Let’s take a moment to sit back and appreciate what is about the happen tomorrow.

No matter which side you’re on, history will be made — a black president, or a female vice president.

The rule book in this country will surely change. But what about the workplace rulebook?

There is still rampant discrimination in our nation’s offices and factories.

Pregnancy bias is up to record levels. “Working women in the United States filed 65 percent more complaints of pregnancy discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission than they filed in 1992. A sampling of these claims found that complaints filed by women of color and those working in industries dominated by female workers fueled much of this sharp increase,” according to a new study by the National Partnership for Women & Families

Racial discrimination is on the rise. “Racial harassment cases have more than doubled since the early 1990s, hitting an all-time high of 6,977 in 2007. (Blacks file nine out of 10 race harassment charges.) From fiscal 2000 to 2007, the EEOC received 51,000 racial harassment charge filings nationwide, already over the number received during the entire 1990s.”

And I’ve written often about how women only make up about 13 percent of all the top executives positions at the nation’s corporations.

Clearly, we have a long way to go before people of color and women are given the respect they deserve in the workplace, but I wondered if on Wednesday all that would change.

I asked some experts in workplace bias whether the discriminatory environment would be altered by the election?

I must confess to be extremely excited regarding the fact we will either have our first minority President in history OR our first female Vice President in history. I had always hoped that we would move in this direction, but was never sure we would achieve such a result in my lifetime.

I think that one of the best things we have seen during the campaign is recognition of the fact that neither Sen. Obama nor Gov. Palin is really that different from our traditional white male politicians. (I would also include Sen. Clinton in this group given her work during the Democratic primaries.) They are as capable, as articulate, etc. as our traditional leaders. I think this fact should help to eliminate the impact of negative stereotyping based on race or gender in all aspects of our lives.

Workers and employers who may have thought that certain jobs are for males or for whites are beginning to realize how inappropriate those ideas are in the 21st century.

This is truly a historic time. It will be most interesting to see the outcome of Tues. vote and to see whether Pres. Obama or
Pres. McCain will finally expand civil rights protection to include sexual orientation, as a number of states have already done. This is one of the last major categories to be excluded from federal civil rights protection, and it would be nice to see Title VII amended to include this factor.

– Charles B. Craver
Freda H. Alverson Professor
George Washington University Law School

I think possibly, and that it depends on who that Black man or woman was. Generally one would quickly say yes, in answer to such a question, but it would definitely depend on the person in office. In this case, I think of Sarah Palin, whose views are not necessarily supportive of women’s rights. Her being in a top position might not be so helpful. I think also of the politician Keys who was sent from Maryland in a last ditch effort to run against Barack Obama for Illinois State Senator. Not all politicians in political offices would necessarily be good for people of color and women.

Having said that, I think that were Barack Obama to become president, it would be helpful in shaping some widespread unconscious negative perceptions about Blacks, which might help reduce discrimination somewhat. The next president will also be likely to appoint some Supreme court justices, who have been increasingly conservative and prone to vote against equal rights for women, people of color, and sexual minorities. Again, if the right person were elected, discrimination might be reduced or recourses for such might be less likely to be experience exclusionary legal decisions.

– Myrtle P. Bell, Ph.D.
Associate Editor, Academy of Management Learning & Education
Professional Insights Editor, Equal Opportunities International
University of Texas at Arlington

Having an African American President may help other minorities in the workplace through example. We often only talk about the glass ceiling for women, but it can also exist for minorities in the workplace. Yet, when we observe one of our own (i.e. a woman, minority) excel and make it to the top of the ladder, it can have a dramatic effect on the negative perception of being stymied in the workplace due to discriminatory attitudes and beliefs.

In other words, we begin to believe that we can accomplish great achievements as well, and that negative attitudes and stereotypes will not kill our dreams.

– Sherril Colombo
Labor & Employment Attorney
Cozen O’Connor

As a general rule, I doubt there will be a sea change in discrimination law or the workplace if Obama becomes president, or if Palin becomes VP. Certainly the victory of Obama would reinforce globally and in the US the fact that all persons are equal and should be judged solely on their individual merit and accomplishments, without artificial barriers.

If Obama wins, and/or if the Democrats achieve a veto-proof majority in both houses of Congress (which would also give them the ability to defeat any filibuster attempts by the Republicans), several bills will certainly pass which will alter the workplace landscape to some degree.

One example which comes immediately to mind is that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 will be amended to prohibit employment discrimination due to sexual orientation and perhaps transgender issues. Some states currently prohibit such discrimination, but the federal law does not.

A second example would be the passage of a bill currently in Congress titled the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would amend the Equal Pay Act to make it significantly easier for women in particular to prove discrimination in pay practices. The House passed that bill in July, but it is currently dead in the Senate. Obama is on record as supporting that bill, and would certainly support the amendment of Title VII concerning sexual orientation.

If McCain/Palin win, the Democrats would likely need a veto-proof majority in both houses to see the above-mentioned bills become law. I would not expect Palin’s election to otherwise alter the law of the workplace in any other manner.

–Lawrence J. McNamara
Labor and Employment Attorney
Spencer Crain Cubbage Healy & McNamara

Our nation and institutions—including the businesses where we work—have become far less discriminatory and more inclusive over the last few decades. However, many of us still act in ways that unintentionally discriminate.

How bad is it? In this week’s New York Times Nicholas Kristof describes a research study in which California college students, many of them Obama supporters, unconsciously perceived him as less American than the former British Prime Minister, Tony Blair.

My colleague, Joan Reede MD, Harvard Medical School’s Dean for Diversity & Community Partnership, and I recently published a research piece that identifies seven unintentional forms of discriminatory behavior that are common and costly within today’s business environment. Sixty-two percent of minorities and fifty-three percent of women we surveyed experience one or more of these discriminatory behaviors at least monthly; ninety-six percent say these incidents cause them to make negative judgments about whether their organization values equity and fairness; and fifty-three percent say that, when these problems occur, no one confronts or discusses them.

I think the election of a black man or a woman vice president will actually have a fairly dramatic impact on these unconscious, or at least thoughtless, forms of discrimination. Here’s why. Humans are very poor at detecting and recognizing gradual change. We don’t see problems that creep up on us until a crisis happens. After the crisis, when we look back, the pattern seems obvious. We don’t understand how we could have missed it. Some examples? The gradual rise of extremism followed by 911; the gradual rise in global warming followed by Hurricane Katrina; the gradual loosening of financial regulations followed by our current meltdown.

The same inability to see patterns occurs when things are getting better. The roles that blacks and women play in our society have steadily improved, but this election will be the lightning bolt that makes these changes visible. We will look back on Wednesday and see black and women achievers everywhere—at the tops of their professions. And I think this realization will sink deeply into our psyche in ways that will finally defeat at least a few of our unconscious biases.

–David Maxfield
Coauthor
“Influencer: The Power to Change Anything”

My gut feeling is there will be divided opinions and feelings in offices and factories about discrimination in the workplace if there is an African American president or female vice president. However, I think minorities, particularly African Americans, will be viewed in a more favorable light by Caucasian workers, though subtle discrimination will probably continue. I think more minorities will undertake leadership roles at work and feel more comfortable about doing so. I also think minorities and women will feel more empowered about engaging in dialogue in business meetings/conferences and will be taken more seriously by their Caucasian counterparts.

–A. Martin Wickliff, Jr.
attorney
Epstein Becker Green Wickliff & Hall

I will include other contributions from experts as they come in, but take a moment to share your thoughts.

Will this election transform that workplace hater into a workplace healer?

Think of Sarah Palin as just another job seeker looking to advance her career.

She knows that you need to look money if you want to impress hiring managers, aka, the American voters.

Sorry folks, that’s just the reality.

If you go into a job interview looking like Oliver — you know that poor kid from the 1960s musical — you’ll be shown the door pretty quick. I don’t care what position you’re applying for.

I was in Target the other day and whenever I’m in there I make a point to look at those tiny desks near the cash registers where job seekers come in and fill out job applications.

These desks have been pretty full lately, and not just with teens looking for part time work.

Anyway, I noticed a guy, maybe in his twenties, at one of these desks, and he looked like he had just rolled out of bed. (It was around noon.)

I couldn’t believe what he was wearing — old, dirty jeans, and a rumpled bomber jacket that was made out of a shiny, cheap polyester, a real China special.

This guy may have gotten the gig a few years back, but today, with the economy sinking, there’s a good chance he won’t get past the first interview.

This is the reality out there — you have to command respect from people who are considering giving you a job. If you look like a schlub you’re in trouble.

That’s why I’ve been perplexed at pundits lately who have been harping on Palin’s wardrobe. I’m not talking about the debate over whether voter donation money should have been used for her clothing. I’m talking about the debate over whether she should be spending lots of money on her look at all.

I argue, yes she should.

She’s going for one of the biggest positions in the country, vice president. I don’t care if she’s trying to sell herself as a hockey mom or not, she should not be shopping at Wal-Mart for her wardrobe.

Today, whether we like it or not, there’s a lot of crap clothing out there sold at these big box stores. You can spot this cheap stuff a mile away, and I’m sure we’d be making fun of Palin even more if she looked like a bargain basement babe.

The media has already cut her into little pieces over her glasses and her 1950s hairdo. Can you imagine if she had a personal shopper at Sears outfit her look?

This does not just apply to politicians.

Layoff announcements are pouring in the last few days, and I can feel a sense of panic among many people out there who have lost their jobs or are afraid of being next on the chopping block.

Everyone wants a leg up about now, and besides getting more education, credentials and networking contacts, sprucing up your appearance is also a good idea.

But don’t go to the extreme.

I’ve written a lot lately on how getting plastic surgery in order to land a job is a stupid idea. But that doesn’t mean looks don’t play a role in our careers.

There are many of you out there who scratch your heads every time you see a dumb, attractive person moving up in the ranks or getting that great job. I get a bunch of emails about this from readers of my MSNBC.com column. One thing I hear a lot about is the “sexy-woman syndrome.”

Here’s a recent sample:

The operations manager was a woman and often came to work scantily dressed with her breasts exposed to nipple line and in her jeans had tears in them that revealed her underwear. On top of this, she was very difficult to work with, neglected our project in favor of other projects and we were falling behind.

This reader, Jeanette, went to her boss and complained about the sexy woman’s behavior and how the project was going to be delayed as a result and the response she got from her supervisor:

Essentially, he placated me and said that the project would be completed in time and that I was making a big deal out of it. When I pressed him and asked why we enable her behavior, he said that maybe we like the way she looks.

This whole scenario made Jeanette so mad that even though she’s left this employer she emailed me to ask my opinion on what transpired.

“What would you recommend in case this happens again in the future?,” she asks.

What do I recommend? Nothing. You can’t win this battle folks. Even Palin’s sex appeal is garnering her some favor.

The one thing Jeanette said in her email is that she is attractive but she doesn’t play that up at work. Hello, nothing wrong with playing that up. I wouldn’t choose a low cut shirt to do it but a great, tailored, fitted suit can show off your attributes without inviting gawks from the perverts at the office.

And you want to look appealing to any one who’s considering hiring you. Nothing wrong with that. There have been endless studies done on how attractive people typically make more money than their plain counterparts. A story today in the New York Times Style section that touts how “Ugly Is In”, spends much of the piece talking about how the unattractive are screwed. Sorry Ugly Betty.

My advice is to spend some cash on a suit, or outfit. I’m not saying you should go out and buy a whole new wardrobe but that one interview suit is critical. Look at it as an investment.

My best buddy who’s a high-powered attorney in Boston is all about looking good because it inspires more than just confidence from her bosses but it inspires confidence in herself. “You look good you feel good” is her motto.

Now, let me make this clear, just because you spend $150,000 on your wardrobe doesn’t mean you are guaranteed to land the gig of your dreams. But the people that typically get the job are the ones that look like they don’t need it.

Do parents with young children ever have personal time?

I don’t mean time off to clean the house, or go to a kid’s recital. I mean time to just hang on the couch or engage in a favorite hobby.

My husband Andy and I had a whopper of a discussion/fight over this very issue this morning.

His human resource department advised him this week that he needed to take his personal days or risk losing them; and I suggested he take some time to go to his daughter’s school this Friday. The teacher needed volunteers for a Halloween party and I figured it would be a good thing for him to go in and connect with her teacher.

This suggestions did not make him happy. Why? Both of us have been burning the candle at both ends lately. Work has been crazy and, with all the kids extracurricular activities, we have only two nights during the week where there isn’t something to do. Also, soccer eats up most of our Saturdays, and Sundays are packed with fix-it projects for Andy, and a host of other house duties for both of us.

I don’t blame him for feeling overwhelmed, but how the heck do you make sure your kids are doing well in school and manage work, house, etc., and still have time for yourself.

Time for yourself. Ahhhhhhhh. Is that just a pipe dream when you become a parent?

At some point during our discussion, Andy started chanting, “work, eat, sleep. Work, eat, sleep. Work, eat, sleep. Work, eat, sleep.”

“Is that all there is?” he wondered loudly.

I couldn’t help but think to myself that the answer to that question might be “yes.”

A scary thought, but it may very well be our reality for the next decade or so.

Any thoughts from all of you out there? Do you also feel this way? Have you found ways around it? Do you have precious personal time?

By the way, Andy just volunteered to go to our daughter’s school Friday, on his personal day.

What if someone came to you when you were 13 and told you to forget about following your dream of becoming a doctor, an artist, or the president of the United States?

That’s sort of what’s happening right now in the shape of career services geared toward teens.

There is an increasing desire among parents to figure out what their kids are going to become when they grow up earlier and earlier. With college costs skyrocketing, few parents want to see their kids floundering from major to major during college and ending up on the five or six year graduation plan.

That has prompted some parents to get there kids aptitude testing as early as 12 years old so they can find out fast if they’re cut out to be lawyers or botanists, or what ever wacky career kids get it in their head to pursue.

A young man from Illinois I interviewed in my MSNBC.com column this week wanted to become a surgeon until, that is, his mom got him to a career counseling service that told him he just wasn’t cut out for the profession. The career counselors gave him a dexterity test and the poor kid failed miserably.

Coincidentally, the day I interviewed this kid I had an appointment with an ear doctor because I’ve been having trouble hearing through my right ear. The doctor was also a surgeon so I told him about the story I was writing and whether a test like that could really determine whether someone should pursue medicine or not.

He said, “no way.” There are very few people who are naturals when it comes to surgery, he added, “most of us have to learn this.”

Then he went on to joke about how bad his dexterity was as he poked my inner ear with a sharp object. Very funny.

Anyway, when I got back to my office I decided to take one of these career/aptitude tests and see if I was really cut out to be a journalist. I went online and found a free test that took only a few minutes to take. I was honest with everything on the test but my birth date. I wanted the test to think I was a young kid. (Guys, if you take this, don’t give out your personal information and don’t buy anything.)

So, what did the test think I should do with my life?

No, not journalism.

I was cut out for, drum roll…..

Eve, your test reveals that Government/Policy may be a great fit for you.

Seriously folks. Here are some sample job titles that would work for me:

Urban and regional planner; state legislator; tax examiner; judge; municipal clerk.

Tax examiner!

Wow, never would have thought that. I hate doing my own taxes.

Anyway, the point of all this is these tests blow. Well, they don’t blow, but they definitely can’t tell you what you should do with the rest of your life.

Is it a smart idea to be filling kids heads with “nos” when maybe we should be filling their little heads with “yeses”? When I say, yes, I mean, why not encourage them to follow their dreams and maybe knock around a bit until they figure it all out? I know many people who change their career paths several times, well into their 40s and 50s.

I love what I do. I get up every morning and can’t wait to do my job. I miss it when I’m out on vacation, or in bed sick. Chances are a career test at 12, about the time I decided to become a reporter, would have tried to convince me to take another path.

In all honesty, my guidance counselor in junior high school laughed out loud when I told her I wanted to be a journalist when I grew up. My grades in English were horrific, and she stomped on my dreams like she would a big hairy spider.

When I got home I told my mother what had happened. She hugged me, wiped away a tear or two, and said, in her broken English, “that lady is stupid. You can do what you want.”

Career dreams are part aptitude part want. But often the “want” part is the most important part.

Layoffs are spreading like a virus. Chrysler, Yahoo, Goldman Sachs, Xerox, Merck all announced job cuts in recent days and most economists now believe the economic downturn is going to hit employees hard.

Jobless claims are at recessionary levels already and most analysts believe the worst is yet to come.

Everyone out there wants to tell you how you can keep your job during the bad times, but it’s time for a reality check folks.

There isn’t a lot you can do if your number comes up when managers are crafting the pink-slip list. I’ve been through a few downturns in my day, and most often the head honchos at most companies panic during times like this. They hack and slash and hold their collective breaths, hoping that the stupid, seat-of-their-pants moves they make will help them from loosing their jobs.

That’s just the way it goes. Few managers actually think about the bottom-line, about the long term and how certain employees will help them weather the tough times.

All they see is a bunch of heads and they typically start cutting the most expensive heads first, that is, not those in the corner office, but those regular Joes and Janes that make more than the other Joes and Janes.

But unfortunately, the idiots push out the people with the most experience as a result, experience that probably would come in handy right about now. And that’s just a dumb idea.

I’m telling you this because I want all of us to take a deep breath and realize that there will be little rhyme or reason to what happens at many firms as the employee cuts come down. So people, don’t take any of this personally and don’t spend too much energy trying to figure out why they cut you as opposed to someone else. That’s a lot of job-searching energy wasted.

With all that said, I will still offer you some tips on ways that might help you to keep your job. Emphasis on the “might.”

Maybe you work for one of those companies that actually use some forethought before they start handing out the pink slips. For this reason, and this reason alone, I’m offering these suggestions.

1. Make sure people think you’re working hard right about now. Coming in late and leaving early is probably not a great idea.
2. Make some friends. Loners are typically the ones with targets on their heads so take a coworker out to lunch, or ask a supervisor to have a cup of coffee.
3. Move to a division that’s making money. If you’re sure your department is bleeding red ink, it might be a good time to move to another department if you can, even if the position you can secure isn’t the perfect one.
4. Let people know what you’re doing. To often we assume our bosses know how hard we’re working and what we’re accomplishing. This is a load of crap. No one is watching your every move, especially in tough times. So keep your managers up to date on your work. Don’t be a pest, just send an occasional email, or pop into your manager’s office now and then to update them.

But I’m not saying you should kiss anyone’s ass right now. Just do your job and be smart about what the future may hold.

If you suspect layoffs maybe coming, it’s a good time to update your resume and reach out to contacts you have in your industry. If you haven’t gotten on LinkedIn or Facebook yet, pick one already and sign up.

Before the ax is about to fall and you know it’s going to behead you, Stephen Viscusi, author of “Bulletproof Your Job”, had a good suggestion that may save you your job. He suggests you talk to your boss about alternatives. “Say, ‘Let me take less, or work 3 days a week, instead of 5,’” he advises. “It is better to have a job than none.”

And be a bit selfish, Viscusi adds.

“Don”t worry about co-workers losing their jobs. Devise your own strategy for you only. Gossip is gold. Don’t be ‘the office gossip.’ but know who that person is, there is a grain of truth to all gossip-find out the who and the what of is going on — be prepared.”

Unlike me, he believes a bit of brown-nosing isn’t horrible.

“If it came down to brown nosing, what is wrong with that? Everyone loves flattery, even the boss. However I am describing getting the boss to ‘empathize why they should keep you’, and fire someone else. It is about making the boss’s job easier, being low maintenance, and letting the boss know the personal you. For instance, if your husband died in 9/11 and the boss did not know that, now is the time to bring it up.”

What do you all think? Is Viscusi pushing the keep-your-job envelope too far?

The summer after Nancy Calderon had her baby she became a partner at accounting giant KPMG.

She went through quite a tough pregnancy, having to telecommute for the bulk of her nine months before the baby came at a time telecommuting was not the norm at the firm.

But motherhood and months of being out of the office didn’t send her careening onto the Mommy Track.

Why? It wasn’t a magic spell folks.

She had quite a few things working in her favor – a desire to keep her career going and understanding managers.

“I was able to be a good mommy and still do a good job,” she says.

That’s right at the heart of what so many women, and men want. To be good parents but to also excel at their chosen profession.

It’s not an easy task, but it can be done.

Tomorrow I’m giving a speech about “Staying off the Mommy Track” in Richmond at the Virginia State Society for Human Resource Management conference. And the bottom line, as far as I see it, is empowering women to fight for what they need in the workplace so they can keep their careers thriving.

I know, we need Corporate American to get on board as well. But how do we get an established system that has long catered to men who had wives that stayed at home to change? Women have to play a pivotal role.

Calderon attributes several factors to her success.

A mentor was the first thing she mentioned when I asked her.

“I had a mentor who had two children and she successfully managed a career,” she explains. The woman had been Caldernon’s manager and then the relationship turned into one of mentor and mentee.

“She really had great expectations for me, constantly encouraging me,” she says. “There were a lot of hard days when I had my daughter. She was two months premature, and she always kept encouraging me.”

Calderon also worked her butt off so there would be no way people would think she had “checked out” when she became a mom. “People would get emails from me at midnight and the early morning,” she adds.

KPMG also had a culture that wanted to support working moms, she says, and she trusted her managers.

Most of all, she was lucky enough to have a supportive family. Even though both she and her husband work, they were able to coordinate their schedules to accommodate the kids when one of them needed to travel, and their extended family also helped out.

Clearly, making it work requires more than just wishful thinking.

Calderon stresses that women have to be proactive when it comes to creating a work situation that works for them and their employers.

The problem she sees is “most people aren’t asking for it.”

On another Mommy Track note, I had the nerve to defend Sarah Palin earlier this week in a blog post on the Huffington Post.

I got so mad that everybody was dogging Palin for taking her kids on work trips I wanted to write about it.

Oh boy, did I get an earful from readers.

Basically, I made the case that if women are ever going to become leaders in any great numbers, the system would have to change to accommodate the changing family structure. Today most men and women work even though they have children at home, and unfortunately Corporate American and the political arena have not adapted to this phenomenon.

We are all pretending the structure of the American family hasn’t changed, that only one parent works and the other stays home.

That’s not the case anymore.

Leaders who are hired to run our corporations or voted into office, come to the table with a new reality…a spouse that works.

That means we have to start considering what will happen to the children of these leaders in this new mix because that impacts a leader.

We’ve all been fed a line folks, that women have to pretend they don’t have children and grin and bare any parenting hurdles that stumble into their career path. Well, most men in power never had to worry about that.

So, if we want to level the playing field it’s time to demand new rules.

Here’s an excerpt from my blog on Huffington Post:

(If women are going to avoid becoming road kill on the Mommy Track, things are going to have to change when it comes to what we’re willing to give our leaders in politics and in Corporate America.

Sarah Palin wants to bring her kids on work trips because women are still the main kid watchers and kid nurturers in most American families.

Sorry folks, that’s just the reality.

The women who are outraged that she used state funds to bring her kids along better shut up and shut up quick.

These are the types of accommodations that have to be made if we’re going to get more women in the corner offices.)

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this issue. Please put your feelings about Palin aside for a moment.

Is it a big deal if presidential campaigns bash Muslims?

It’s just part of the political mudslinging, no? It won’t impact the Average Joe or Average Jalaal. Right?

Wrong!

How do you think bigots in the workplace get the balls to undermine or harass workers that are different than they are, dress differently than they do, pray to a different god?

If they hear surrogates of John McCain spewing hate about Muslims on the stump it’s like a free prejudice pass.

And folks, this isn’t just a recent phenomenon. Hillary Clinton even stoked the anti-Muslim flames when she was running against Obama in the primaries.

It amazes me that people can be so desperate for power they’ll use anything they can to grab it.

That’s why I was heartened when I heard Colin Powell this week on Meet the Press.

If you guys missed it here’s a video of the interview. I suggest you listen to it all, especially the part about Muslim bashing.

For those of you who don’t have time to listen to the entire interview, here’s an excerpt of a key part:

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.” Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, “He’s a Muslim and he might be associated terrorists.” This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

Exactly! And at the risk of tooting my own horn, I wrote about this in the Huffington Post months ago in a blog post titled, “So What If Obama Were Muslim?”

In it, I talked about the Muslim bias that had been bubbling up during the election process:

Race has been the linchpin in American bigotry, but after two planes flew into the World Trade Center towers, everything seemed to shift a bit.

Proof of the transformation has been evident during this presidential contest.

Rumors that Obama may be a Muslim are reported in the press as a “smear campaign.”

The bias is not merely stuck in politics. It will, and already has, permeated the workplace.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, recently reported that there were 2,652 incidents and e of anti-Muslim violence, discrimination and harassment in 2007 — “the highest number of civil rights cases ever recorded in the Washington-based group’s report.”

The study found that, “discrimination in the workplace against those already employed increased by 18 percent, with 384 cases reported in 2006 and 452 cases reported in 2007. There was also a 34 percent increase in reports of discrimination against those seeking employment. Cases involving denial of religious accommodation in the workplace jumped eight percent.”

Politicians may think they can say anything during an election and it will all go away once Nov. 5th rolls around. But unfortunately, the seeds sowed by the recent hateful/political speech will inevitably grow into weeds that choke Muslim workers in the workplace and beyond unless more people like Powell say enough is enough.

I love my kids. They mean everything in the world to me. When they came into my life my world changed forever.

Given all this, I have tried to keep myself, Eve, as intact as possible. This is hard, no way around it, especially when you feel like you’re drowning in a sea of homework and toys.

I started thinking about this today when I read the suicide rate among white middle-aged women, between 40 and 64, is escalating.

The researchers don’t know why the numbers have jumped, but one experts, Dr. Jan Fawcett, a professor of psychiatry at the University of New Mexico, surmises: “the kids leave home and that changes everything.”

“When you get into middle age and start evaluating whether your dreams have been fulfilled – when you realize you’re not going to be a Master of the Universe and besides that you’re balding and aging—that can be hard,” Fawcett told the Chicago Tribune in a blog post about the alarming suicide study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Here is some of the data:

Between 1999 and 2005, the suicide rate for white women age 40 to 64 rose 3.9 percent annually. The raw numbers show a 35 percent jump, from 2,429 suicides in this group in 1999 to 3,280 in 2005.

The rate among white men is also on the rise, but not as dramatically as their female counterparts.

More from the Tribune:

What we’re seeing is the emergence of white, middle-age people as a “new high-risk group for suicide,” the authors write in the journal article.

Why is this happening – and why now?

“Really, we don’t know,” said Susan Baker, an author of the new study and a professor with the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Perhaps, she notes, Baby Boomers are more prone to depression, drug abuse and their counterparts—despair and hopelessness. Perhaps women have become more vulnerable to mood disorders as they’ve pulled back on taking hormone replacement therapy around menopause.

We’re not sure what the reason is, but I think this is a good time for women every where, especially moms, to rethink their personal lives and their careers or lack of careers.

I hear from many women who feel like they lost their identities to motherhood, and that’s not acceptable in this day and age. Reach out to your spouse, your family, your friends, NOW.

Being a mom is hard, and no one can change that. But being miserable and feeling down about yourself and your life choices is something you have control over.

Make things better! Find a career, return to a career, work part time, volunteer, rediscover hobbies/passions from youth.

You’re in there somewhere. I can see you underneath that thick mommy skin.

UPDATE: Some of you have asked me if the study included any figures on if the women who committed suicide were married, mothers, employed, or not. I emailed an author of the study Holly C. Wilcox, assistant professor at the Dept. of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, and unfortunately, says, the data they evaluated did not have that level of detail.

A while ago I wrote about a stupid move Circuit City made regarding its veteran sales workforce.

The company decided last year to fire 3,400 of their highest-paid clerks and replace them with workers who would take less money.

My story sparked quite a bit of outrage in the blogesphere against the electronics retailer, and almost every analyst called it a dumb business decision that would take a bloody bite out of employee morale and also create a crummy shopping experience for customers.

But Circuit City management stuck to their guns. So what was the outcome?

It turned out to be a bust.

This from the Associated Press today:

Circuit City Stores Inc. is considering closing at least 150 locations and slash thousands of jobs to avoid filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, a report said Monday.

A report in the Wall Street Journal said people familiar with Circuit City’s plans said the store closings and job cuts could allow the retailer to liquidate $350 million in inventory that could be used to pay real-estate costs, including leases on abandoned sites. Circuit City, the nation’s second-largest consumer electronics retailer, could then try and renegotiate leases with existing landlords, the report said.

Surprise, surprise. Trying to create a third-world workforce in the Good Old USA doesn’t garner a lot of customer or employee loyalty.

Maybe they should hire back those former employees, the ones management thought were grossly overpaid at $8 to $15 an hour.

One question I love to ask successful men and women when I interview them is — “What are some of the biggest mistakes you’ve made in your career?”

The CEOs that tend to be the most savvy and successful, tend to be the ones that will tell you every detail of mistakes they’ve made and what they learned as a result. (My column today on MSNBC.com is about whether admitting mistakes is a good career move.)

I devoted a whole chapter in my book, “From the Sandbox to the Corner Office”, to fumbles the top executives experienced, and recently I went back and researched many of these top dogs to see what they were doing now.

I found out one of the guys in my book made a doozy of a screw up a couple of years ago that cost him his job.

Brian Keane, the former CEO of technology services firm Keane Inc., a company his father John founded, stepped down from his post amid a firestorm of sexual harassment charges by two Keane employees.

In a statement, the company said Keane denied the charges but admitted to behavior that “reflected poor judgment.”

One of the alleged victims in the harassment case got a $1.14 million settlement.

I’m sharing this story with you all, because it’s a good example of how careers can collapse almost instantaneously; that poor judgment in business can have severe ramifications.

I don’t know what the circumstances were regarding Keane and the two women he once worked with. But clearly, it didn’t bode well for this once high-flying CEO.

Here’s an excerpt of Keane’s section on mistakes from my book that eerily foreshadows his ultimate demise:

“My dad’s father had a saying, and my dad always told it to me, ‘your hard luck can be your good luck but only if you take advantage of it.’ Imagine being a kid and hearing that 200 times. The main point is not whether you face adversity but how you respond to it.”
Being upfront with his mistakes, he believes, made him a better leader. “Acknowledging the mistake and getting it out in the open becomes a means to learning for everyone involved,” he says. “So you go and make a mistake, maybe it cost you millions of dollars. You have to look at it as a million dollar investment in learning.”

I wonder what he learned from his last big mistake?