Moms on a Mission: Getting Back to Work
It’s a group within the labor force that is slowly starting to gain recognition, but for all the wrong reasons. Ask yourself if you know a woman right now who took time off to be at home and raise her kids, but then went back into the workforce? If you know one of these women, then congratulations, because their numbers are small, and their story is troubling.
Currently, more than three million women with college or advanced degree are trying to reenter the workforce, and they are struggling. Why? A Harvard educated attorney with finance industry experience on her resume should be a slam dunk correct? Not so fast…
Jennifer Gefsky had it all, and at the top of her field, a lawyer and deputy counsel general for Major League Baseball. Her business card read “vice president” and her accomplishments incredible. After her second child was born she decided she couldn’t keep up the workload pace of the sports world, so she entered the mom world. Jennifer left the workforce, and she couldn’t get back in. Turns out, she wasn’t alone, as I discovered when I was doing research for my new book “The Comeback: How Today’s Moms Reenter the Workplace Successfully.”
Across this country, women with resumes just as impressive as hers, were being shut out of hiring pools, discarded by corporate America. She decided to pivot, and a business was born, Apres’ Group. After linking up with Nicole Kroll, a dietician from NYU who also left the workforce, the two decided to create a digital marketplace for women just like them.
Launched this month, the site is a network where companies can search the mom ranks for executive talent, and women can take the job search process one step further. With a dozen corporate partners, the two have been amazed by the reception from both companies and moms. The goal is to instill confidence in their members to reenter the workforce and provide them with a job market made just for them, and to create a community of corporate partners who are committed to hiring women making their return.
It’s a subject I explore at my website www.cherylcasone.com, and I was lucky enough to sit down with Jennifer to discuss the business further. One thing I’ve learned is that the vast majority of women who leave the workforce want to return at some point, and Jennifer and Nicole are leading the charge.