Friday 12 April 2013
Some Final Blitherings (Because I Don't Have Time To Blog Anymore)
Posted by Leigh at 22:45 View Comments
Friday 21 September 2012
The Cause of Ovarian Cancer Chose Me
As many of you know, I've been part of creating and supporting an Ovarian Cancer Awareness initiative called It's Time To Shout.
At the time when i had reached out to Elana & Mark (Waldman) I hadn't really been touched by cancer. But since that time, my uncle died of esophageal cancer and my father died of Pancreatic cancer.
Most importantly, we found out that my family has what is sometimes known as the "Jewish Cancer Gene" BRCA . (note: There is an increased rate of BRCA in the Ashkenazi Jewish community of
1 in 40, vs. 1 in 250 in the general Caucasian population)
It's funny. I worked on It's Time To Shout for over a year. I have hours of video of Elana and a hundred conversations talking about her diagnosis, BRCA in her family etc. and it never occurred to me even for a second that BRCA ran in my family. So when my sister mentioned to me a study of Jewish women in Toronto where we would be tested, I thought, well, sure, it will give the study more data, probably a good thing to do but again, NEVER OCCURRED TO ME FOR A SECOND THAT WE HAD IT.
And then the results phone call.
Genetics Councellor: " Just calling to tell you that you DO NOT have BRCA."
Me: " Ok great. thanks" (i mean exactly what i expected right?)
Genetics Councellor: "Have you talked to your sister yet?"
Me: "No. Why? Why would i need to talk to my sister?" (me...panic)
So i did end up talking to her -- and I (unfortunately) burst into tears when she told me she had BRCA II. Everyone in my family has now been given the choice to be tested (or not) with results that they choose to keep private and I won't discuss here.
When I told Elana she said to me,
"Sometimes you don't choose things, they choose you"
And clearly It's Time To Shout chose me.
I tell this story (with my sister's permission) to ask everyone to help bring attention to Ovarian Cancer awareness in any and all forms. From our site to this infographic to of course Elana's own powerful story.
And that's what I'm going to leave everyone with.
Spread the word and maybe, save a life.
Posted by Leigh at 16:07 View Comments
Labels: Its time to shout, Ovarian Cancer
Sunday 13 May 2012
Business Lessons From Motherhood
Posted by Leigh at 07:33 View Comments
Thursday 5 April 2012
The Competitive Advantage Of Letting Your Employees Leave at 5:30
Posted by Leigh at 13:46 View Comments
Saturday 31 March 2012
Innovate By Focusing In On What Makes You Great
Always innovating is a tough game. RIM more then anyone has had a tough go of it recently. Jon Evans has a piece in Techcrunch today that I really relate to. If you are from Canada, it's hard not to want to see RIM turn themselves around. There are a tonne of smart people at that company and they simply transformed the technology market place here at home.
Posted by Leigh at 14:51 View Comments
Labels: Business, technology
Friday 23 March 2012
Chilling Real Time Decisions In A Real Time World
James Armstrong is live Tweeting the Tori Stafford murder trail and wrote a post called "Tweeting from the Rafferty Murder Trail" about his experience which is well worth a read.
I have to say, as a Mother of a 16 year old daughter, and a 3 year old and as someone who worked with the amazing Leslie Parrot, mother to Alison, this story has actually kept me up at night. I find myself conflicted as to what I want to know as a human being, what I should know as a parent and what I should just stop myself from reading.
Armstrong said this:
In a real time world, we are now in a situation of facing real time decisions. What is right to one person, is completely wrong for another.
For those who work as social strategists, they often tell clients to use common sense, but there is nothing common about any of this.
Posted by Leigh at 11:12 View Comments
Labels: Futureof, Realtime, Social Media
Saturday 26 November 2011
Training Hybrid Thinkers
Solving the ambiguous problems that plague our society, such as health care or access to clean water, will require working across multiple disciplines. Instilling the value of hybrid thinking--the mashing up of disparate disciplines--will ensure that we have leaders ready to tackle pressing issues.I've always tried to build cultures of hybrid thinkers. It isn't about one school of thought, it isn't even that i think hybrid thinking is a school of thought in itself. It's about different ways of thinking and different thinkers coming together to solve complex problems.
Posted by Leigh at 11:18 View Comments
Labels: Social Business, Social Enterprise Design