Wonder Women in Business Ally, Rich Bracken

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Rich Bracken

Rich Bracken is a keynote speaker, author and podcaster who focuses on emotional intelligence to help improve the personal and professional lives of everyone he interacts with. Through his lively presentations, television appearances and other content, he shares inspirational stories to help his audience realize their full potential.  

He’s had the privilege of speaking at numerous conferences across the country, has been handpicked and brought in by several Fortune 500 companies to speak to their executive teams, hosts the informative and uplifting EnRich Your Soul podcast, and frequently guest stars on various other podcasts. 

You can learn more about Rich and enjoy all his content at richbracken.com

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Rich Bracken

Connect with Rich

richbracken.com

LinkedIn

Instagram - @richbracken1

Twitter - @richbracken1 



Wonder Woman in Business, Suzanne Brown

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Suzanne Brown

CEO, Mompowerment

Suzanne Brown is a strategic marketing and business consultant and work-life balance speaker, strategist, and award-winning author. Tapping into her 20+ years of experience, she helps entrepreneurs and large companies overcome their strategic marketing challenges. And Suzanne empowers working moms and companies to think differently about balance and take action, using her own experience and research as well as tips, insights, and advice from interviews with more than 110 working moms. Find out more about her strategic marketing services at www.oksuzi.com and her work-life balance books and services at www.mompowerment.com. Suzanne and her family live in Austin, TX. 

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Mompowerment: Insights from Professional Part-Time Working Moms Who Balance Career and Family

When moms consider their career options, they traditionally consider working full-time or stay-at-home. What about the huge area in between? How can you be the mom you want to be without walking away from your career and all you’ve worked so hard for? What if you could work part-time, continuing down your professional path, and actually spend quality time with family? Suzanne Brown interviewed more than 110 professional part-time working moms as research for her book, Mompowerment: Insights from Successful Professional Part-time Working Moms Who Balance Career and Family. She shares their stories, advice, and insights to:

• empower you to think differently about career and work-life balance

• provide a guide for transitioning your career model

By the end of this book, you’ll be able to see if the professional part-time option is right for you, think through mindset shifts, make changes at home and at work, and set yourself up for success in your new career approach. This book will help moms who are interested in transitioning to this new career approach or those who have recently made the transition.

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Mompowerment: Insights from Successful Professional Part-Time Working Moms Who Balance Career and Family

You had a picture in your mind of what work-life balance would look like before you had kids, but real life is not quite what you imagined. What if you could be more efficient with the things you must do so that you have more time to do what you want to do?

In The Mompowerment Guide to Work-life Balance: Insights from Working Moms on Balancing Career and Family, Suzanne Brown shares her own experience and thoughts combined with detailed research and tips, insights, and advice from more than 110 other professional working moms to help you:
•shift from feeling overwhelmed to more in control
•become more intentional and efficient with your time at work and at home
•overcome challenges in your work-life balance

Whether you’re a new mom or you’ve been at it for a while, after reading this book you’ll have practical ideas you can implement or adjust to fit your needs. And you’ll feel more empowered to create the work-life balance you crave.

Suzanne Brown



Wonder Woman in Business, Catherine Lew

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Catherine Lew

Co-Founder & Principal Consultant

THE LEW EDWARDS GROUP


 CATHERINE LEW 

Co-Founder & Principal Consultant 

The Lew Edwards Group 

With over three decades of experience in community organizing and politics, Catherine Lew is known as one of California's most successful advocates for local government and women running for office. A first-generation California native, she was raised in the Salinas Valley by parents who immigrated to this country to seek a better life. 

A California attorney and veteran of over 700 political campaigns, Catherine was a 10-year trainer for EMERGE – an organization working to elect more Democratic women to office. She has worked on behalf of political clients who include Congresswoman Barbara Lee, the California Democratic Party, California Teachers Association, California Nurses Association, children's organizations, Sierra Club, and scores of local elected women. She was Deputy Political Director of the Northern California Clinton-Gore campaign in 1992. 

Catherine’s firm --The Lew Edwards Group—is a nationally recognized, award-winning company founded 23 years ago. LEG has enacted $38.5 Billion in California revenue measures at a 95% win rate to repair classrooms and improve libraries, parks, and public hospitals consistent with the firm’s philosophy to empower voters to protect their local quality of lives. 

A graduate of UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco School of Law, Catherine and her spouse live in Oakland, California. When she is not busy during an election cycle, she can be found at a barn with her American Quarter Horse Dakota. 

Catherine Lew

Contact Catherine:

Email: catherine@lewedwardsgroup.com

Twitter:  @catherinevlew

FB/LI/Instagram:  Catherine Lew

URL:  www.lewedwardsgroup.com



Wonder Woman in Business, Susan Marchand

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Susan Marchand

Susan Miciotto Marchand was born in Louisiana, and grew up moving back and forth between LA and TX, landing in Baton Rouge in 1980. She is a 1988 LSU graduate, as well as a 1994 BR General School of Nursing graduate. After a 15 year nursing career, Susan became the Co-owner of a fitness studio called Yoglates, which combines Yoga, Pilates and calisthenics. The discipline of Yoglates has been in existence for 20 plus years, and Susan is very proud to be a co-owner of the only Yoglates studio in the region.

Susan is happily married to Matthew Marchand, her husband of 29 years, and is the mother of 3 near-adult daughters. Her family has always been her priority, and nursing and owning her own business have given her the flexibility to allow her to continue focusing on them throughout the years, while building careers that were important and essential to her.

Community involvement includes the support of many businesses and events in BR, such as the Bella Bowman Foundation supporting Comfort Care for families of children with pediatric cancers, food drives supporting the Baton Rouge Food Bank, and Companion Animal Alliance pet adoption yoga classes. Yoglates has donated thousands of dollars to local charities and events over the past 11 years.  

Susan’s proudest professional moments include obtaining an ASPAN certification during her time as an RN, which is a Post-Anesthesia RN certification.  She also enjoyed her time as a Surgical ICU nurse, and had many brilliant female mentors in nursing school and in her 15 year nursing career. As a business owner, her proudest professional moments include celebrating a 10 year anniversary in the current Yoglates location amidst a surplus of Boutique Fitness Studios in the Baton Rouge area. 

Similarly, Susan counts her business, Yoglates, being honored by LSU as a Top 100 Fastest Growing Tiger owned business in 2018, an incredible accomplishment. 

Susan Marchand

Connect with Susan

Website:

http://yoglates2.com

Facebook:

Yoglates II, Yoglates II Online Classes

Instagram:

@yoglates2

Susan is also a representative of Zyia Active Wear.



Wonder Woman in Business, Grace Futrell

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Grace Futrell

Grace Futrell grew up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and attended Louisiana State University. Following university she joined the Peace Corps and spent two and half years in Ukraine. After Peace Corps Grace began her employment with the federal government and now lives in Washington, DC with her wife and cat. 

Grace Futrell

Connect with Grace

 Photo blog from Ukraine: https://gracefutrell.blogspot.com

Instagram: @futrellgrace

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grace-f-2a677b77/



Wonder Woman in Business, Verni Howard

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Verni Howard

Verni Howard is a native of Shreveport, Louisiana and the daughter of Rev. and Mrs. C. F. Williams. She is a 1987 graduate of Caddo Magnet High School and furthered her studies at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. After earning a BS in Microbiology (1993) and a MPA (1997), Verni began the Commercial Banking Training program with SunTrust Bank in Atlanta, GA. After more than 18-years of corporate and non-profit banking experience including Regions Bank, Whitney Bank and JPMorgan Chase, Verni became the new Executive Director of Providence House in December of 2015. In addition to a stellar banking career, she has served on 15 major boards of directors across the country including East Baton Rouge Parish Redevelopment Authority Advisory Council, Cancer Services of Greater Baton Rouge (In-coming President), Volunteers of America (Baton Rouge), Volunteers in Public Schools (Treasurer and President), Boys and Girls Club, Catholic Charities (Baton Rouge) and Downtown Development District. In 2011 she was nominated for the Outstanding Women in Business Award by Cancer Services of Greater Baton Rouge and in 2012 received the Volunteer Activist Award from the Emerge Center, an honor bestowed upon twelve outstanding volunteers across the city of Baton Rouge. In 2015 she was recognized for her outstanding achievements and was honored with an African American Achievement Award.

Verni is a 2018 Virginia Shehee Influential Woman Award finalist and a 2018 Athena Award finalist. In 2017 Verni received the Blue Cross Blue Shield Angel Award from the Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation. She is a Paul Harris Fellow (Shreveport Rotary Club) and 2018 board member of the club. Verni is also a new member of the Louisiana 4-H Foundation’s board of director, Christus Highland Quality Committee, Choice Neighborhood Implementation Advisory Group, Bancorp South CRA Advisory Group and is an ex-officio member of the board of Providence House. Above all, she is committed to God, family and service to the community. Verni and her husband Don, have been married for 21-years. Together, they have the joy of parenting two fantastic children, Hannah Elizabeth (age 12) and Matthew Reed (age 9). She lives by the belief that we are our brother’s keeper.

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Verni Howard