​Moved by her mother’s personal story, Natassia Katopodis helps young women see their own futures. My mother grew up in a rural village in Greece in the 1950s. At that time, the young women in her village weren’t typically educated beyond reading and writing—enough to write their names and read a contract. Then, they were married off—and typically had no choice who they would marry. My mother was fortunate that she married my father, who is a courageous, compassionate, and amazing individual. But when I have conversations with her, I often wonder . . . if she had the choice to pursue an education or if she was financially independent, how might have those opportunities influenced the choices she made for herself? Times have changed in that little rural village in Greece. Women have choices now. But where I live—in South Africa—and across Africa and the Middle East, there are still communities where my mother’s experience is the status quo. I imagined how I could be part of changing that. ​[Natassia Katopodis] And that’s how I got connected with the DreamGirls Academy, an organization founded by three women—absolute trailblazers—who believe reaching teen girls early can rewrite futures. If we can empower just one young woman to become self-sufficient, then she can go on to empower her community. In partnership with Microsoft and DigiGirlz in South Africa, DreamGirls also helps girls and women pursue digital skills through events like coding workshops—showing them what careers are available. In a recent workshop, 87% of the girls admitted that they didn’t know that these types of careers existed—that they thought technology was something you only read about in books. After just a one-day workshop, these girls were seeing a different future. I feel truly blessed to have a community at Microsoft that gives me access to leaders who serve as my mentors, as well as the opportunity to mentor other women by participating in Women at Microsoft. That’s what makes Microsoft’s mission of empowerment meaningful to me. I can empower women and girls—and I don’t have to do it in isolation because I’m connected with others who share the same purpose. My heart fills with so much joy when I think about it. —Natassia Katopodis, Johannesburg, South Africa The original article was published here.

​Huong Haley, the daughter of a Vietnamese prisoner of war, speaks up about how her background—which she identifies as “first generation, low income”—surfaced challenges during her transition to corporate life. Now, she’s making it easier for others to find their way, too. Huong Haley is always on the hunt for a deal—marked-down clothes, free food, cheap airfare home to Lansing, Michigan. For Huong (whose name is loosely pronounced as Hoon in English), stretching every dollar to its maximum capacity is a moral imperative. When Huong was getting ready to go on her first business trip as a Microsoft employee, she did what she always did when booking travel: she found the cheapest deal possible—even though this time, the company would be paying the bill. When her fellow coworker and travel partner, Lori Knapp, visited Huong at the motel, Lori noticed a few problems: stained walls, dingy-looking beds, one communal hallway bathroom, and a location pretty far from the conference center. Lori persuaded her friend to upgrade her hotel to a more convenient location, assuring her that Microsoft wanted their experience to be safe and comfortable. “As a new employee, you know you should be frugal when booking work trips,” Lori—who has since moved on from the company—explains. “But for most, ‘frugal’ is a subjective term; it’s not for Huong.” That incident kicked off a conversation between the two about Huong’s background. Huong’s motel choice was but one example where she, and other people who identify as first generation, low income (or FLI or FGLI), had to decode the often-unspoken behaviors of corporate culture. People who identify as FLI—a term and acronym made popular through higher education research and programs—might be the first in their families to attend college or might come from a low-income background or household. Once they are in the workplace, FLI employees might also be the first in their families to hold full-time corporate jobs that have high-paying salaries and some job security. They might also encounter unique challenges in the transition. “If you’ve never had a salary before, how do you know if you are being offered a fair wage? What’s the norm?” Huong said, explaining the questions that many people who identify as FLI are forced to ask. “What kind of health-care options do you need when you’ve never had to pick before? What the heck is a PPO or a 401k, and how do you make the most of them?” [Family photos of Huong Haley's parents first arriving in the US, and a young Huong and her brother playing around on a bike]  Huong knows that these are points of confusion for many new employees no matter their background, but she says that there’s another layer of tension present for people identifying as FLI: their broader family or community may not be able to help guide them through these issues. “We can’t ask our parents since they haven’t had to do any of this, so we have to rely on our own resourcefulness and the community we build around us.” Huong came to rely on her FLI community at the University of Michigan during her undergraduate studies and missed that support when she started at Microsoft. Huong laughs at the motel story now—and today, nearly four years after joining the company through the Microsoft ACE Rotation program, she’s adjusting well to the culture. Now, she’s given herself a new challenge: make that transition easier and faster for other FLI employees at Microsoft. ***** Born and raised in Vietnam, Huong’s dad fought on the South Vietnamese side during the Vietnam War, during which he was captured and held as a prisoner of war by the Viet Cong. After the war, he was released and soon met Huong’s mom; they married, and they had Huong. When Huong was one year old, they came to the United States through an immigration policy that granted citizenship to South Vietnamese veterans. They had donated their home in Saigon to a nun to start a women’s shelter, so they arrived in the United States with little money. They quickly found low-income housing in Lansing, Michigan, where Huong’s uncle had immigrated and began the work of acclimating to a new culture. [Family photos of Huong Haley and her mother, father and brother through the years]  From the time Huong could read, write, and speak English, she began to translate for her parents. At age six, she was helping her dad read websites for job offerings. Later, after a layoff, she applied for government assistance and health care on his behalf. “It wasn’t just filling out applications,” Huong emphasizes. “It was also searching for what websites to go to for unemployment. I had to learn how to find things—literally typing in the words ‘Michigan unemployment’ into the search bar. “Taking on those type of applications and challenges at a really young age and kind of being the head of the household for your family, I think that’s pretty unique to immigrant families and families coming from lower income backgrounds who need resources,” she says. “I had to grow up faster than many of my peers.” ***** Although one of Huong’s goals (and her parents’ dreams for her) is job and financial stability, Huong’s feelings about her current income as a Microsoft employee fills her with a confusing mix of celebration and sadness. “My parents ran a smoothie stand near their home in Saigon for a few years. When they started, they didn’t know how to make smoothies; they just did it one day and kept doing it until they perfected the taste. My mom has amazing social skills—a smoothie saleswoman; my dad, an electrician in Vietnam, is super sharp,” she explains. I had to grow up faster than many of my peers. She struggles to understand how her parents’ skills didn’t translate (while her skills did) to a professional career or higher paying job in the United States. But then Huong sees that they are so proud of her and her brother and reconsiders that maybe it’s okay that her parents are where they are. “I still feel guilt sometimes, but instead of letting it get me down, I use it to fuel my dream even more. With all the support I have been given, I want to help others get a little bit closer to their own dreams.” ***** For Huong and other employees identifying as FLI, the extra effort to understand certain corporate norms is more than inconvenient; the results can negatively affect a person’s mental well-being. For example, if people don’t know that some job aspects are negotiable, they may not advocate for themselves, which could result in feeling stuck and eventually defeated. They might soon quit a job they worked so hard for, become turned off at the idea of working in future corporate environments, and maybe even get cut off from potentially higher sources of income. “In many ways, you feel so lucky to be at Microsoft in the first place that it can be hard to talk to your manager about job advancement,” Lori adds. “Coming from a place of gratitude is good, but that can also mean you don’t think to ask for more.” Additionally, FLI employees who don’t live close to their families can experience pressure from family members who don’t understand why their child or sibling moves away for a job, says Huong. Especially when they could live at home, save money, and remain an active member of the day-to-day family life. For instance, last year Huong’s father was injured in a car accident in Lansing. Huong managed his health care and insurance remotely from Seattle where she lives with her husband, Tom. She says it’s hard being far away from them, and she knows it’s hard on them—considering how much they rely on her—but Huong’s parents have never expressed anything but support and pride. Still, her parents are getting older and speak only Vietnamese, so Huong feels the pressure every day to take care of a lot. She’s hoping to convince her parents to move out to Seattle someday soon. ***** When Huong had the idea to start an employee network called FLI (pronounced fly) to Microsoft, she reached out to Lori, who was passionate about the cause as well. During business school, Lori had started a nonprofit that aimed to simplify direct cash donations to people in poverty. Two other cofounders joined the cause, and the team launched the community in early 2018. FLI to Microsoft, now with more than 200 members and 8 co-leaders, is working to balance the inequity of knowledge among employees: knowledge of corporate norms and lingo and knowledge of logistics, resources, people, and behaviors. It’s the gap between what some new employees should know for succeeding in a new job versus what they do know. “It’s quite a big jump,” Huong says. “I want to make sure people know they’re not alone.” FLI to Microsoft is currently focused on finding ways to volunteer their time and resources to the local community, spreading the news to new employees about joining FLI, and creating a digital hub for people to share resources. And it’s not just for new employees; it’s common for longer tenured employees to reach out to the group—some admitting to still being confused about aspects of corporate life, while others share links, tips, and insights that they picked up along the way. Coming from a place of gratitude is good, but that can also mean you don’t think to ask for more. “The answers people need are usually there, and we are working to make them super easy to find,” says Huong. In the end, Huong hopes that FLI to Microsoft will become a well-known group where people can come to feel accepted. She also hopes to become a group of trusted advisors—just as many other employee groups at Microsoft have—to help internal product teams consider the viewpoints of people coming from economic backgrounds like hers. Also, she’d like to help coworkers remember that there are many aspects of corporate culture that are not the norm for many people. And for herself? Huong says for her most of her life she was so focused on pulling her family out of poverty and accomplishing her goals that she put her mental wellness second—something the pandemic has given her the opportunity to consider. “There are many intersections between experiences and identities. FLI is just one of them.” She hopes to create spaces for FLI community members to share and to foster even more conversations about intersectionality. For now, Huong is keeping it simple. “If I can help someone else breathe a little bit easier because I shared my story, it’s all worth it.” The original article was published here.

​Brittany Valdes struggled to find her place between two sometimes conflicting identities: motherhood and professional life. Now, she’s rewriting the narrative about working mothers.​It’s approaching 10:00 PM on a Tuesday. The house is hushed, and the family is sleeping. All except for the mom. Brittany Valdes sits in her bed, laptop open, face lit up by the screen. She’s catching up on emails for her side business, a nonprofit organization called The Mom Economy that supports moms while they navigate their careers before, during, and after having children. She’s heard that working from bed can affect her sleep—but she does it anyway. An email comes in from a new mother who’s feeling overwhelmed and discouraged after her first week back at work. She cried during a meeting and missed her baby’s rolling over for the first time. Brittany chokes up, remembering those feelings all too well. “It’s okay,” she types, nodding her head with confidence. “You are doing great! I cried too.” She encourages the new mother and then connects her to one of The Mom Economy members, who started a support group for this very situation. As she closes her laptop, Brittany’s mind flashes back five years ago to when she discovered that she was pregnant. “That’s it,” she thought at the time. “My career is over.” She believed that if she wanted to raise a family, she couldn’t be a working mom. Chapter One “When you’re pregnant, everyone wants to give you advice, but you have to do what your heart tells you is good for you and your family.” Brittany has always been driven by her career, she explains. During college in West Palm Beach, she ran multiple student and community activities. Then she moved to Chicago and worked in marketing and events at a publishing company and a tourism group. By age 25, her professional achievements were mounting, fueling her growing ambition. “I was working 60-hour weeks in a big city, and it never felt like work,” she says, laughing knowingly at her younger self. “I thought I was invincible.” And then, she was contacted by a recruiter. Did she want to lead local community programs for a new Microsoft retail store in Miami? It was the career move she’d been waiting for. Three weeks later, Brittany received the job offer, but then her life took a twist. She found out that she was pregnant—and was immediately overcome with doubt and ambiguity. “I thought that if I wanted to raise a family, I couldn’t be a working mom,” she says, her cheery voice turning suddenly serious. The decision felt especially fraught for her, given the culture in which she was raised. “My dad’s side is Cuban, and my mom’s side is Puerto Rican. People from cultures centered on family like mine often particularly struggle with the guilt from wanting both,” she explains. She was tortured with questions: “Will I get to spend enough time with my kids? Will I be able to devote enough energy to my clients? My baby will only be little for a short time. . . . If I take a break from work, will I be able to pick up where I left off?” Even though she was uncertain and scared, she had a village around her and decided to make the leap. She took the position as a community development specialist with Microsoft and helped open the first Microsoft retail store in the Miami area. Chapter Two “A dream woke me up in the middle of the night, and I’ve been awake ever since.” Over time, through trial and error and many of what she calls “non-Instagrammable moments,” as well as with ample support from family, friends, and coworkers, Brittany learned to redefine success on her own terms. Once she found a rhythm, other new moms began to reach out for advice. What started as DMs and coffee dates soon became the inspiration for The Mom Economy. “The Mom Economy was a dream that I had. It woke me up in the middle of the night, and I feel like I’ve been awake ever since.” Working full time, mothering full time, and running her side job has raised a lot of questions for her about how she does it all. Her eyes are smiling but somber—a mother’s face just before a teachable moment with her child. Her answer: “I don’t. It’s just not possible.” ​​[Two black and white historial photos showing a girl behind a counter in a small shop and a historical theatre in Chicago]  Chapter Three “Entrepreneurship is in my DNA.” Helping other moms was one part of Brittany’s desire to start a side project. Entrepreneurship, as we call it now, or the side hustle, as her grandfather calls it, runs in the family. Brittany’s abuelito, Wilfredo, fled Cuba in 1945 and moved to Chicago with his new wife, Delia. In addition to working a full-time job, Willie hosted dances for the Latin community on the weekends at a theater he rented—and eventually bought—named the Aragon. He kept his side hustle a secret from his full-time work for nearly seven years; that’s just how it was done then. And it wasn’t just her grandfather who had this entrepreneurial spirit. His son, Brittany’s dad, Willy Jr., started his own vitamin shop in the early 2000s and later owned a financial planning business. “I worked at the shop,” Brittany remembers. “My brother worked there. After school, we were packing bottles, selling. I never even thought about it as something extra. It was just part of our DNA as a family unit.” Chapter Four “I wanted to show my children what my parents gave me and take it to the next level.” While she credits her entrepreneurial spirit to her grandfather and father, she also sees the women—her abuelita, Delia, and her mom, Irasema—working tirelessly to empower their husband’s careers and businesses. Brittany explains that in her culture and family, there can be covert (and sometimes overt) expectations placed on women to prioritize home and family life. But she wanted something outside of the home, too. She wanted both. “I wanted to shift the perspective and take all the beautiful things my mother taught me about prioritizing my children to the next level with my kids,” she says. “I want to teach them to really push themselves and go for their dreams.” “And I think that’s what we need to do at every generation, right? If we do exactly what our parents and our grandparents teach us, we’re not leveling up. We’re not changing. We’re not evolving. We’re not growing.” Chapter Five “And I realized we needed a community of women—a safe space to talk about the things that we were dealing with.” Six years after she accepted the job at Microsoft—and now with two boys—Brittany noticed that she wasn’t alone in her struggle to be a working mom. So she started The Mom Economy. The Mom Economy has several initiatives, but this year, her favorite program was the Mother’s Mercado—a weekend that brought together mother-owned businesses that started as side projects. It was like a boot camp for mom entrepreneurs to learn how to scale their businesses, and one person won a pop-up retail space in New York City. “I felt like this was a really great demographic because a lot of moms are super creative and started these things as a side hustle, and now it’s their full-time job,” she says. It was inspiring to her, and she wanted to get the word out. As president of The Mom Economy, Brittany answers emails, connects moms to resources, and focuses the big picture strategy for the nonprofit. The mission is to grow a thriving community of women supporting women. “You’ve heard the phrase, ‘shop local.’ I say, ‘shop mom.’ Let’s support these families. Investing in mother-owned businesses that are more likely to hire more women creates this amazing trickle-down effect in the ecosystem.” ​​Chapter Six “Still, as a working mom, there are hurdles. There are things that people do not see.” Brittany knows that on the outside, it might seem like she has it all put together. Beyond The Mom Economy, she’s excelled in her career at Microsoft and was named Store Associate of the Year before moving to her current role as the southeast community engagement manager. While she acknowledges that she has an amazing life, she’s been through the fire—and has come out the other side. Her father had a near-fatal heart attack right when Brittany went back to work after her second pregnancy, during which she was also struggling with post-partum depression and working on her masters degree in Business Administration. She thought the stress was going to end her. “People only see the glamorous side, right? They don’t see all the hurdles,” she says, pausing with sadness. “I get emotional speaking about it because, when you’re an entrepreneur, when you’re a working mom, there’s sacrifice. There are things that people don’t see. No one wants to share those things on their Instagram highlight, but it’s part of who we are. We have to find joy in those seasons, too.” Chapter Seven “I’m not perfect, but when my kids look at me, they’re looking at a mom who’s giving them opportunity to see what their life could be.” Through struggle and support, Brittany crafted a lifestyle that could sustain both family and work and side projects: a worldview that honors letting go of perfection, staying present in the moment, and investing in things that last. “It’s not about doing everything in your life perfectly; it’s not possible. It’s about being present for the moment you are in.” “We really need to push the boundaries on what work-life balance means, because I don’t think there should be a balance. I think it should be a meshed lifestyle,” she says. “If not, no one’s going to be happy because you’re going to always feel like you’re compartmentalizing everything.” “I’m not perfect, but when my kids look at me, they’re looking at a mom who’s giving them opportunity to see what their life could be.” Photography and videography by Sebastian Demarco; Additional videography by Candace Whitney-Morris. The original article was published here.