8 Steps to Being a Great Working Mom

This book give practical tips and advice to all parents, but especially working moms, about how to juggle the many roles we have in life and feel good about our success as a parent. Each chapter ends with exercises designed to help ensure that the reader can put these tips to use, as well as "Sanity Savers" - key ideas from each chapter. The author, Gretchen Gagel, has held numerous executive positions, is working on her fourth degree, and is the loving mother of two great kids who are college students. But mostly, she is a "Great Working Mom" and wants to help you be one too! A portion of the proceeds from this book support two outstanding nonprofits focused upon helping single working moms, Warren Village in Denver Colorado (www.warrenvillage.org) and Safehouse Outreach in Atlanta (www.safehouseoutreach.org).

From the Author: "Years ago a friend was having her first child and said to me "You always have it all together, even with traveling every week - how do you do it?" What an amazing facade of calm I was putting forth! It was then that I realize that we are all working so hard to be great parents, great employees, great spouses, etc. but we rarely share the challenges we face, both men and women.

If this book accomplishes one thing, I hope that it will help working parents feel less stress and less guilt. Please lighten up on yourself. We all make mistakes. We all have days that we feel like we're not doing any of our roles very well. But we are "great" because we work hard every day to care for our families and our companies. We are not "perfect", we are "great". We care. If we are all a little gentler on ourselves, a little less stressed, we'll have better relationships with our kids, our spouses, our families, our friends, and our fellow employees.

I am on a mission to not only get this book into the hands of every working parent, but to continue the healthy dialogue about how we all make it all happen on a daily basis!"