Dreams for the New School Year – Choosing Persistence
August 5, 2024
I really love sports. Sports brings out the best in us. Teamwork, communication, dedication, persistence, and excellence become the norm when you play them. Dealing with failure and overcoming increasing challenges are just part of the experience. The valuable lessons that are taught stick with you over time, especially those related to choosing persistence. What a summer it has been for sporting events. For a sports lover like me, this summer has been a…
Read moreSeventy-Five Summers
July 3, 2024
Talk to anyone in my family, and they’ll tell you that I’m wild about the 4th of July. Not in a decorate the house in bunting kind of way, but in being part of the quintessential American Independence Day celebration. I have lots of options in my hometown since both Williamsburg and Yorktown, Virginia, hold huge fireworks displays attended by tens of thousands each year. One in the colonial capital and one on the…
Read moreIt’s Graduation Season
May 31, 2024
Summertime Feeling Throughout May and June, millions of students across the nation reach that major life milestone of graduation. Some are leaving school and moving on to other educational institutions; others are heading into the workforce. But, to a person, I can guarantee that they are nervous about their future. This is why this is such an emotional time for all these students and their families. I participated in this rite of passage this year…
Read moreLife Lessons from Leading Girl Scouts at NextGen Workshops in North Carolina
May 9, 2024
Setting the stage When Christina Williams-Debrew signed on to facilitate a new series of one-day workshops for young women, she went in with plenty of entrepreneurial mindset knowledge thanks to her certification as an Entrepreneurial Mindset Program facilitator. She was familiar with one of the organizers, NC IDEA, a private foundation committed to supporting North Carolinians in achieving their entrepreneurial ambitions to start and grow high-potential companies, but she had less background with the other,…
Read more“Withdrawal in disgust is not the same as apathy,” Or, Optimal Engagement in the Workplace
April 10, 2024
When I first heard Michael Stipe cry out that line from the R.E.M. song What’s the Frequency Kenneth? something about it stuck with me. And it still resonates with me today. I was relatively new to the workforce, and that one line said a lot about what I saw every day in my workplace. I was surrounded by incredibly bright, capable people who, on the surface, seemed at best apathetic. Were they really apathetic,…
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