What’s the NewNorma.com project?
Jayne Jennings & Valerie McDougall teamed up to start and fund the NewNorma.com project as part of their commitment to help other working women, particularly women entrepreneurs, attain life work balance.
Their first step was to conduct an international survey of women entrepreneurs on the topic of work life balance.
Achieving work life balance has been called one of the key challenges of our time for men, women and societies.[1] Volumes have been written about it since the 1980s when the term came into more general use. But most research has been for employees—not for business owners and entrepreneurs.
At the same time women in many countries are starting businesses at record rates. In the USA women owned companies with revenues of $1 million–plus and women owned businesses with more than 100 employees are growing at twice the rate of all companies.[2] Their reasons are often linked with the ‘balance’ they are seeking in their lives. Are they succeeding in this?
In one Australian study, twice as many self-employed women reported that work interfered with family/friends time and non-work activities compared with women who were employees.[3]
Valerie & Jayne’s next step was to produce the White Paper: Life Work Balance Strategies for Women Entrepreneurs & Business Owner.
This is available at no cost.
Why Is This About Women?
We firmly believe that achieving ‘life work balance’ is not only for women—and not only for women business owners. Like our views that the feminist movement meant men would be freer to have wider choices in their lives when women could make more choices, ‘life work balance’ is something we all need to bring to our relationships for more contented and fulfilled individuals, families and the children they nurture. As two women self-funding this project, we chose the niche we knew best.
What Came Next?
The third step was to become Champions of Life Work Balance. They saw that working women needed not only business help but assistance in other areas of their lives. What’s more, they needed to enjoy life without guilt!
So Jayne & Valerie enlisted the help of experts around the world and developed programs to help business mothers—the group shown as needing most help—save time and money and achieve life work balance. See www.GuiltFreeBusinessMothers.com.
Check out that website and get your copy of the White Paper at no charge.
[1] The Myth of Work-Life Balance: The Challenge of Our Time for Men, Women and Societies
Richenda Gambles, Suzan Lewis, Rhona Rapoport
[2] How She Does It. How Women Entrepreneurs are Changing the Rules of Business Success. Margaret Heffernan, 2007, USA
[3] Skinner, N., Pocock, B., & Williams, P. (February 2008). Work-life issues in Australia: what do we know? Paper presented at the 22nd AIRAANZ Conference ‘Workers, Corporations and Communities: Facing Choices for a Sustainable Future, Melbourne, Victoria.
