 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
Women's group takes its members' power further
By ANDREW MEACHAM The parking lot for Saffron's Restaurant and Catering runs all the way to the water from Park Street. But you had better get there early if you're looking for lunch on a Tuesday. Those spaces have been filling up rapidly since a women's networking group began meeting there four months ago. A significant percentage of the 82 women attending Tuesday's 11 a.m. meeting of Pinellas Women in Power were already settled in by 10:30. Linda Burhans, once the chief financial officer for a Connecticut watchmaker, started the meetings in October with a few friends. She wanted to create something different -- a business networking group without dues, restrictions on who can attend or a lot of rules. The first PWP meeting drew 29 women. "I wasn't too impressed," said Burhans, 49, now in business for herself as a party planner and caterer. Burhans asked the women to come back the following week with a friend. "The next week the parking lot was full," she said. Advertised as the "unnetwork" on its Web site, pinellaswomeninpower.com, the group dispensed with the regulations common to other networking groups such as mandatory attendance, its leaders said. There is no ceiling on how many women of the same profession may attend. And it's okay to announce having two occupations. A Clearwater meeting on Mondays at 11 a.m. has also been drawing women to Shannon's Pub, 45 N Fort Harrison Ave. Between the two meetings, more than 400 women have attended Pinellas Women in Power luncheons since October. Burhans expects to have a Hillsborough meeting site working by April. Lunch is $11 for the St. Petersburg meeting at Saffron's, 1700 Park St. N, and $8.50 at Shannon's. A woman need not have a job to attend. People have found employment by going to the meetings, Burhans said. Tuesday's conversation bubbles with connections, referrals, subcontracting, talk of problems and solutions. "I don't think you're going to go to too many other networking groups where someone will say, 'My child is sick, and I need to see a client this afternoon,' and another woman will say, 'I'll come over and watch your child for you,' " Burhans said. Some have left high-powered jobs. For 10 years in a row, Barbara Doyle said, she vacationed in Bermuda and Palm Springs for free as a top sales representative for Sprint. But Doyle, 44, wanted to control her own destiny. She started a magazine, Families on-the-go, now in its fourth year, for Pinellas County. Doyle has since joined forces with fellow PWP board member Deirdre Cavener, a Web site developer who had left her job as vice president of a computer company. The two expect the first issue of their joint venture, Pinellas Life Magazine, to come out soon. Cavener, 38, said that the "unnetworking" approach makes more sense than limiting job categories to one person. "We're all from six-figure corporate America," Cavener said. "It's like a corporation -- different departments, but everybody works together to make money." Bonnie Kittelson attended a meeting to boost her Juice Plus line. She said to people, "Oh, by the way, I'm an artist. "I had people start coming up to me and going, 'We're looking for artists.' And I'm going, 'Excuse me?' " Now 14 of Kittelson's mixed media pieces hang in LillyPilly, a Dunedin day spa. Offers to promote her work have come unsolicited through other businesses and a Web site. "Seventy-five percent of my business comes from this group," said Tara Liaschenko, 30, who publishes an event resource guide. Twenty newcomers lined up Tuesday behind the microphone to tap into that same magic: Two travel agents. A wedding and event planner. Social workers looking for volunteers. One newcomer, Kris Self, was once the driving force behind the Grand Central Business District. A wireless systems engineer, Self, 43, has finished a state contract in Tallahassee and returned to look for work. Self said she was impressed by what she saw at PWP. "They are very focused," she said. PWP has different goals than the now-defunct Council of Business Associations, which was intended to help economic development and small businesses, she added, and so cannot be compared. Board members have put out feelers on the possibility of group insurance coverage to replace the benefits most have given up. Office space has been at least imagined. Cavener, who has taught statistics at the University of South Florida, said the sky is the limit. "We want to fill up Raymond James Stadium," she said. MeetingsEUCLID-ST. PAUL: 7:30 p.m. Thursday (7 p.m. social). St. Paul's Catholic Church cafeteria, 1900 12th St. N. Police Chief Chuck Harmon. LIVE OAKS: 7 p.m. Tuesday (6:30 p.m. Crime Watch). St. Luke's United Methodist Church, 4444 Fifth Ave. N. SNELL ISLE: 7:30 p.m. Thursday (7 p.m. social). St. Petersburg Woman's Club, 40 Snell Isle Blvd. NE. City Council member Bill Foster.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
From the Times South Pinellas desks |
