Conference with the Stanford Alumni Association, May 1, 2018 at Stanford University. Attendees will have the opportunity to learn more in his breakout session, “LinkedIn: Upgrade Your Profile and Your Skills.” For more information about the conference please visit https://www.irelaunch.com/viewconference/2459

In this empowering episode, Carol talks to Liza Caldwell, co-founder and director of SAS for Women, an organization that provides divorce support and coaching for women who are considering, in the process of, or recovering from divorce. “Divorced and happily single” herself, Liza discusses divorce topics including the timing of a return to work, reinforcing your values and enhancing your sense of self-worth, and the importance of information gathering as a first step in designing an educated divorce strategy with the greatest integrity.

How can women overcome their reluctance to let people know how talented they really are? What makes networking so hard, and what’s the simple way women can redefine this opportunity by using skills that come naturally? In this podcast, Wendy Sachs, author of "Fearless and Free: How Smart Women Pivot and Relaunch their Careers," speaks with Carol about how she turned to Silicon Valley to find out how relaunchers can develop a more entrepreneurial spirit when returning to their previous careers or pivoting into new ones. Wendy discusses embracing failure, networking, the difference between “branding and bragging” and how to maximize the effort you make in finding your next job.

Guest: Jill Kravetz, Special Projects Advisor to iRelaunch Are you intimidated by technologies that have come into prominence since you left the workplace? If so, you’re not alone. In this episode of 3, 2, 1, iRelaunch, Carol speaks with Jill Kravetz, special projects advisor to iRelaunch and our “go-to guru” on a variety of social media and technology questions. Jill shares the six tech tools of which everyone should have a basic understanding before starting a new job. She touches on social media, file sharing, team collaboration, personal productivity and advancement, company-specific tools, and ends with must-have workplace tools. ­­­By taking a small amount of time to understand these tools, you’ll return to work on a more equal footing with your peers.

Shelley Zalis built her career on a foundation of purpose and a passion for "driving change - and making the new, the new norm." In this episode, Carol speaks with Shelley about her pioneering work in migrating market research from a central location or telephone to the Internet, at a time when the medium was new and untested. Ten years later, Shelley sold that company, Online Testing Exchange (OTX) for $80 million. Her desire to "give back with generosity what I wish I had rising the ranks" then led her to create "The Female Quotient" and "The Girls' Lounge." Hear how Shelley is "committed to advancing equality in the workplace through collaboration, activating solutions for change and creating measurements for accountability" and how her passion and fearlessness can drive your return to work.

In this episode, Carol speaks with LeeAnn Dance, co-producer/director of “My Dear Children,” a documentary about one woman’s quest to learn more about her father’s past in Eastern Europe following World War I. A former CNN producer, LeeAnn took a 10-year career break and returned to work as a documentary film producer. LeeAnn explains her journey back to work including how her former career provided a foundation for her relaunch, her initial fear of learning new recording and editing technologies, doing some non-paid work to build her portfolio and a following, and finding a career that meets her and her family’s needs. LeeAnn also explains how the career break itself provided much-needed experience and perspective.

Carol talks with Jen Scott, Vice President of Strategic Partnerships for the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) and co-lead of the STEM Re-Entry Task Force. Since its inception in 2016 the STEM Re-entry Task Force has been a pipeline for more than 200 female technical professionals to return to the workforce. In this podcast, Carol and Jen discuss how the Task Force was initially conceived, its substantial growth over the past few years, how returning professionals can find out more about these programs, how to apply, and what to expect in these programs. Companies considering developing a re-entry internship will hear about how these internship programs are set up, the support from SWE and iRelaunch, and the nearly 90% average hiring rates after program completion.

We've compiled the best advice shared with us in interviews with business leaders, career experts and relaunchers over two seasons of podcasts. Enjoy! And thank you for listening.