Smashing the Glass Ceiling #FearlessFriday by Susie Black

FEARLESS FRIDAY

Please welcome Susie Black back to Discover... Her Fearless Friday tale is for sure fearless, and I'm happy to say successful. It's a great story, so read on! And be sure to read to the end where the link to a free swimwear fit guide is just for you.

My maternal grandmother had two favorite expressions: Man plans and God laughs, and nothing turns out the way you think it will. She believed things happen for a reason, even if we don’t always understand why. She warned me to be careful what I wished for since I might get it. That sometimes God punishes us by granting us our wishes, and other times God saves us by not granting them. And that God helps those who help themselves. As I’d come to learn, my wise nana had the secret of life down pat. 

At the end of my college freshman year, my dad, a ladies' apparel sales rep, got a huge opportunity and moved my family from Los Angeles to Miami. Relocating from hip LA to “God’s waiting room” failed to excite me, and I chose not to go. 

Three years later, armed with my journalism degree and a blind idealism only the young can sustain, I dreamed of being a writer, but fate had other plans. A family crisis threw me into an improbable situation. During an Atlanta trade show, my dad needed to leave to attend to the crisis and reached out to me to take over the trade show in his place. I pointed out the obvious to my dad…that the only experience I had with ladies’ apparel is that I wore it. Nonetheless, this was my father…so how could I turn him down? Of course, I couldn’t. 

After only an hour of apparel sales lessons, my dad left me to run the tradeshow for three days. Miraculously, I wrote a huge number of orders and my dad offered me a job as a sub rep. Graduate school wasn’t appealing, so I accepted my dad’s offer. 

Baptism by fire got me into the rag biz. My life veered off in a completely different direction than I intended, and it would never be the same. Despite not knowing a soul there, I moved from Los Angeles to Atlanta. After a week of training, I became a manufacturer’s sales representative and traveled a territory comprised of four states in the deep south. 

While the majority of people were friendly, nothing could have prepared this California kid for the culture shock of living in Dixie. Completely foreign social mores- including anti-Semitism and countless acts of racial discrimination- different cuisine, and a stifling hot and humid climate I never got used to made it seem as though I had moved to another country, and not just another state. 

Schlepping six canvass garment bags filled with heavy samples in and out of numerous stores everyday…it was a tough way to make a buck, and I earned every plug nickel with my sweat, tears, and aching back. 

As a woman working in a traditionally male-dominated industry, I had to prove myself every day. When I started my apparel sales career, no other woman did what I did in the deep southern states. Depending upon who you spoke with, I was either famous or infamous-but one thing was certain: I was the talk of the garment industry. No one-except my mentor father and me- thought I’d last a season. 

Grit and stubborn perseverance to prove them all wrong kept me going, no matter how daunting the
challenge. And prove them wrong I did- and succeeded beyond my wildest dreams. I took a sledgehammer to every glass ceiling I encountered and smashed it to smithereens. And the bonus? I opened many doors for the next generation of women executives to succeed in male-dominated industries. 

But if it wasn’t for my nana urging me to “Keep a journal. Get all your experiences down on paper. Maybe this is the reason you’re in the rag biz. This must be the story you’re destined to write,” I doubt if I ever would have leveraged my successful ladies’ apparel sales career into a writing gig. 

It was my daily journal entries chronicling the interesting, quirky, and often challenging characters I encountered and the crazy situations I got myself into and out of that gave me the stories I’d ultimately write and thanks to Nana, my life completed the destiny of its circle.

Link for Swimwear Fit Guide

https://www.dropbox.com/s/7lerp4cy1al2j0l/CHOOSING%20THE%20RIGHT%20%20SWIMSUIT.pdf?dl=0

Susie's latest great book released November 15.  CLICK HERE

Holly Schlivnik dreams of being a writer, but fate has other plans. A family crisis throws her into an improbable situation and her life will never be the same. Determined to make her own luck when things don’t happen the way she plans, the irrepressible young woman takes a sledgehammer to the glass ceiling and shatters it to smithereens. The wise-cracking, irreverent transplanted Californian goes on a raucous, rollicking rollercoaster ride of hysterical adventures as a ladies' apparel sales rep traveling in the deep South and finds herself along the way.

Susie Black biography

Named Best US Author of the Year by N. N. Lights Book Heaven, award-winning cozy mystery author Susie Black was born in the Big Apple but now calls sunny Southern California home. Like the protagonist in her Holly Swimsuit Mystery Series, Susie is a successful apparel sales executive. Susie began telling stories as soon as she learned to talk. Now she’s telling all the stories from her garment industry experiences in humorous mysteries.

She reads, writes, and speaks Spanish, albeit with an accent that
sounds like Mildred from Michigan went on a Mexican vacation and is trying to fit in with the locals. Since life without pizza and ice cream as her core food groups wouldn’t be worth living, she’s a dedicated walker to keep her girlish figure. A voracious reader, she’s also an avid stamp collector. Susie lives with a highly intelligent man and has one incredibly brainy but smart-aleck adult son who inexplicably blames his sarcasm on an inherited genetic defect.

Looking for more? Contact Susie at:

Website: www.authorsusieblack.com

E-mail: mysteries_@authorsusieblack.com