Working Mom Wednesday: her kind of perfect

This week I am really excited to announce that I’m launching a new campaign called Working Mom Wednesday {#workingmomwednesday}. Every week I’m going to interview a working mom who inspires me. I think women can learn so much by listening to one another. What works for her might motivate you! So let’s get started…

I first encountered Tammy McDonald on accident.

When I launched Femfessionals Kansas City last spring, I emailed a former work acquaintance of mine, the publisher of HERLIFE, and never heard back, unaware that the magazine was in the final stages of being bought out.

After a few weeks I got the sweetest reply from Tammy, the new owner, wanting to learn more about this new professional women’s group. A two hour meeting later, I left with a new board member for our community and a new friend.

Tammy is just the kind of positive, goal-oriented and honest woman I had in mind when we started Femfessionals. She is incredibly thoughtful {she surprised me with a bag of peanut butter balls when I had mentioned in passing it was the only thing that sounded good when I had morning sickness} and is a huge supported of women. {Duh. She owns HERLIFE…} Without further ado!

TFM: Self-promo time. Start by telling me about your business.

Tammy: I am the owner and publisher of HERLIFE Magazine. I purchased the Magazine in April of 2015. I run the corporate office in Overland Park and I have franchisees in California, Colorado, Idaho, New York, and Washington D.C. I am also an officer of my Dad’s company, Crystal Trenching, where I handle his day-to-day office operations on a part-time basis.

TFM: Sounds like you have a full plate! What is a typical day like for you?

Tammy: I wake up early to snuggles from my 3 and 6 year old boys. My husband and I get them ready and off to school, I head to my HERLIFE office, or my dad’s office once a week, and have meetings, conference calls, and stay super busy. Usually home around 4:30/5 and Trey and I do homework and dinner with the kids. We get the kids in bed and I usually hit the computer again!

TFM: I do the same! Sometimes it feels like the emails never stop. At least you have the morning snuggles to look forward to 🙂 If you weren’t the publisher of HERLIFE, what would you be doing?

Tammy: I would like to say I would be a full-time mom and volunteer at the kids’ school, but I like to work so I would probably start a new company.

TFM: Another business, huh? Sounds like you’re a true entrepreneur! What is the best part of being a business owner?

Tammy: I like making my own schedule and when I need or want to be home for something the kids have going on, I can. I also like having a staff that I can motivate and lead on a daily basis. Strange, but I like the stress and craziness…the busier I am, the better I am at work and at home.

TFM: It forces you to stay on top of everything! Surely you’ve dropped the ball either at work or home though. Tell me about a time you failed or really messed up.

Tammy: I can’t remember a time I failed. I am saying this because I never view anything as a failure, but as an opportunity to learn or grow. Don’t get me wrong, I make screw-ups all the time or mistakes, but they happen. You learn from them and move on.

TFM: That’s a great way to look at.

Tammy: I just look at it as everything happens for a reason, whether I know the reason when it happens or not. I use every failure and spin it into something positive. When I fall off the horse, I wipe myself off and get back on!

TFM: They say it takes a village to raise a child. Who helps you with your kiddos?

Tammy: My Village does. We use my cousin, Molly, as our Nanny for after school and any night or evening. We also use my Aunt, Molly’s mom, sometimes they work together. I also have all of my family within 15 minutes, so my parents and grandparents are always there to help. We have been so fortunate to have family close by, but also some sitters…no, I will not give you their numbers 🙂

TFM: What is your favorite part about being a mom?

Tammy: The look I get from my boys…the “I love you no matter what, even when you don’t have make-up on”. No matter what, I can always grab a hug, a kiss, or a giggle.

TFM: Speaking of no makeup, what one product or service do you love so much you could be a brand ambassador?

Tammy: The Halo Laser found at Aestheticare. It did wonders for my complexion and the overall appearance of my face.

TFM: No makeup needed! back to your boys. Have you ever missed a moment in your child’s life that you regret because of work?

Tammy: I have missed some, but I don’t regret it. That’s not to say I wasn’t sad that I missed that moment. I let my mom take Quade, our oldest, to get his first haircut. I don’t regret moments like this because I view them as getting to share them with someone else. She watched Quade so much the first 3 years of his life, that I wanted her to enjoy and cherish some of his firsts.

TFM: That’s a great outlook on it. You’re sharing these moments, not missing them! If your kids take away one thing from you running a business, what do you think that would be?

Tammy: When you own your own business, you need to be there working it with your team, or employees. Something I learned from my dad. He owns a construction company and could run it from the office and stay clean, dry and warm. Instead, he is out there digging and working as hard, if not harder, than his crews.

TFM: And hard work pays off. What’s your best piece of advice for other working moms?

Tammy: Find balance. I struggled with that for a while. I’ve learned to put down the phone and computer from the time I get home until after they go to bed, sometimes things come up. They get my undivided attention for only a short time when they’re not in school or with a sitter, that they need that and I love giving it to them.

TFM: What keeps you sane?

Tammy: My husband. He has a way of bringing me back down before I explode. My dad, he has a way of putting things in perspective. My mom, she lets me call to vent, cry, or laugh anytime I need her.

TFM: Last question…my tagline is “a working mom’s quest to having it all.” Do you think you have it all?

Tammy: I just featured Jaycee Waters on the January cover of HERLIFE and she has a blog, kindofperfect, and that is what I have…I have my kind of perfect, not yours or anyone else’s, but it is mine. I do have it all, but I think we always want more and I am finding that balance of do I really want more? I think I have it all, but not because it is all right now, but it has been something I have had, learned from, or I have within my means to reach. It is all there somewhere. It is how we use it, see it or achieve it.

Thanks, Tammy!

Be sure to check out HERLIFE magazine and see you here next Wednesday for another #workingmomwednesday.

Want to be interviewed for #workingmomwednesday? Contact me to find out how.

January 5, 2016February 21, 2016

50 things I learned from my coworkers

Today you headed back to the office after a two week hiatus for the holidays. I’m guessing you were dragging a little and maybe even apprehensive about having to show up and be productive after such a relaxing break. One thing I am sure of is that your motivation to get out of bed this morning was that you got to reunite with one another. So while today I officially hang my virtual “open for business” sign and stamp “entrepreneur” on my LinkedIn profile, I spent most of the day thinking about how much I’m going to miss you.

I’d been at my job for nearly five years. Some of my you were there before I arrived and others started just six months ago. All of you made your marks on my life and I am incredibly grateful. And lucky. I know from previous jobs that your coworkers can make or break your work life. Not only did you give me a reason to come to work every day, but we actually wanted to hang out even more after we’d already punched the clock. It didn’t take long for you to become so much more than colleagues

It sounds like a line from a cheesy movie, but I learned a lot about who I want to be because of you. I won’t always recall every painfully useless meeting we endured together {most of them}, or every inside joke we came up with {swoop and poop, HOP, Mean Girls, and on and on and on}, but I will always remember the things you taught me about being a good coworker, friend, mother and wife. Here are my top 50:

Collaborate as often as possible
Brainstorming sessions will improve the quality of your work
Delegate when you can
Ask for help
Show appreciation
Don’t take credit for something you didn’t do
Handwritten notes have not gone out of style
Family comes before work always
Take time off when you can
Let the little things go
Pick and choose wisely what colleagues you decide to become Facebook friends with
Apologies go a long way
Change happens
No one has done everything
Think twice before you hit “reply all”
Be on time
Vacations are time well spent re-energizing
Don’t leave a meeting without a plan of action
You’re never too old to learn something new
Sometimes you need to pick up the phone
You don’t have to like everyone
Not everyone is going to like you
Hair lice can keep coming back if the mother ship doesn’t get exterminated
Always go to the funeral
Be fiercely loyal to those you care about
Teen boys smell really bad after dancing
Know when to voice your opinion
Know when to be quiet
We wear pink on Wednesdays
Holding a grudge is unattractive
When you build a website, you will dream in code
Make fake award certificates for yourself if it motivates you
Random gifts can brighten someone’s day
Bring food to the office for any reason or no reason at all
If you have the opportunity to drink a purple cocktail made with champagne, just ask for the champagne
Own up to your mistakes
Win graciously
Lose graciously
Sometimes you just need to ugly cry and be hugged
Takeout Chinese food for lunch can turn a day around
Don’t keep your basement refrigerator stocked with liquor if there are teenagers in the house unless it has a lock
Traditional white lights aren’t the only way to decorate for Christmas
Some people are cold literally all the time
Those people travel with space heaters
If you say you’re going to do something, do it
People mellow with age
Don’t lie to your employer
You get out of it what you put into it…it being work, friendship, marriage, parenthood or anything else you decide to do
Mayo and sriracha sauce make a great dip
Distance makes the heart grow fonder

I know there are many more {and I hope you call me out on them}.

So while today I am enjoying the peace and quiet of my new home office and the comfort of my yoga pants, I know that some days it will feel more like loneliness. So, dear coworkers, my Mean Girls, I hope you weren’t quite done teaching me lessons yet, because you can expect to see me often.

I miss you already.

December 29, 2015February 11, 2018

Get more done by adopting this one habit

After a week at home for the holidays, my kiddos are finally out of the house. My coffee is hot. My desk is organized. The day is young. I finally sit down to work.

I know I need to write another blog post, but first I think I will open up Facebook and schedule a few social media posts I’ve planned for a few of my clients for the New Year.

Then my phone pings. Someone liked my most recent Insta post about working on my business goals and plans for the year. It’s so exciting to see new followers {strangers even!} finding about The Free Mama.

Back to Facebook. Okay, one post scheduled.

I better check my FemCity email. I haven’t checked it since before Christmas and I really need to finish my annual plan for our community. I fire off a few emails to business owners about some event ideas.

I return to the browser with my Facebook page open. I scroll through my news feed, just once, and an article called “21 Annoying Facebook Status Updates that Need to Stop” pops up. That looks interesting, and I definitely need to find out what those things are {to make sure I’m not an annoying Facebook status poster}, so I click on it.

I skim the article and go back to my news feed, fully confident that all of my friends totally are not annoyed with my posts. Cute pictures of my friend’s baby’s first Christmases rotate with puppies and snow and more click-worthy articles from Buzzfeed and the Huff Post.

And then I glance in the upper right corner and realize an hour has gone by already. And I haven’t even started this blog post yet.

I’m not much of a gambler, but I’m willing to bet some version of this has happened to you before. Our phones and computers have become major time sucks thanks in large part to social media. But it isn’t just mindless scrolling that can cause us to lose track of time and productivity. I didn’t have a plan. I sat down to accomplish one task, but immediately moved on to other things on my to-do list and then became distracted. While my email sending and social media managing still chipped away at my overall workload, I lost valuable time and creative energy bouncing between tasks. Not carving out specific time for particular projects prevents us from packing in a fully efficient work sesh. So what should I have done differently?

Start each day with not only a list of top work priorities, but a schedule for accomplishing them. This technique is called time blocking and it is a powerful tool that can truly help you get more done if you make it a habit. So how can you {we} become better at time blocking a get stuff done? Try these 4 tips to time block like a pro.

1. Block time to time block

You shouldn’t spend your freshest moments of a new day mapping out your time blocks, so plan them in advance. Carve out time on one of your least productive day, typically a Monday or Friday or even the weekend, to evaluate what you need to get done for the upcoming week. I use Google Calendar for everything, both work and personal, because it actually looks like little colorful blocks that can be shared with others so they know when you’re time blocking a.k.a unavailable.

2. The early block catches the worm

I’m a morning person. I’d say 80% of what I get done in a day happens before 1 p.m. Be sure to schedule your time blocks when you work your hardest so they don’t fizzle into a procrastination period. Just keep in mind that you should aim to get your highest priority work accomplished before you move on to things like meetings and emails. So if you’re a rare breed who perks up after lunch time, don’t over commit in the morning or meetings may intrude on your precious time block.

3. Tune out to block in

When it’s time to time block and you’re ready to dig in to that super top priority thing to do, eliminate distractions. No social media. No emails. No phone calls. No office visits. It’s go time.

4. Don’t over block

When you schedule out your time blocks, it’s important to keep windows in your day. Projects may come up that you weren’t anticipating and certain jobs make take longer to accomplish than you originally thought. No need to fret if you’ve left some holes in your day to work on these things, as well as catching up on any outstanding emails or phone calls {although I do recommend carving out an email time block if you receive a high volume of them}. Finish that important task before your time block was over?

Do you time block to reach maximum productivity during your work day and make sure important tasks get done first? What works or doesn’t work for you? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.

Happy time blocking!