My husband recently had a business trip to the beautiful island of Barbados. Now, that of course is not that interesting. What is, is that he met with the executives of this large corporation and what struck him immediately when he entered the board room was, that the majority of the executives present were women!  

Did you know that the women in Barbados occupy many important leadership positions? Why? According to one of the men in the room: ‘We men screwed up! When women set out goals for themselves, they give it their all and become very successful. In business and at home. Men have the tendency to be more laid back and many times don’t finish what they started. Women will eventually take over’, he said.

Is that good news or what? In my book, I don’t know if it is good news or not, because it is not a race between men and women. I wish that everyone (men and women) would set out their goals and give it their all. Imagine if we would all do that, how great it would be to work together as a team. Use each other’s strengths and weaknesses to achieve major personal, company, organizational or even governmental goals.

As many of my friends know, I hate this ‘us against them’ discussion. But of course, because I am a woman, it does do me great pleasure when I see women succeed in the cruel business world, ruled by men. I used to be very ambitious myself, the sky was the limit. Then I met my now husband, at age 29, we got married at age 34 and what usually happens after that, yes, I got pregnant at age 35, while occupying a leadership position.

It was at that point that I made a conscious choice to give up (or maybe just suspend) my career plans and focus more on my time as a mom, wife, family member. 

We all have a choice to make and sometimes the sacrifices are harder for one or the other. What worked for me, might not work for you or the other way around. What is important is that you are happy with the choice(s) you make and those around you, are too.

Don’t think I am not ambitious anymore. To the contrary, I rewrote my professional goals and found what works perfectly for me and my family! I’m just happily taking another route than I initially had planned.

To men and women out there: Set your personal and professional goals, work hard to achieve them and try to be the best version of yourself, every day. Do not make it about “us against them”.