Overview

Invest for Better is excited to announce we are continuing our partnership with the Women’s Money Lab (W$L).  Due to the success of our Fall 2022 program, we are again offering W$L’s flagship Financial Courage Immersion Lab starting January 24, 2023 to the young women in our members’ lives. As an IFB member, you are already on your own personal journey toward the knowledge and confidence you need to secure your financial future and match your investments with your values. Many of you have told us, however, that you wished you had learned about money at an earlier age. In response, we are again offering you the opportunity for you to sponsor a young woman in your life to do just that. We encourage you to consider this special course as a gift for your daughters, granddaughters, nieces, mentees, or other special young women you know. 

Course Structure

W$L’s Immersion Lab is a unique educational and motivational program which combines financial literacy education with an understanding of the emotional aspect of money. It is structured as a 5-part series that takes place every 2 weeks over a 3-month period. Each meeting is facilitated live by the course creators, each of whom is a financial expert with experience creating safe and inspiring group learning environments. Due to the immersive nature of the course, it is only open to 20 young women. As a sponsor, you will be invited to participate in the final session. This enables you to hear from participants about what was meaningful to them and bring your own experiences into the conversation.  

Since this is a fully facilitated bi-weekly course, we will be charging a fee of $200 per sponsored pair. Details of the fee are provided at the end of the course description.

Outcomes  

By the end of the course, participants will have:

• Discovered how the psychology of money impacts their decision making, and made adjustments
• Learned about foundational financial concepts and set personal goals
• Created a personalized financial plan to meet their goals
• Developed courage in financial conversations – including negotiating financial worth 

Prerequisites & Level of Effort 

This program is for women who are in the early stages of managing their financial lives and want to develop financial courage and wellness in a supportive space with other women. 

Monthly Commitment: 3 – 4 hours

Approximately 1 – 2 hours of homework is required prior to each meeting, which are expected to last about 1.5 to 2 hours. Homework consists of a combination of journaling, reading and videos. For those who want to go deeper more quickly, a few books are recommended as ancillary materials.

Course Content

Financial courage is often more important for women than actual financial knowledge as financial courage is what causes us to act. For many of us, if we wait until we are confident that we know everything there is to know about financial matters, that day never comes. When we summon our financial courage, we learn it is ok to take small steps toward financial wellness & build from there.

• Meeting 1: Community building, exploring how our family money history impacts our financial decisions and understanding financial issues specific to women
• Meeting 2: Life values quiz application, relationship between unmet needs and adverse financial decisions, and Goal Setting
• Meeting 3: Identifying our money language, understanding interest compounding, and investment allocation overview via an experiential exercise
• Meeting 4: Financial courage strategies, overview of investing your values, and common investment pitfalls
• Meeting 5: Understanding how your 401K/503b is invested, financial NorthStar exercise, resources for reaching your goals, and closing exercise designed to connect & inspire

Course Creators

Cynthia Zeltwanger. Cynthia is a co-founder of Women’s Leadership Lab and Women’s Money Lab, through which she develops and facilitates collaborative, intersectional programs for women. Cynthia spent years being the “only” woman at the table in the masculine world of international finance. Now she is bringing her decades long experience working in the financial, non-profit, and international business sectors to bear for other women. She strongly believes that the best way for women to reach their goals for themselves, their families and communities is by embracing authentic leadership skills and to develop financial wellbeing. Cynthia has been co-facilitating both corporate sponsored and multi-company Labs since 2010.

Nancy Kaplan.Nancy is a co-founder of the Women’s Money Lab and an Advisor to the Tenzer Family Office. Like Cynthia, Nancy brings several decades of experience to her current efforts. She spent many years working in financial services where she conducted research, developed new financial products, and served as an options trader. She has also taught finance and economics at the college level. Nancy is passionate about helping women gain financial wellness. She understands the challenges of managing money through many of life’s passages, blessings and challenges, having worked at various levels while raising two children to independent adulthood.

Date, Time, & Fee

In Winter 2023, the course will take place from 5:00 pm to 7:00 pm PST / 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm EST on:

• January 24
• February 7
• February 21
• March 7
• March 21 (Sponsors join)

The $200 fee includes:

• Beneficiary participation in the 5-part Financial Courage Immersion Lab
• Sponsor participation in the final session
• Beneficiary becomes a member of IFB for one year and receives a copy of Activate Your Money
• The course, which is normally offered at a cost of $300, has been deeply discounted for IFB members, as has been the IFB membership. The value of this package is $400.