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💁🏻♀️ who's glad Summer is over?
In awe of these women making waves and building wealth 🚀
Rebecca Leppard
August 31, 2023
🔥Welcome to episode 13 of The Upgrading Women Newsletter
I’m your editor, Rebecca Leppard, a feminist and communications nerd who’s not immune to having the flu AND her period in the same week.
Yeah, this Barbie had to skip last week’s newsletter due to her paracetamol-induced extended naps. 🌸
And a LOT of things happened that week, too, which set me me an emotional rollercoaster! From Spanish women winning the World Cup 💃🏽 to a Spanish dude exhibiting toxic masculinity 🤮 for the entire world to see.
Then our girl Mary Earps was vindicated twice!
🧤crowned with Golden Glove
🥇fans taking her shirt replica to market (this is after Nike refused to sell the official merchandise citing that goalkeepers aren’t popular enough 🙄)
You see, when women band together, we make sh*t happen.
Enjoy this episode, ladies. There’s so much to talk about! 👏
What happened recently:
Rihanna launches maternity bra line, naturally!
I have worn out dozens of maternity bras over 10 years and honestly there’s nothing special with Riri’s bras other than it’s HER. It’s the mogul herself making breastfeeding not only normal but sweet and savage at the same time! Rihanna is rebranding motherhood 🎤
Photo from BadGalRiri’s Instagram page
Simone Biles is back!
She had a two-year mental health break and came back victorious. The Guardian reported that the seven-time Olympic medalist has been hailed as the greatest gymnast ever, inspiring a popstar-like devotion from her fans who packed a hockey arena over the weekend for the US nationals. If your workplace does not support your mental health break, forward this to your HR department 💤.
Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Associated Press
This 93-year-old broke the record as the oldest woman to finish a marathon
And she only became a runner when she was 46! Okay, I still have time 🐷
Photo of Mathea Allansmith by Lauren Allansmith
Sierra Leone will have the largest female representation ever
VOA Africa’s Senanu Tord reported that the country will have 41 female lawmakers, which is more than double that of the last election. And this is only the beginning because they still have not met the new 30% female leadership quota. Imagine that. 🌤
Photo: Tolu J. Bade/Trócaire
Pictured above are Isata Sesay, Hawa Dumbuya and Menunata Nallo from Kambia District in Sierra Leone who are running for political positions in the June 2023 election.
There are many barriers for women such as deeply embedded gender norms, lack of funding and an exclusion from political spaces.
Our biggest barrier in politics is the men.
🔴 VOTE FOR 👏 HER 📣
Update from around the world:
The first Palestinian World Cup referee is a woman 🧕🏾and her name is Heba Saadieh
Follow her journey here.
Photo from Heba Saadieh’s Instagram page
Adidas, please cut the cake not wages!
Isn’t it infuriating when you see a brand that sponsors the Women’s World Cup while the women who produce their product are not being treated equitably?
On Adidas’s anniversary last week, the Indonesian shoe workers union sent the company a cake pleading for it not to cut their wages. As reported by the Clean Clothes Campaign, workers at the Panarub factory in Indonesia have been fighting Adidas’s “wage theft” for more than 11 years.
🚨 In 2012, when 2,000 mostly women workers went on strike to protest wages below the legal minimum, management responded by dismissing 1,300 workers. More than a decade later, 327 workers still haven’t received any of their legally owed severance. 😡
🚨 In 2016, the ILO Committee on Freedom of Association declared that the dismissals were a violation of workers' rights of freedom of association. Adidas had sourced goods from the Panarub Group and failed to take adequate action to prevent or mitigate the workers' rights violations. 😡
🚨 The Panarub case is not an exception. Go to adidassteals.com to learn more about adidas theft worldwide and see how you can take action! 😡
Photo from Instagram page of SerikatPerbuPasGSBI (Shoe Worker Union Indonesia)
A message from a communications nerd:
Bloopers are everyone’s favourite.
Non-profit campaigners take note! In the world that strives for perfection, being ridiculously messy can be a great strategy.
This is the idea behind the opening of The Restaurant of Mistaken Orders in Tokyo, Japan. It was founded as a way to raise awareness and celebrate the quirks of living with dementia. So its servers all have dementia and of course will botch your order. Even though 37% of the orders are delivered wrong, 99% of customers are happy, the restaurant says.
BTW: if you want a group of marketers who keep their ears to the ground for out of the box ideas like that, you’re welcome to get in touch with us.
💰 A woman AND a business owner?
Apply to the Xero Beautiful Business Fund!
The Xero Beautiful Business Fund offers more than NZ$750,000 in funding to Xero small business customers in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, South Africa, the UK, and the US. There are four categories in seven countries and no limit on how many you can enter ✅ If you think you qualify for each, go all out.
🚀 Innovating for sustainability
🚀 Trailblazing with technology
🚀 Strengthening community connection
🚀 Upskilling for the future
Stop wasting time 🙅🏾♀️
You know that marketing budgets are ALWAYS the first ones to go during a recession, yet the pressure to increase revenue is never reduced.
BUT here’s one thing you can do within your control: save time!
One of the most mind-numbing time-sucks is back-and-forth emails trying to find a suitable meeting time that works for you and your prospects.
Just use TidyCal (top tip: get 80% off for a lifetime subscription). You can simply share a booking link with them with favourable timings AND you can automate reminders, pre-meeting messages and post-meeting follow-ups.
Did you find that useful?
💜 Girl Brand is where you get more tools info like the above, PLUS
🙋♀️ Daily post inspiration and engagement
🙋♀️ Best-practice insights from our chief strategist
🙋♀️ Regular live, global co-working sessions (remote working can be lonely!)
📣 Founding Members pay £47 (or $57) once for a lifetime subscription, while club members pay monthly. Save a sh*tload of money by joining the waitlist for a limited-seat Founding Membership today!
If you’re on the fence, just taste this delicious freebie of THREE months of carousel template for your LinkedIn. Is it re-purposable for TikTok and Instagram sliders too? 🤌🏾 Yes of course: who has the time to reinvent the wheel!
Click the image above to get the file
How she’s done it 💅🏿
She’s 53 and a mother of three.
She is one of Forbes’ 2014 Power Women.
She was born in Tanzania to an Indian Sikh couple.
She slays throughout her career in Merrill Lynch, Amazon and Google.
She has been a multi-exit tech founder.
She is Xero’s new CEO in 2023.
Her name is Sukhinder Singh Cassidy.
🔥 That is why we need to listen to that fire in our belly.
🥇 That is why it’s never too old, too late, too anything really.
🎬 Do what you are called to do!
Inspect her 📲 gadget
Something to add to your tech stack: FutureMe.
Call me old but I always love the question “what would you tell your younger self?” 👑 This site was suggested by one of my hype women (you need plenty of these in your life!) and I suggested my team at Upgrading Women to do it too. Now it’s your turn ⚡️
What to enjoy next week
📕 Brazen by Julia Haart
Another inspiring memoir of a beautiful badass boss who started late in life. She was relatively undereducated, locked in an ultra-orthodox community and trapped in an unhappy marriage with four children before gaining financial freedom that led to actual freedom at the age of 42. 👏
🎙 Women at Work by Harvard Business Review
It does what it says on the tin 🥫
🍿 The Good Fight by Michelle King
If you know The Good Wife? This is its spin off. If you don’t, the series stands on its own and is arguably better and more powerful and brave in its political views. It gives you drama and comedy. And you would not expect this series to be produced by the same person who did Alien, G.I. Jane, The Martian, my personal favourite: Sir Ridley Scott.
🎪 I am celebrating my 40th birthday by hanging out with my marketing community. I’ll be speaking about leadership in agency life at the Business of Marketing Summit. Here’s my gift to you: free ticket for all.
That’s it. Thanks for reading.
Did you know that forwarding this newsletter to someone in your network to subscribe will add to your good Karma abundantly? 🤍