Jane Genova: Speechwriter - Ghostwriter

The Non Lean Ins: We wobblies are doing fine

Jane Genova — 2013-05-24T09:16:51-04:00

According to the Lean In evangelists, the world is turning into a jungle of female lions who rule everything. I have met one on Facebook and it wasn't pretty. There are a few others in my 12-step support group. My objective is getting in and out of the meeting fast without any real connection with them.

Amidst this infliction of Leaning In on us, there continues to be those with a wobbly sense of self who are doing fine. I am one of them. At age 68, I am still an emotional mess. But, I am earning a very good living through keeping clients delighted with my ghostwriting and speechwriting. I have reared three dogs and seven cats. They lived happy non-obese lives. I help underemployed Baby Boomers re-start the fire in the belly and get more work. I have kept myself out of the nut house, jail, and bankruptcy. What's next? I have ruled out becoming a Buddhist nun. My eye is now on a vacation home in Rhode Island or Ecuador.

The Leaned-In Woman will soon face a profound backlash. The Wobblies like me are more in demand.

Influence: The digital game has changed in blogging

Jane Genova — 2013-05-24T08:43:25-04:00

Unless you're selling advertising, you might forget monitoring the overall traffic on your blogs. Where influence is coming from is not from the average of visitors. Instead, it now happens via the one well-done post which goes viral. Because on the web we're operating in a niche marketplace, the right people will see it. Likely they will pass on that post to more of the right people.

Soon enough there are invitations on LinkedIn to connect. There is a surge in views of my LinkedIn profile. The phone rings with requests for information about how I work and what I charge. And I get more confidence. In this era of uncertainty when we all wonder about The Next, believing in ourselves is everything.

More of my best thinking is now invested in zeroing in on the right topics, with a provocative angle.

NEW HAVEN REGISTER Obits: Remote condolences

Jane Genova — 2013-05-24T07:35:43-04:00

The newspaper industry now can digitally link families of the deceased with those who want to express their condolences.

This week the NEW HAVEN REGISTER published the obituary of a professional acquaintance - Bob Stanley. For 30 years he had worked at Aetna insurance. Next to that is a Guest Book. In it we can record our thought about our relationship with Stanley. We can also read the reflections of others who knew him.

This remote collective mourning has been surprisingly satisfying.

Cockroaches: No wonder we Jersey City kids are so resilient

Jane Genova — 2013-05-23T22:24:32-04:00

"You keep bouncing back!" That's what both my friends and enemies remark.

Now I can answer, "I owe it all to the cockroaches I grew up with in Jersey City." Their own resilience taught me mine. AP reports that the current issue of SCIENCE explains how cockroaches in Florida developed glucose aversion within five years. They did that to prevent getting poisoned by sweet-tasting bait traps.

In Jersey City, no matter how fastidious a person was, once roaches entered the apartment (we were urban kids) they were never going to leave. I observed. Then I applied those survival and comeback lessons to my own career challenges. My business is bouncing back nicely from the last recession.

Thank You for Not Sharing Your Photos

Jane Genova — 2013-05-23T01:31:41-04:00

No question, we're in a visual era. But I have come to select my new friends on the basis of if they spare me the constant updating of their lives and those of their families and pets through photos.

It used to be in our Baby Boomer youth, young adulthood, and middle age that this visual rite happened only at Christmas. That cute dog with a red-stocking hat made it onto the family Christmas card. Now, it's several times a day. And not only on Facebook.

Call it photo fatigue. I thank my new circle of friends for not sharing their photos.

Anthony Weiner, The Candidate: What's he up to?

Jane Genova — 2013-05-22T21:43:48-04:00

Anthony Weiner carries the Scarlet "L" Letter, standing both for "lewd" and "liar." He has entered the race for mayor of New York City as politicos distance themselves and polls show he's not doing so hot. So, we have to wonder what's he up to.

Could this be a dry run for something else, to test the waters as to how badly he has damaged himself? As the saying goes, you don't know anything about anything until you're in it, doing it. He has prepared for this with a high-profile media campaign, including a lengthly feature in THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE.

Or, does he have the ego strength to believe he could win? His message is targeted at New York City's middle class who have been losing ground. Can he convince them that he has come to save them?

Or, is the guy delusional? Comebacks are made all the time. Among them has been Henry Blodget who heads BUSINESS INSIDER. However, comebacks take time. The sinner has to spend enough time in purgatory. Weiner hasn't. Andrew Cuomo, after his political and marital meltdown, spent considerable time in the political wilderness. It was enough time.

Most political shows are fascinating to observe and deconstruct. This could be simply sad. The timing is off.

ESPN Eliminating 300-400 Jobs: Uneasy lies the head employed in glam media

Jane Genova — 2013-05-22T07:35:58-04:00

Sadness, not surprise, followed announcements by traditional media such as the DAILY NEWS and COLUMBIA JOURNALISM REVIEW that there were layoffs. Now, we're puzzled that sports broadcaster ESPN, owned by Walt Disney, announced it is eliminating 300 to 400 jobs, some through layoffs, some through not filling them. It contends, reports NEW YORK Magazine, that the expense of acquiring the rights to broadcast games has risen. Thus the need for the cutbacks.

If popular, profitable niche player ESPN is reducing headcount, then all those in media or planning to enter media have to get it that there is no security in the industry. To paraphrase a Shakespeare history play, uneasy lies the head that is employed in the glam field of media.

Envy is probably the appropriate term to describe how those of us in less volatile lines of work like ghostwriting/speechwriting viewed careers in media. Those folks had daily bylines. They were interviewed or conducted interviews on television and online video. They traveled the world. They attended VIP events. And we toiled by our Microsoft Word, invisible, isolated, and not going very far from our home office.

Maybe access to glam is too high a price to pay in a dicey global economy disrupted by technology. One seems to become fodder for the bean counters.

Media: Surviving on a lot less

Jane Genova — 2013-05-21T22:21:16-04:00

Maybe it started when I shifted back to executive communications from social media. Then it could have reached a tipping point when Mediabistro.com morning media news feed kept being released later and later in the day. I stopped keeping up with all the developments reported by the media. Nothing happened, at least negatively.

Assignments in executive communications, unlike the trending keywords in social media, don't demand up-to-the-minute tracking of what's going on in the world. Also, those assignments require time and focus. They are not short takes. Currently I start my work day not checking about 10 news sites. I have to plow right into the book, article, and speech.

Who really needs so much media, in addition to SEO players? Well, David Letterman's writers do. And, of course, those in the media niche themselves.

An accidental benefit is that I'm more social. I don't share with everyone breaking news. They seem to be responding better to me this way, more interested in them and less frantic.

OUT and THE ADVOCATE: Will they modify upbeat tone?

Jane Genova — 2013-05-21T17:00:14-04:00

Alternate-sex lifestyle publications OUT and THE ADVOCATE still arrive snail mail in a plain gray wrapper. I subscribe to follow trends in outlier media. However, in the past several months the tone in both has been upbeat. As it should. Across generations we have accepted not only gay culture but also gay marriage.

However, with the recent violent hate crimes against gays in Manhattan, a usually liberal mecca, that tone might become more subdued. NEW YORK Magazine chronicles three incidents. The battle has not been won.

The success of gay rights, I am convinced, is a model for Baby Boomers to have our own aggressive campaign for better treatment. We are invisible. Also, as soon as I walked into job interviews (obviously they hadn't googled me), jaws dropped. Actually that worked out fine since I have returned to freelancing and am making more money doing that than I would have in any full-time position.

If gays continue to suffer, so will we the aging.

Suicide: We know to be prepared, but still devastating

Jane Genova — 2013-05-21T09:01:20-04:00

In 12-step programs, from the get-go they warn us that there will be suicides. When it comes to the sorts of things human beings join 12-step programs for, the options are do it right, or kill yourself, go insane, or spend most of your life in prison.

Warned, yes. But we were not prepared for the suicide of one of our members in a North Haven, Connecticut 12-step group. Seven days a week he was at a meeting. He gave out anniversary coins at the Thursday evening meeting. He talked the good talk, which maybe should have tipped us off that he was in trouble. That included saying he was managing the blow that during the divorce process, his former wife had lost her job. At their age, there would not be a comparable one. So, he was saddled with alimony he did not expect to pay. He worked that out to protect his pension. The financial horror could become less horrible when his daughter, who he was helping pay for her Master's degree, received it this month.

Last night at our Monday night speaker's meeting we found out that he had committed suicide. Perhaps he did not share his suffering enough? Perhaps two years in the rooms were not enough to get a handle on that suffering? Whatever. The disease of alcoholism claims another fine human being.