A Balance at Beam

Beth Bronner, ’74, still gets to the office at 5:30 a.m. every day, but she said she manages a good work-life balance better than she used to.

I can’t say I worked harder because I was a woman or my employers expected me to, she said. The brutal truth was, I probably didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t see any distinction between my work life and my personal life because there wasn’t any. I lacked balance, big time.

Bronner, chief marketing officer at Jim Beam Brands, shared a dozen pointers for striking a balance with students and alumni November 5 at the Chicago Women in Business annual fall conference in downtown Chicago . There’s a tendencyand pressurefor women to blend in at companies, she said. I'm urging you to do the opposite. Keep your individuality. Don’t take yourself too seriously. Laugh. Wear leather to a big meeting if you feel like it. Remember, you're not an actress, and your office is not a stage. You’ll lose your balance if you try to be someone you're not.

Bronner’s list of guiding principles, which she said she developed in hindsight, included the following points:

•  Remember that you can’t do it alone. Make building a team a priority.

•  Network. Build a federation of friends and advisors in your peer group. Join the right clubs, sit on the right panels. It’s important to have friends not just across the hall, but across the country.

•  Look for a mentor. Find someone who you respect and admire. If you think you can learn something, ask them to lunch, pick their brain, and pick up the tab. Be a mentor yourself.

•  Keep your integrity. Remember who you are. Remember your principles. The business world can be a slippery place.

•  Try to learn something new. Become an expert on international currency. And while you're at it, take ice skating lessons. One of the best ways to keep your balance is to keep growing in different directions.

•  Take care of yourself. Keep yourself physically, spiritually, and intellectually fresh. On the home front, get help if you can afford it, even if you can’t. Get a cleaning service, a lawn service. Don’t view it as a luxury; it is a necessity. And stop feeling guilty. Say, I am not perfect. I do not want to be perfect.

•  Do something meaningful. No one in this room is going to have her face added to Mount Rushmore for the contributions they made at work. Make time to give back. We all have resources and advantages other people lack. Carve out a few hours a month to volunteer or sit on a board. It will be good for the world, and good for your soul.

•  Marry well. Find a partner in life who is supportive to you on both an emotional and a practical level.

•  Help your staff achieve worklife balance. See them as whole people; look beyond the employee. If they need help, work with them to explore options like telecommuting. Let them feel they have some control over their lives and careers.

Chicago Women in Business hosts programs for female students to share personal and professional experiences and explore ways to continue to integrate women into the business world.