We were lucky to catch up with Courtney Cecil recently and have shared our conversation below.

Courtney, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

15 years into a career in management consulting, I realized I was living in a man’s world. I had given tirelessly to my company, and around every corner I was being faced with more evidence that the male leaders would continue taking care of their own kind and that they didn’t appreciate that women solve problems differently. Despite working directly for multiple administrations, there were sizeable examples of injustice and qualified females being passed over. This pattern encourages attrition of women in middle-management, particularly in the professional services industry. Many women are discouraged that those a step ahead of them are not being respected and leave, particularly for industries more amendable to raising kids.

I was giving between 65-80 hours/week of myself to work each week. While I was a recognized high performer, it was still never enough. I remember a time when my 6-month-old had RSV and I couldn’t find the time to hold his sick body. Despite putting in 80 hours that week, I was told by my male boss it was insufficient.

This lack of compassion seemed to be prolific in male leaders, which underscored to me the criticality of getting more women into leadership. However, that can never be achieved if more women don’t remain in the workforce after having kids, let alone in the professional services industry. Unfortunately, though, many corporate DE&I programs are focused on headcount equity (i.e., can we achieve an equal number of men versus women), but few focus on retention, which tends to go sideways in middle-to-upper management.

At this 15-year juncture, I was burnt out and resentful that I’d sacrificed so much of myself for a company that didn’t appreciate me. I knew it was time for me to leave and spent the better part of that year soul-searching what my next career move would be. At the time, I was serving as Chief of Staff for the CEO of a multi-billion-dollar company and was committed to finding one more major corporate role, but it was also important to me that I did something that fueled my heart. In that 15th year of employment with this company, I met with close to 100 people to see where the wind would blow me.

During that process, I prayed nightly for clarity and found that eventually my path revealed that my calling was to coach working moms and help them see a sustainable path to remaining in the workforce. My observation is that many women leaders were either not married or did not have kids. This was also consistent for men unless they were fortunate enough to be supported by a wife who stayed at home to care for the kids and the household. This reinforced to me that something in the ecosystem is broken. While we may continue to say we support working parents, the evidence does not support the narrative.

I believe that one of the most compelling opportunities we have to position working parents – particularly moms – to be successful in climbing the career ladder is to train them how to more efficiently manage life at home. Organizations invest significant capital in technical training, however, that “sharpening the saw” represents the top part of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Until the bottom half of the pyramid is cared for, or more specifically that our home lives feel in control, working parents will never be fully present and engaged in the workforce.

I am convinced that teaching professionals how to more easily manage all of the non-work parts of life will help them believe a career is more sustainable. This, in turn, will lead to them investing in their career growth. This is a win for working moms because they get the benefits of remaining at work, such as socialization, intellectual stimulation, compensation, etc. It’s a win for families because they have less stressed and more present parents, as well as more disposable income as a byproduct of having dual-income parents. It’s a win for organizations because they have more engaged employees. And it’s a win for society because more women remain in the workforce. I believe the world benefits from having women leaders. We are compassionate, creative, efficient, and resourceful problem solvers.

While I do still remain in corporate now (as Head of Culture at a Fortune 50), I am pouring my soul into building my company – Working Moms Movement – because I believe in building a movement to help busy parents reclaim their control and free time so that they can confidently remain in the workforce without losing their sanity, or themselves!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

As a time and stress management coach for working moms, I’ve come by my trade honestly. Most foundationally, I have lived through being time-poor and on the verge of burnout to a place where I’m now time-abundant with my stress under control. In 2018, I was spiraling. Having two young kids was harder than I imagined, and I couldn’t keep up with everything on my plate. I thought once my youngest was sleeping through the night that everything would look up, but of course that’s not how it works. I had high standards for myself and couldn’t reconcile how I could maintain those as a mom while not falling apart.

I hit my version of rock bottom. My cortisol was extremely high, I wasn’t sleeping, and I couldn’t control my emotions. I was impatient, desperate for sleep, and not at my best. After a particularly challenging week where work took more of me than it deserved, I committed to climbing my way to a place where I was mentally and physically healthy and where I could sustainably thrive in my role as a working mother.

I believe that experts use experts, so my first decision was to invest in a professional to help me fix my chronic sleep and cortisol problems that were both byproducts of my extreme stress. It didn’t happen overnight, but I went from taking hours to fall asleep and waking up in the middle of the night virtually every night, to a place where I get quality, consistent, deep sleep every single night. This is of course one of several factors that also positively affected my cortisol levels.

I also got back to my roots. I am a proud Industrial & Systems Engineer (ISE). ISE, for those not familiar, are trained experts at making processes and systems both efficient and effective. I overhauled my routine and put systems in place that would help make our household run more effectively in ways that demanded less of me, therefore freeing up time for me to redeploy for my family and myself.

And last, I channeled my experience in culture. At its core, culture change is behavior change at scale. At my day job, I essentially try to orchestrate employees to behave in a way that’s consistent with the company’s values. This showed up for me in two ways:
1. I got really clear on what I valued, because what I value drives what I prioritize. And when I’m clear on what I prioritize, I’m more intentional about aligning my resources – time, money, and energy – around these priorities. It helped me eliminate waste that didn’t serve me.
2. I introduced change at a sustainable pace in a way that built long-term habits that would serve me for the rest of my life.

This framework changed my life. It took me from a place where I felt like I was constantly drowning, to one where I feel like I’ve got another 20 years left in me….without sacrificing for my family or for myself!

This framework is the same one I now leverage for my clients and the bones of my signature program – The Life Management System – which aptly is also the name of my podcast. The spirit behind The Life Management System is that every single person has unique values and needs, so we co-create a system to their specific life. But best of all, these lessons and changes will serve them for the rest of their life.

My target market is high-performing working moms who are used to maintaining high standards to do big things. But while those standards got them where they are now, they’re also the same standards that are breaking them. They’re exhausted, they’re burning out, and can’t figure out how to create time to care for themselves. They’re also in the messy middle of raising kids. So often parents think to themselves that “Things will get better when my kid starts sleeping”, or “…when they’re out of diapers,” or “…when they stop napping”, or “…when they’re in elementary school.” But turns out, it’s all just a new version of hard and unless we learn a way to do things differently to make the volume of moving parts more sustainable, we’ll always feel like we’re drowning.

So if this is you…a high-performing mom who’s in the messy middle – likely with multiple kids – who has no time for yourself; is tired of carrying the mental and physical load; and is desperate for extra time and to feel seen, know that I see you. And best of all, know there is another way and I’m here to hold your hand through your journey to peace and time freedom.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

While there are likely others who do something similar to what we do, I believe we’re each a unicorn. It’s our authenticity, our story, our confidence, and our unique credentials that collectively build our brand. This has certainly delivered for me. I am a walking testament to the time and stress freedom promises I make to my clients. I consistently work 60-80 hours per week, have a very close relationship with my family where I can be fully present for my boys, am publishing a children’s book, host a podcast, send a weekly newsletter, chaired my college department’s Advisory Board, travel multiple times a month, and invest fully in my friendships. But most of all, I wear my heart on my sleeve. The people who have gotten to know me can feel how invested I am in their success, which helps build trust.

Moreover, I’ve been fully committed to helping my target audience and have given generously to the working mom community by speaking to companies’ Employee Resource Groups (ERGs), postpartum support groups, etc.. I’ve been steadfast about building meaningful relationships with vendors in tangent markets, particularly within Charlotte where I live. I am a believer in women supporting women and show up selflessly for both my target audience and vendor partners.

My weekly newsletter and podcast – The Life Management System – have also been productive. I pack a lot of punch into each one. They are “snack sized” pieces of content to drive big value in a digestible amount of time for my busy moms on the go. I’ve been pleasantly surprised how well the podcast is received, but especially to help build my reputation as a qualified source.

I also believe my technical skills “credentialize” my ability to promise results in ways that my clients are confident I’ll be able to deliver for them. My degree in Industrial & Systems Engineering, my steady career growth in the behavior-shaping space culminating with me leading this function in a Fortune 50, and my certifications in change management, project management, and my Six Sigma Black Belt all bolster my brand.

How did you build your audience on social media?

As with anything in life, I think it’s important to get clear on the end goal. For me, social media is a way to connect meaningfully with my target audience. I am not there to entertain, but instead hope to make a lasting impact on my community with the information I share. Because of this, my priority has been to connect deeply, instead of chasing numbers. It has also helped me prioritize growing @WorkingMomsMovement on Instagram where my target audience is, instead of feeling the need to manage it all.

Part of my strategy to accomplish this has been my weekly “Mom hack” post. This is a way for moms to hear from others’ so that they feel less alone in the working mom journey. In addition to showcasing the creative way others get by, it’s also a way for me be seen as a credible voice with their audience. Seeing the Working Moms Movement brand shared by a friend is much more meaningful than if they saw the brand shared by a big influencer.

I also strategically leverage others’ audiences though. I want to do it in a way that isn’t perceived as self-serving; productively contributes to my audience; and is with kind, heart-centered working moms. One of my favorite ways to get in front of someone else’s audience is either speaking on their podcast, or hosting them on mine. A story is so much more compelling when you can have a natural conversation about it, then can get those shorts in front of others on social media.

I made the mistake early on of investing in a vendor that could increase my follower count. While I got an almost overnight infusion of 500 followers, they weren’t in my target market. I spent so much time combing through and removing them to protect the intimacy of my community. While I expect I’ll invest again in inorganic support and know it’s necessary to scale, I will be incredibly intentional with my next investment.

That investment will likely coincide with the release of my children’s book, Wally’s First Day of School. This book is about a mom sending her youngest son, Wally, to kindergarten. While it is intended to be read to kids, it is more written for parents to give words to this emotional life milestone. For me, it felt like a form of becoming an “empty nester”. It was hard to believe that the baby years were officially behind me. I’m a highly emotive person and recognize not everyone is, so this book was my love note to parents everywhere. I actually started the process of publishing the book before I had the idea for Working Moms Movement, but conveniently my target audience also has kids this age.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.workingmomsmovement.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/workingmomsmovement/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/workingmomsmovement/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/courtneyca/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@WorkingMomsMovement
• Other: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-life-management-system/id1762298645

Image Credits

I have full usage rights, but the personal photos were taken by Connection Photography.