We’re looking forward to the three day weekend and we know you are too! Here is a great article on IBM’s thoughts towards this year’s Memorial Day weekend. They analyzed social media sites to come up with some interesting facts comparing 2011′s spending habits and travel plans for the holiday to 2012′s.

• 46% increase in conversations about Memorial Day traveling
• 65% increase in conversations about flying
• 13% increase in conversations about driving

We frequently talk about social media in the OYM offices and like to point out that people rarely put anything less than their best selves online for the world to view, which might skew some of the numbers. However, it’s still very interesting to see that the positive to negative ratio on gas price comments takes such a big jump from 2011 to 2012 (5 to 1 this year, 1 to 1 last year).

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ibm_media/7256966638/in/set-72157629872975326/

We recently asked them:

If you were running for office today, what two things would you focus on as your “political platform?”

These results support what we hear women say everyday – that they are most concerned about and focused on issues that have an immediate impact on their children and their household.

An invitation-only group of professionals and industry leaders gathered together last week for the Women in the Economy conference, arranged by the Wall Street Journal.  The goal of the conference was to create action strategies for the career advancement of women through “Executive Task Force” working groups. While some argue gender inequality is no longer an issue, the forum was constructed with the understanding that there is indeed a long way to go for equal opportunities and treatment in the workplace.

The resulting strategies assembled by the working groups are easily attainable by just about any organization, but require the ready cooperation of both company executives and their employees to achieve success. From these cohesive strategies, the three points of focus for a fairer work environment and more supportive advancement opportunities are sponsorships, accountability, and flexibility.

Sponsorships

Sponsorships (or mentors or advocates) for women are currently few and far between. As mentioned in The Journal Report article on the conference, only 17 CEOs of the Fortune 500 are female.  With so few female executives, women at lower levels within an organization rarely look to the executives of the company and see someone they can aspire to be. Consequently, many women lack the resources those with sponsorships or mentors experience, especially in the form of project and job recommendations and company navigation advice.

Executives, on the other hand, sometimes choose not to sponsor an employee within the company for fear of future competition. With this in mind, what the Executive Task Force recommends is companies encouraging sponsorships between leaders and employees that are at least two levels down from their own position.

Accountability

Accountability seems to be an obvious approach because it’s always been a golden rule of success. In this case, the Executive Task Force is charging female employees with holding themselves accountable for setting goals and more aggressively pursuing them, while the higher-ups must be accountable for establishing unbiased performance metrics and appropriately rewarding a job well done.

Flexibility

One of the bigger stumbling blocks along women’s path to advancement in the workplace is maternity. As women begin having children and prioritizing their families, the goals of the female professional, as well as the organization’s goals for her, can change. The lofty work-life balance is only attainable through flexible time management, both at home and at work. As such, the female professional and her company must be willing to step up to the plate to meet the demands of the family and the job.

For advancement, women must stay motivated and aggressive. To do so requires support from sponsors and flexibility from the company. But that’s not all – structures within the organization must also be in place to allow for women to rise. Executives must be accountable for unbiased assignments, reviews, and promotions. The professional success of women, as well as of the organization, is dependent on full participation.

As a viewer of AMC’s “Mad Men” and a lover of all things 1960s, I was ecstatic to read Jane Maas’ “Mad Women: the Other Side of Life on Madison Avenue in the Sixties and Beyond.” In the book, Maas talks about specific campaigns she was involved with as a copywriter in New York (most notably, the “I Love New York” tourism campaign) and tells the stories of the few other female peers she had. While she makes references to “Mad Men,” she focuses on three main topics: how females were viewed in the office, the never-ending full-time employee and mother battle, and the struggles of being a woman in the industry back then.

According to Maas, women usually entered an ad agency as a typist or a secretary, then slowly worked their way up (if they desired to). The senior men in the agency would often make their rounds through the female groups, as if the women of the office were their personal pool of available dates. This included just about everyone and anyone, regardless of marital status. Maas informs us of the “Three-Martini Lunch,” explaining that senior employees rarely returned to the office from lunch sober, creating an office full of sexual tension and flirting.

Maas opens “Mad Women” by walking through her daily routine of working on Madison Avenue and explaining her priorities as a full time working mother. She is clear when she says that her career came first, followed by her husband, then her children. She was able to live this way because of her “lifeline,” her nanny/housekeeper, Mabel. Maas did what was required of her to get ahead, even if that meant leaving her family behind and says later that she wouldn’t go back and change her priorities if she could. However, many other working mothers interviewed in the book discuss the revolving door of daily guilt around not being with their children when at the office, and not working when at home with their families.

In addition to the working mother conflict, Maas writes about other difficulties facing women in the 1960s working world. Females made half the wages of their male counterparts and were rarely given raises. Maas explains that when given the opportunity to begin actually writing copy, she had to do so on her own time, as not to interrupt her typing duties. This meant prioritizing her career even more, and spending less time with her family. In the final chapter of “Mad Women”, Maas questions whether or not women are equals in the modern workplace. While Maas believes women have come a long way, she also thinks that we “still have a long way to go.”

I saw The Hunger Games movie this past weekend and while I didn’t love the storyline or the movie as a whole, I did absolutely fall in love with one character: Katniss Everdeen.

It’s not every day that you see a film become such a big hit AND have a strong female lead, especially a movie that features so many violent scenes. There are plenty of war-themed movies about men fighting for what they believe (Gladiator, Braveheart, 300), but rarely do we see one about women. Not only did Katniss fulfill this role in a blockbuster film, but she went above and beyond as a tough young woman.

In addition to coming out of the Games alive, she made sure her family would be taken care of while she was away. While being strong enough to survive, she was able to remain true to herself and her values. She cared for other tributes during the games, most notably a younger participant and an injured one. To top it off, she wouldn’t give in to what The Capitol wanted and stood up for what she thought was important.

Too many of today’s female characters are too much like Bella – a damsel in distress – and not enough like Katniss – a headstrong heroine. Hopefully she will spark a trend and young female audiences will have more positive and powerful role models to look up to.

Two of the biggest teen series to hit the 21^st century are without a doubt Twilight and The Hunger Games. Their main characters, Bella Swan and Katniss Everdeen respectively, have since become role models, as well as household names, particularly with young tweens and teens. The problem we have, however, is that Bella does not represent the type of person young girls should aspire to be.

I read The Hunger Games series and the first two books of the Twilight Saga. Unlike Hunger Games, the reason I never got to the final two Twilight books was because I so strongly disagreed with codependent Bella being portrayed as a female heroine. Throughout the Twilight series, Bella goes through bouts of depression and nearly dies several times because of her love for vampire Edward, but ultimately survives due to Edward saving the day. Edward saves her by merely returning her affections when she’s depressed for weeks, and by actually protecting her against werewolves and other vampires. Bella, rather than prioritizing her health and well-being, becomes dependent on Edward for her happiness and, ultimately, her survival.

Bella’s character provides young teens with the impression that “love conquers all” when your only priority is being with that person. I would argue that your priority should be yourself by creating a well-balanced life, not a life that completely revolves around another person.

Strong courageous Katniss, on the other hand, I have no problem getting behind. Unlike Bella, Katniss prioritized the welfare of her family and her own survival, and pushed her romantic life aside until she had the capacity to deal with it. I believe Katniss proves to be the better role model for girls because she’s more emotionally balanced by not allowing the romantic attentions of young men to compromise her decision making.

***Because the OYM team is such a big fan of Katniss, there will be another post about her tomorrow – stay tuned!

Infographics are quickly becoming a preferred way to communicate data-rich ideas in a simple, visual way. A few weeks ago, the Business Insider released an interesting infographic entitled “The Purchasing Power of Women,” which came onto OYM’s radar through She-conomy, one of the several fact contributors. While some of the facts aren’t new, this image does a nice job of summing up a powerful idea – women are gaining serious ground in buying power.

It’s an uphill battle that we will fight for years to come, and isn’t even close to being won. It was mostly fought by women at first, but now men are jumping on the bandwagon as well. Moms. Models. Celebrities. People everywhere are starting to come out of the wood works to fight:

PHOTOSHOP.

It’s lovely to think that some of Hollywood’s biggest stars want us to see what they actually look like, rather than the photo editor’s Photoshop skills. Kate Winslet has been known to object retouching. Jamie Lee Curtis has even posed in her underwear sans makeup and photo manipulations!

A little eye whitening and skin brightening never hurt anybody, but I’ve seen magazine covers where the Hollywood starlet isn’t even recognizable as herself. Cinching waists down by inches and lengthening legs and arms happens all too often and is giving young women the wrong idea about body image, if you ask me. As if it’s not already difficult enough to be a young girl in today’s society, the women they see plastered all over magazines and advertisements have unreal proportions.

Faith Hill's Redbook cover and original image

Some people have even gone so far as to propose restrictions or a ban on Photoshop usage. The American Medical Association is reportedly urging advertisers to reduce the amount of photo editing to models in ads, as well as to choose “healthier” looking models. They have expressed fears about “portraying models with body types only attainable with the help of photo editing software.” Well put, AMA.

I don’t necessarily think that a ban on Photoshop is likely, so I think we need to change our perspectives on it. Instead of reading these magazines and buying these products, why don’t we teach our young girls that it’s far more important to be healthy than it is to look like these modified versions of women? We need to make sure that they are aware of how phony these photos are so they understand that it’s normal to have thighs that touch and average length legs. We need to make sure to protect their personal body image and remind them what “normal” is.

Here’s a link of funny Photoshop flubs to take your mind off of the above frustrations!

I forgot my cell phone charger when I was out on the road a few weeks ago, and I was struck by how much the idea of being without my phone bothered me. The phone has pretty much become an appendage, something I have with me at all times, especially when I’m traveling. I have an iPhone, and I love it. It’s a never ending pipeline of information, the ability to know things (and I like to know things). I joke that if I could have a superpower, it would be omniscience and my iPhone gets me pretty close – when I don’t know something, the iPhone usually does. It’s magical.
But it’s possible that, for me (and evidently for many other people), my phone has become too important. According to a recent survey in the UK by SecurEnvoy, two-thirds of that population suffers from nomophobia, or no mobile-phone phobia. Seriously. They’re calling it an addiction. And – more good news – women tend to be affected more than men.

In my case, I wonder what being so attached to my phone communicates to my 6-year-old son. I want him to feel listened to, that I’m present and available to him when we’re together (as much as I can being a working single mom). I wonder what he’s seeing when I check my phone, when I’m interacting with the world outside our little circle. He can’t see what I’m doing, but he must sometimes conclude that it has priority over him. The phone is literally in between him and me. What’s that about?

So, this addiction thing has been on my mind, and I’ve started an experiment that I call “wireless on the weekend.” I turn off my phone or leave it at home for a good chunk of either Saturday or Sunday. I’m only a few weeks into it, but I’m telling you, it makes a difference. There is a feeling of greater substance as I go about my day, as though I’m standing more solidly on the planet. The next step is to commit to a whole day and see what that feels like. After all, the first step in dealing with any addiction is admitting you have a problem.

As mentioned in last week’s post, On Your Mark had its eyes on several SXSW Interactive talks, including a few about women and the digital world. Of these, Designing Experiences for Women presented by Jessica Ivins and Brad Nunnally proved to be quite compelling to us as experts on women. While we have been aware of the gaping holes in marketing to women, Ivins and Nunnally provided great design and marketing mantras for those trying to reach a female audience. Below are a few of our favorites:

• “When marketing to women, emphasize benefits over features or specs – how can your product enhance her life?”
• “If you don’t do research, you’re guessing what customers want. With research, customers tell you what they want.”
• “Don’t stereotype your audience, understand them.”

An interesting example Ivins and Nunnally used to show design-gone-wrong for female users is online dating sites such as Match.com. One of the biggest frustrations for women is the overwhelming communication received from men – both in number of messages and content. Instead of being a safe place to meet people with similar interests and goals, it can become yet another arena in which to be badgered. The websites therefore do not meet the online-dating need of women to have comfortable communication.

While it’s important for designers to make things user-friendly and engaging for women, they can’t completely forget the men when their product or service is marketed to both genders. By going too far femme, they risk alienating or even emasculating the male audience. Through online dating site Herway.com, only women can initiate communication because men are not allowed to search through profiles. Feedback from Ivins and Nunnally’s audience on Twitter indicated many of the men would never use Herway.com, and some women said that they wouldn’t expect men to want to try this online dating site either.

@vdyej Anyone know a self-respecting man who would sign up for dating #herway? Doubt it. #designwmn

To reach an appropriate balance of incorporating the needs and preferences of both genders, Ivins and Nunnally recommend – what else – research! The most important thing marketers and designers can do to successfully reach their customers/audience is to understand them.