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Authors of Financial Books
for Women
Joline Godfrey
Author of No
More Frogs to Kiss
Visit Joline Godfrey's website at www.independentmeans.com
- What led you to write this book?
By the time I wrote the book, Independent Means had been
operating for a couple of years and we were answering
the same questions over and over: how can I raise money
smart daughters? This book was a compilation of responses
we give to women who attend out training workshops, as
well as core advise we give through our other programs
for parents and educators concerned about the next generation.
- What do you feel to be the biggest challenge facing
women today when handling their finances?
- Taking themselves seriously.
- Having others take their initial. sometimes awkward
first steps seriously.
- Starting.
It's been my experience that once women make the first
step towards economic empowerment, their journey has begun
and they rarely go back to a place of being money-stupid.
But starting takes courage and support--this is often
true even for the so-called really educated woman. Education
and financial empowerment have not necessarily gone hand
in hand. 4. Having mighty visions. Women are trainined
to think small--and they do it well. Having a mega-moster
dream is harder work and often scary.
It's a little different among the girls we work with
at IMI. They are fearless and hungry--and great to work
with for that reason. Getting others to take their efforts
seriously is still a challenge though. And getting them
to think big is the other challenge we still see in girls.
- How has the atmosphere changed for women investors
in the last 10 years?
Suddenly they are a target: everyone wants their money.
This is good and bad in that it makes a lot of women anxious:
if they want my money, why shoudl I trust them?? That's
the dark side; the sunnier side is that there has never
been so much supportfor women's economic power, or so
many resources.
- How will the atmosphere change for women investors
in the next 10 years?
They will grow up, take charge of their money and start
to put it to work: as social activists, philanthropists,
policy makers, leaders. Women will have to whine and plead
for less and will more and more write checks to make things
happen.
- Where did you start your career and how did it lead
you to where you are today?
I'm a learner. I started in my family's small commercial
dairy in Maine...was trained as a social worker and left
grad school to work as a social worker at the Polaroid
Corp. in Cambridge, MA. Polaroid fed my own entrepreneurial
instincts and invested in my first business. When I sold
that in 1990 and was looking for my next challenge, my
first book, Our Wildest Dreams, pointed me towards the
needs of girls. My journey has been a little unothodox,
, but internally coherent as far as I am concerned. Years
ago I remember mentioning something about a "career ladder"
to the man who hired me at Polaroid and he went ballistic:
Ladder! What makes you think life is orderly enough to
have ladders! he yelled!! It was a great response to my
youthful naivety and stuck with me. I have followed the
important questions of my brain and spirit over the years,
not tried to climb any mythical ladder.
- How much money do you need to start investing?
$10. You save $10 a week until you get to $100 and invest
in something, anything...WAiting until you have some number--$1000
or $50,000 gives you a perfect route to procrastination.
Just do it.
- How should a woman get started investing with no investment
experience?
Practice and do your homework. Whether you use an online
portfolio or just paper, pen and financial pages of the
newspaper. Choose a couple of stocks, make soem "practice
investments, do research on the companies you like and
see how you do. Mistakes will be made--but after 6 months
of practice. There is no reason not to make a jump to
the real thing.
- If a woman has debt, at what point should she become
an investor?
Yesterday.
- Have you published any other books before this one?
If so, what are they?
A college text book years ago; Our Wildest Dreams: Women
Entrepreneurs Making MOney, Doing Good, HAving Fun (HarperBusiness);
and coming out in the spring is Twenty Secrets to Independence
(St. Martin's Press)
- What are your future book writing plans?
Constant...
Visit Joline Godfrey's website at www.independentmeans.com
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