All posts by jtoh

The Struggle Inside: Lean In or Lean Back?

Before having children, I used to think that it would be no big deal to have both a career and a family. In other words, be a superwoman.

My mother did it, many of my friends’ mothers did it…and it felt like we owed it to our feminist elders to take on the torch and continue making progress towards equality in the career marketplace. Our partners would be more sensitive and involved in the raising of the family so the burden would be eased. Society would be fully supportive of working families and there would be many options for childcare available. I was going to make a big impact in the world, and I would happen to be a woman.

Then I had my kids.

Continue reading The Struggle Inside: Lean In or Lean Back?

The Summer of Jen – an update

When I shared the news of my leave of absence from Accenture back in March of this year, I envisioned that during my leave I would set out to accomplish goals in 5 general areas. Here they are verbatim:


  1. Career Calibration – I need to figure out where I want my career to go in the next 3-5 years, what I find fulfillment and enjoyment doing, and how to best accomplish this.
  2. Health – Physical and Mental – I’m going to sort out my exercise and sleep regime, spend as much time outdoors as I can this summer, *not* commute in the car an hour each way, and hang out with my family without having to worry about the daycare pickup time
  3. Learning and Creation – I will commit myself to publishing something at least once a month (let me know if you want in on the distribution – I promise not to post too many selfies of ). I’m also toying with the idea of teaching myself to develop an app in one of the mobile technologies. Also will devote time to actually watch some of those TED talks that I’ve bookmarked away.
  4. Community – I have neglected contributing back to my community in the last few years. I want to devote some of my time this leave to volunteer. If you know of any organizations looking for someone with my skills and enthusiasm I’d love to hear about it!
  5. Home affairs catchup – to address parts of my home life that have been neglected over the last few years, e.g. long-term financial plan, home decluttering and organization, buying drapes for the windows, actually doing some gardening

Continue reading The Summer of Jen – an update

So You Think You Can Blog? (In other words, why I started this blog.)

During this leave of absence from Accenture, I’ve had the blessing and the curse that is “free/unstructured time” between the time I drop my kids off at daycare/school and when I pick them up.

The blessing is that I’ve been able to make progress on several of the items I had on my list to do during this break. Yay me!

Continue reading So You Think You Can Blog? (In other words, why I started this blog.)

Hello world!

Well, I’ve finally gone and done it, and have launched this little vessel of a blog into the raging data streams of the interweb. Here’s hoping that this will be a positive learning experience for all of us! ~Jen

Hello world!

Well, I’ve finally gone and done it, and have launched this little vessel of a blog into the raging data streams of the interweb. Here’s hoping that this will be a positive learning experience for all of us! ~Jen