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Comeback Moms: How to Leave Work, Raise Children, and Restart Your Career Even if You Haven't Had a Job in Years
 
 
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Comeback Moms: How to Leave Work, Raise Children, and Restart Your Career Even if You Haven't Had a Job in Years [Hardcover]

Monica Samuels (Author), J.C. Conklin (Author)
3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)


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Book Description

May 9, 2006
Millions of educated, professional women are quitting their jobs to stay home and raise their children.

That would never be you, right? You worked hard for your degree and even harder to get to this point in your career. Quitting now, even for a few years, would kill your career. Right?

That’s what Monica Samuels thought when she found out she was pregnant and boy, was she wrong. Once you have a baby, your life changes in ways you’d never imagine. Some of your friends and family members may think you’ve gone a little crazy—crazy enough to leave a salary and paid vacations to stay home with your child. Before you go storming into your boss’s office to announce your departure, read this book. There’s more to quitting than saying the words. There’s strategy involved.

Over 60 percent of professional women who leave work to raise children want to go back into the workforce someday. If you even think you might want to go back to work, be it in one year or twenty, you need to lay the groundwork now for a successful reentry or your options will be limited. If you do a little planning, you can reposition yourself professionally and have the choice to one day get back on the same career track, shift gears, accelerate, or change careers entirely. And, if you’ve already been out of the workplace for several years and never thought you’d go back, you’ll learn about the best strategies and resources for jumping back in.

Comeback Moms is a practical, commonsense approach to career planning for all mothers. Monica Samuels and J.C. Conklin examine every conceivable angle and obstacle to help you make the best decisions possible before leaving your job, during your time at home, and once you decide to return to work. They offer advice on how to keep one foot in the professional pool, when and if it’s best to go back to school, setting realistic expectations when re-entering an old career, helping your children adjust when you do go back, and on the logistics of rebalancing marital power when a spouse leaves or re-enters the work force. It's all here in an invaluable guide for every woman who wants it all.

"Proving once again that there is no one-size-fits-all approach in women's lives, Monica Samuels and J.C. Conklin's insightful book reveals to us the delicate and complex balance of family, power, and career. A must-read for both women and men seeking to manage career and family sucessfully."
-Representative Dianne White Delisi


Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

While it's arguable that women can have both a career and children at once with some degree of success, many like Samuels, an attorney, prefer to focus on one at a time, and decide to become stay-at-home moms. But that doesn't mean that they can't return to the work they love. The key, according to Samuels and co-author Conklin, is laying the groundwork for your comeback long before leaving a job. "By planning, we mean decide, as much as you can, what you want: are you gong back to work? Do you want to try part time? Do you want to work on special projects occasionally? Do you want to work with the company again in the future?" All options are viable, given realistic expectations and sound exit and re-entry strategies, and all are thoroughly examined here in a practical and candid manner. Whatever decision a woman makes, Samuels says that those who have the courage to create a path that works for them will find "opportunity to become something else, something new-a mother who knows she doesn't have to do it all, all at once."
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

Comeback Moms is loaded with practical tips from high-powered women who have dropped out and then reentered the workforce . . . refreshingly no-nonsense.” —Fortune

“A must-read for both women and men seeking to manage career and family successfully.”
—Representative Dianne White Delisi

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

  • Hardcover: 272 pages
  • Publisher: Broadway (May 9, 2006)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0767922425
  • ISBN-13: 978-0767922425
  • Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 14.1 ounces
  • Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,776,679 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

6 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
3.5 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful and Informative, August 13, 2006
This review is from: Comeback Moms: How to Leave Work, Raise Children, and Restart Your Career Even if You Haven't Had a Job in Years (Hardcover)
I bought this book after reading a very favorable recommendation for it ([...]/2006/06). Although I normally don't invest in books like this, I found it intriguing and relevant to my life so I got it.

This book is filled with excellent advice on how to tackle balancing career goals with the needs of a family and covers almost every topic imaginable in the process. I especially enjoyed the tone in which the information is presented using humor and anecdotes to make many of its points, but still providing a tremendous amount of insight and valuable information. It is exactly what I was hoping to find - - informative, yet enjoyable to read.

I must say I was surprised to find an Amazon review of this book that suggested it was "patronizing." As a wife, mother, and student I found the information to be very applicable to most women I know. I see this book as being addressed primarily to women who spent a great deal of time and effort pursuing their education and careers prior to becoming wives and mothers. Their families and friends expected them to continue with the dreams they talked about as young girls and they are not used to hearing them now put the role of wife and mother as number one. I found the book to be an excellent look at life from that perspective, and although it is a great read for anyone, it is particularly relevant to that group of women. Thankfully, there are many such women out there. These women want to put their families first for a time and then get back out in the work place to pursue the careers they love.

Bravo! I'm glad to see there is something out there for us too!!!
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38 of 48 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't stomach the patronizing tone, or the Karl Rove references..., August 12, 2006
By 
This review is from: Comeback Moms: How to Leave Work, Raise Children, and Restart Your Career Even if You Haven't Had a Job in Years (Hardcover)
The topic of this book is a great one: preparing women who decide to leave the workfore while raising their kids but want to return someday. I picked this book up at the library and was excited to get some good advice.

However, I could not get past the patronizing tone that the authors use towards their readers! Maybe some people like this kind of "Girlfriend's Guide" approach to the topic, but I found it to be totally demeaning to women.

Here's an example. One of the chapters is focused on preparing financially to leave the workforce--a great TOPIC, by the way. Here's an excerpt from that chapter:

"To figure out if you can stay home or not and for how long, you have to know your financial information better than you know Britney Spears's [sic]love life."

Blech..like I need to be ripped away from the gossip pages-give me a break. It goes on...

"Once you determine where your money is going, you'll know if you can cut back your spending and by how much.
Sit down with all your monthly bills.
Sometimes it's better to do this with your husband, empasis on the SOMETIMES. If he's a big spender and needs to understand how much debt the two of you are in and what you need to do to save, then take him through it. Show him the large stack of papers and corresponding checks you're about to write. Scare him into saving."

Scare him into saving. Nice attitude. It goes on:

"Maybe he's the one who usually pays the bills and you need to figure out what's going on with the budget. You're the big spender. Buy yourself a bag of candy and force yourself to go step by step over the budget with him."

BUY YOURSELF A BAG OF CANDY??? Like you couldn't possibly tackle something financial unless you have a bag of candy to pacify you? But there's more...

"Educate yourself. Think of this as the horrible prerequisite you have to take in order to graduate. Muscle through it."

Yes, because LEARNING about finances is so horrible that it must be muscled through. Ick. It goes on...

"You'll gain some shopping willpower when you look at the credit card bill and truly understand how much of your money goes to shoes and manicures."

SHOES and MANICURES??!? Could we get any more stereotypical? Yes, of course one of the steps to becoming financially independent is reviewing your expenses and determining wants vs needs, but must we reinforce steretypes about women's vanity?

Later on in this chapter the authors give advice about cars, and what kinds of sacrifices can be made to build up savings before one person stops working.

"Also, if you live near public transportation can you and your husband mangage with one car? We know it's a horrifying suggestion, but give it some thought. Obviously, if you live in a place like Texas or California or Nebraska where public transportation is an oxymoron this isn't an option for you."

It's horrifying to suggest that a family might make do with ONE car?? And if you live in Nebraska having less than two cars ISN'T an option? Have these people even heard of the concept of carpooling? I won't even talk about the use of the word oxymoron here, but last time I checked there was indeed public transportation in California.

I must also add that one of the authors goes out of her way to name drop her association with KARL ROVE as though that is something that is going to win over her readers. Maybe you're the kind of person that is impressed by Karl Rove. Maybe you think these "jokes" and chatty tone are funny. Maybe having less than two cars IS horrifying to you. If so, you will probably like this book.

But if any of this stuff raises your hackles, don't even bother picking it up. And if you have a better book to suggest, do it here on Amazon--we need an alternative to this one!
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars MUST READ!, July 24, 2006
This review is from: Comeback Moms: How to Leave Work, Raise Children, and Restart Your Career Even if You Haven't Had a Job in Years (Hardcover)
I love this book!!! It's loaded with great information yet entertaining and easy to read. I've read similar books and articles but found them pretty dull. I'm not that interested in reading a lot of studies and surveys. With kids to look after, I don't have a lot of time for that. I just like a book with practical information that gets right down to business. This book does just that. I highly recommend it!
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