Back on the Career Track: A Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms Who Want to Return to Work (Hardcover)

~ (Author), Vivian Steir Rabin (Author)
Key Phrases: first relaunch, elevator story, sample résumés, New York, Lehman Brothers, Relaunch Movement (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Cohen and Rabin are two Harvard MBAs who stepped away from high-powered jobs to raise their children, then years later attempted to relaunch their careers. Faced with myriad challenges, the authors wondered if other women experienced the same struggles. Their business backgrounds show in the organized approach they take to guiding self-evaluation and assessing marketability. But they provide a more personal perspective through interviews with more than 100 women, from a broad career and economic spectrum, who remember the difficulties of relaunching their careers after hiatuses from 18 months to 20 years. They encountered less-than-supportive partners and children and skeptical prospective bosses, not to mention their own self-doubts. In a separate section, the authors offer accounts of women who succeeded in their relaunches, including former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. Cohen and Rabin applaud a relaunch movement they hope will be so widely recognized that women will not be stigmatized for gaps in their résumés. A helpful and inspirational source for women reentering the workforce. Bush, Vanessa
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review

"A terrific compendium of the issues, trade-offs--and opportunities--that Serious Moms recommitting to Serious Professional life will encounter." --Mary Lindley Burton, president, Burton Strategies, and coauthor of In Transition: From the Harvard Business School Club of New York's Career Management Seminar

"After you have talked your girlfriends to death, bored your husband with all your plans and even, in desperation, consulted your mother-in-law, let Cohen and Rabin show you how it is done. They will help you plan the step-by-step campaign that will get you back into the job market no matter how much time you have taken off." --Lisa Endlich, author of Goldman Sachs: The Culture of Success

"Candid, constructive, compelling... The authors provide realistic yet optimistic advice with examples on how to relaunch a career successfully." --W. Stanton Smith, National Director, Next Generation Initiatives/Human Resources, Deloitte & Touche USA LLP

"This guide is a wonderful and practical roadmap to 'on ramping' back into the workforce. If you're thinking about that journey, this book is the way forward!" --Anne Erni, Chief Diversity Officer, Lehman Brothers

"This comprehensive step-by-step guide to workforce reentry should be invaluable to women seeking to relaunch their careers. Real-life examples of success stories combined with a multitude of practical advice make this book a unique resource." --Constance C. Helfat, professor, Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College

"Finally! A smart, practical, inspiring guide for moms looking to get back to paid work--without losing their minds." --Leslie Morgan Steiner, editor of Mommy Wars and columnist, www.washingtonpost.com

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Business Plus; 1 edition (June 15, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446578207
• ISBN-13: 978-0446578202
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #360,721 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Helps with the thinking AND feeling side of going back to work, June 27, 2007

By	Daphne de Marneffe - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book has two great strengths. One is that if offers a calm, practical strategy for breaking down and following through on the many tasks involved in going back to work. This is really important and welcome, since in the busy day-to-day of parenting, it is often hard to look at the big picture and think strategically. The second is that it talks about the practical AND emotional hurdles to going back to work, and manages, in an upbeat but balanced way, to talk like a firm but supportive friend about overcoming them. There' s a lot written lately about how mothers are foolish and naive if they don't work for pay, a point of view bound to alienate mothers who aren't currently working. This book, by contrast, is not ideological, but helpful and eminently practical. It's a great resource if you are just starting to think about (and feel your way through) this complex question.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Relaunch is best for those who have taken off previously, September 2, 2008

By	Ethan Lerner - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

As a medical researcher, I was impressed to see that Cohen and Rabin included grant programs for scientific researchers who are reentering careers after time away. They took this approach throughout their excellent book which highlights how women in a wide range of careers and educational backgrounds could realistically approach returning to work after a career break.

There is a flaw in the recent negative review posted by Martin Nemko. His criticism is directed toward the difficulty of building a resume to obtain a job following a break. Obtaining a job is not the focus of the book. Rather, the book is directed to those who seek to relaunch careers or launch new ones.

His comment implying that these authors are not qualified to write on this topic is wrong. Cohen and Rabin have been through this process personally, run a return to work conference that is touring nationally, and have a lengthy press and speakers list. I highly recommend this excellent guide to relaunching a career following a break.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Back on the Career Track, August 17, 2008

By	Nicole, Mom of 1 and 1 on the way (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Back on the Career Track: A Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms Who Want to Return to Work (Paperback)

I can't believe reviewer Martin Nemzo read the same book I did. As reviewer Rachel Towle mentioned, I do not have an advanced degree, yet I found Back on the Career Track to be a realistic, refreshing guide to career reentry. Women who had "relaunched" careers in all sorts of fields and work configurations are profiled and the advice and strategy is accessible and I think equally effective for those of us without graduate degrees. In fact, I think the stories from the authors and their subjects were unusually candid, which made the points the authors were trying to illustrate even more compelling for someone in the position of being at home trying to return to work. Looking at Mr. Nemzo's background, he does not appear to be in this situation which is why he might have missed the major points of the book.

Finally, his comment about the authors backgrounds is clearly inaccurate to the point where I wonder if Mr. Nemzo had some sort of agenda to diss these authors. His comment that one of the authors is noted in the NYTimes for marrying a physician happens to be her wedding announcement from 1988! From their company website (www.iRelaunch.com) and some of my own googling, I found out that Cohen, a mother of four, resumed working after 11 years out of the full time workforce in a full time job for an investment company. She left after a year at which time Harvard Business School wrote a case study about her journey back to work after her time at home. Rabin went into the executive search business after seven years at home with her five kids.

These two authors appear to me to be the only authors of books on career reentry who have actually gone through the entire process of working, taking a career break and then returning to jobs unrelated to writing about or starting a company in the career reentry field. They wrote their book and started their company after they went through the entire return to work process. That's why they understand it so well! They now run a company that creates career reentry programming for people on career break and they have spoken internationally on the topic. Just take a look at their list of speaking engagements to see the wide range of audiences they address. Mr. Nemzo - I think you better do more careful research next time before tossing out the ridiculous references you make in this review. I give Back on the Career Track five stars and highly recommend it for those on career break interested in a strategy to return to work after a hiatus.

Nicole, mom of 1 with one of the way