StrawberryFrog's Mothers Call for More Mums in Leadership Roles

Mums in the workplace: The topic has sparked endless discussion and promises. Yet the fact remains that most industries have yet to commit to mums, either in terms of recruiting them or creating a work environment where mums can thrive.

In honour of Mother’s Day, celebrated May 8 in countries from Canada to Cambodia, Belgium to Bermuda and the U.S. to Uruguay, StrawberryFrog is giving mothers a 'mums up' with a viral campaign themed around the idea “mum is not a bad word.” Check out the landing page here.

Many industries are missing out on a huge opportunity by not committing to mums, says SF founder and CEO Scott Goodson: “We are passionate about finding solutions to persistent problems. And there has long been a particular lack of leadership roles for women, and especially women who are mums, in the marketing and advertising sector, particularly at agencies. Our goal is to help the workplace overcome its bias against mums in industry, starting with the advertising and marketing industry, and to change the face of the modern workforce by actively recruiting mums and creating a work environment where they can thrive.”

Notes Karin Drakenberg StrawberryFrog co-founder and COO & mum of two, "Making structures work for mums in the work force makes a lot of sense given women make up 50% of the population but drive an estimated 70% -80% of consumer spending through purchase power and influence.  In fact, 50% of products marketed to men are actually purchased by women. Globally women control $20 trillion in annual spending – in the next five years it’s expected to rise to $30 trillion."

Advertising can be fun but it is intense and demands long hours. For many mums it’s simply not possible to work round the clock and be a mum.  The result is many agencies don’t actively recruit mums, particularly for leadership roles.  And that means many clients targeting mums don’t actually have any mums working on their business. Time to bring on the mum incubators.

The two minute video  features interviews with working mums at StrawberryFrog. In addition to the video, there’s a blog and also a podcast all of which can be accessed at http://www.frogmoms.com.  

The first podcast episode features Goodson interviewing Nancy Hill, head of the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4As) on the challenges women and new mums face in advertising and how to overcome these obstacles by embracing things like non-traditional work weeks which make it possible for mums to succeed at both their jobs. The podcast can be found here..

Drakenberg notes, “Since our founding 20 years ago, we have worked with independent contractors, many of them mothers who didn't fit into a male dominated ad industry. We quickly realized that we had to customize around needs to support great talent. If this means a four day work week or distance working or flexible hours and that leads to brilliant strategy and creative excellence then so be it. Time at your desk doesn't equate to higher productivity plus with technology we can and often do work beyond the old fashioned 9-5."

Goodson points out, "When we started StrawberryFrog we wanted to create an environment that was customized around each client's needs but also around the realities of our talent. What we realized at the start was the systems of the past don't represent the structures of tomorrow. The old way, the pretentiousness and lack of understanding, leads to bad or disconnected work. It is important that clients get top tier talent in leadership positions and talent that has real world experience with the target market, in this case women buying for themselves, their partners and their families.”