By MARCIA MOXAM
COMRIE Free designer suits, a new job and a new life, — all of these
things can be found in a small building in Jamaica – a place where new opportunities
are being created each day and women are buttoning up on the fast track to success.
In two adjacent buildings on 116th Avenue and Merrick Boulevard two
vastly different preparations are underway daily.
In one building, people are being prepared at the end of life, in the other, women are
being prepared to start new lives.
Inside a building adjacent to a local funeral home, Dress for Success, an organization,
which suits and supports women for new lives as career women is building new beginnings
for career-minded women.
Getting Fitted For the Future |
At Dress For Success, racks of designer suits line the walls and shelves
are stocked with shoes ready for women who want to "hit the pavement" in search
of a new job.
Working for Dress for Success is a job that suits Alexis
Greene and her clients.
|
There’s a volunteer steam-pressing a suit in the
middle of the open room while another volunteer – a college student – prepares
fliers on a computer as they get ready for a publicity blitz.
In another area of the room, Rhonda Taylor-Becton is being
fitted for a suit. She has just found a new job wearing a donated suit from this very room
and she’s back for a follow up suit to start her job.
She is as excited as a little girl in her Easter best.
Taylor-Becton, like most of the women who will come here,
has not worked in many years. She twirls in the new suit, amazed at the beautiful
reflection in the full-length mirror.
"Wow, I’m feeling so beautiful!" she
exclaimed. "I have not worked in 10 to 15 years," said the newly minted 36
year-old career woman.
According to Alexis Greene, branch director of Dress For
Success, this is a second chance for women who come from a variety of experiences.
"This is not a hand out," said Greene,
"it’s a hand up."
The "hand ups" began about five
years ago when the grandfather of Nancy Lublin, a young Manhattan woman (then a law
student at New York University), died and left a $5,000 bequeath to his great
granddaughter.
Rhonda Taylor Becton (right) gets fitted for a new career. |
Instead of putting the windfall into her education or
an IRA account, Lublin instead went to Harlem to talk to two nuns who ran a job-training
program for underprivileged women, about how she might use the money to benefit people
less fortunate than herself.
The brainstorming session yielded the idea of a place where
women coming from a variety of oppressive backgrounds could be helped back into the
workforce with the help of free suits and other support.
And with that, Dress for Success was born in Manhattan.
Meanwhile, Joy Gordon had finished law school and was
working as a prosecutor in the Bronx.
Gordon’s experience included a stint as a volunteer at
Victims Services, a non-profit agency. One morning while on maternity leave she tuned in
to the FOX-TV show, "Good Morning New York," while Lublin was talking about her
brand new organization which helped women become independent by going to work.
Gordon was intrigued and she offered her services on a
volunteer basis. Eventually, she started sending clients to Dress for Success and liked
the results she was getting.
"The women would come back suited," she said.
"Then Nancy invited me to be on her board in 1997. I was on the board until 1999.
The organization was such a success that Lublin was forced
to go nationwide and international.
Gordon, who had become disenchanted with life as a
prosecutor, became executive director of the Manhattan branch while Lublin went
international.
For Gordon, a St. Albans resident, her tenure would not be
complete success without opening a branch in her home borough.
She contacted Rev. Floyd Flake, who donated a building and
with renovations donated by J & R Associates, a local construction company, and
electrical wiring (also donated) by EGG Electric, a company owned and operated by women,
they were ready for the women of Queens.
Alexis Greene, who was already with Dress for Success in
Manhattan, was appointed branch manager and is now in the throes of finding organizations
for linkages.
According to Greene, Dress for Success is
more than a suit for an interview.
Participants must be enrolled in a (non-profit) training
program offering both hard and soft skills – hard skills such as computer operations
and soft skills such as resume development – and interview skills. The agency would
then refer the client once they have reached job readiness and have secured an interview.
Racks of designer suits line the walls - free to Dress for
Success clients.
|
"The women who come to us are fully job
ready," said Greene. "They’ve learned the hard and soft skills, they have
the resume, they’ve done the mock interview and they have a real job interview
arranged. When they get here they are greeted by a volunteer [a personal shopper] who
assists them."
To Gordon who, at least for now, gave up her law career,
seeing the look on the women’s faces is priceless.
"When they come here it should feel like a very
upscale department store – like a Sax fifth Avenue or a Bergdorf Goodman," she
explained. "It should feel like you’re paying. In fact, one woman came in and
when she got ready to leave she told us the service made her feel as though she had put a
gold card on the table. We know that how you feel combined with how you look makes all the
difference."
"Queens is our most (ethnically) diverse
borough," she observed. "My goal here is really to extend our reach. I love
working with our women and I want to work with all our women here in Queens."
According to Gordon, the "clients" they see have
not worked for a variety of reasons. Some are escaping abusive relationships; some have
been ill while others might even have been in jail or even displaced homemakers. The
reasons become irrelevant once they walk through the door at 116-06 Merrick Boulevard.
"Some of the women have never worn a suit or even a
skirt," said Gordon. "So when they come here and they put on a suit with a pearl
necklace and matching earrings [donated by Avon] tears come to their eyes and to our
personal shoppers’ eyes. It’s a personal relationship between women and all
those socio-economic barriers get broken down. There are no barriers here," she
explained.
The idea, according to Gordon and Green, is to equip the
client to walk into an interview "on equal footing with anyone else." Because if
you walk into the interview looking and feeling great "it reflects to the
interviewer" thereby enhancing success.
You Have
The Job, Now What? |
Dress for Success, according to its local
manager, continues to support the client even in the workforce. They have established
"The Professional Women’s Group," sponsored by Mercedes Benz, and mentored
by professional women with at least five years of (working) experience. They are provided
with job survival tips such as how to handle a difficult boss and how to ask for a raise
and promotion and even childcare issues. It allows for resume exchange and even advised of
openings at their respective companies. "Friendships," they say, have blossomed
in these groups both among the clients and their mentors.
"They take the suit and turn it into a job," said
Gordon. "Our mentorship program teaches them how to turn that job into a career. We
don’t just drop you after you get the job and say ‘goodbye, good luck.’ No.
That could be crash and burn for them."
According to Dress for Success officials,
they are always in need of volunteers for different roles. Because they are a non-profit
organization, they also need ongoing funding and they "desperately need" plus
size suits and other professional garments.
Seventy percent of their clients are plus sized but most of
their donations are for smaller models.
They are located at 116-06 Merrick Blvd. and can be reached
at 949-7179 or at www.dressforsuccess.org.
