Today, there are many ways to give back to others. Some people enjoy focusing their charitable attention on children’s causes and others emphasize issues of poverty; a lesser known resource for charitable energy is to help women to achieve their professional goals and to help them to raise themselves up economically and professionally.
There are quite a few women’s organizations today that do just this. While offering financial contributions and donations to women in need, they also offer women the tools to create their own financial stability.
The National Association for Women Business Owners, for instance, formed the NAWBO Institute for Entrepreneurial Development in 2003. Donations offered to the Institute help them to develop programs and initiatives that will propel women entrepreneurs further along towards their success. This non-profit educational foundation, and an arm of the NAWBO, tries to strengthen the wealth creating capacity for women business owners and to help them to further their entrepreneurial goals.
Another organization, W.O.M.E.N. in America, has created a highly-regarded mentoring program to help women who are early in their careers to build leadership skills and to create an invaluable support network for their future achievement. Their three year mentorship program enables women to learn from the experience of others while reaching for their professional goals. In addition, after women complete the first two years of the three year program, W.O.M.E.N. in America emphasizes the idea of “Pay It Forward.” As W.O.M.E.N. in America explains, during the third year participants will “be invited at the end of the year to present updates on their “Pay It Forward” projects to the Board or at a Quad Cluster meeting.” At the end of their “Pay It Forward” year, mentees are then inducted into the W.O.M.E.N. in America Alumnae Network.
A third organization, Forte Foundation, is a collection of major corporations and top business schools that have come together to help direct talented women to become business leaders. Founded in 2001 to address the results of the landmark research study, “Women and the MGBA: Gateway to Opportunity,” they help women to gain a strong footing in the business world. They motivate young women to explore business as a career choice, increase women’s access to educational and business opportunities, support women financially in their business education pursuits, and support cutting-edge research on women and business. Forte Foundation depends on its many sponsors and collaborators which include business schools, corporations and nonprofit organizations to help today’s women to succeed in the business environment.
These three organizations, the NAWBO, W.O.M.E.N. in America and Forte Foundation, are a few examples of the many organizations out there that are helping women to achieve. As the expression goes, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” These organizations are, indeed, offering to teach women so that they will be able to feed themselves for a lifetime.