LeaderMom Strengths in Action: HalloWeek at the Hagans
Meet LeaderMom, Sarah Hagan. Originally she caught our attention because she so regularly kills it at work. This week, she caught our attention because we were laughing so hard with her family on social media. Knowing her strengths, we are not surprised and asked for the backstory.
LM: Tell us about your original family tradition that you call Halloweek.
SH: We started 8 days of HalloWeek when our son, who is now 2 ½, was 6 months old. Its simple start was dressing him up each day in easy things that he already had. One was a Charlie Brown outfit -- black pants and a onesie that we drew on, with an eyeliner squiggle on his forehead for Charlie’s hair. Our family and friends loved it so much that we did it again the next year. That year, I was busy at work so my husband bought all of our costumes. (It was a little less cute, but it was still great.)
This year, we were challenged to continue the tradition so we had brainstorming session. “What is funny, easy and cheap that we could stick our amazing kid in for good effect?” We wanted a theme this year, and my husband proposed short parodies of movies. We started with Home Alone and getting our son to scream at himself in the mirror, which he loved. We kept going using stuff we already had, like how we worked our giant stuffed shark “Goldfish” into Jaws. Our son was so happy to do it and getting to watch himself after the fact.
LM: What do you do for work, and which of your strengths are evident here?
SH: I lead People Analytics at a software company, and my husband is a Director of Marketing. Our video roles fit our work roles--he took care of all of our captioning, thinking of the shots and how it would come together, whereas I was the executor and project planner.
LM: Your execution is not the only strength that stands out here. Your joy and love are contagious, and I see your professional expertise in play here as well.
SH: Both my husband and I show our love through humor. And we love our tiny human, so we are sharing fun with him, molding his personality and encouraging him to enjoy life and time with us. When I was pregnant, people would say things like, “Having a kid is the best worst mistake you are going to make.” We made a very conscious decision to be positive together because we recognize that our son is learning emotional development from us. We want to be positive and also portray him in a positive light, and hope these videos do him justice.
LM: How hard was this to do?
SH: As traditions go, this was not hard at all. With both of us working full-time, the work week is busy and full. These were planned ahead and filmed on the weekends. I would say it took 20 minutes tops to film (times 8 videos), and then another 10 minutes on each to edit. It was fun, not a burden; we are not trying to perfect this. Editing our less-stellar moments was fun too!
Follow Sarah on Twitter @thesarahhagan to see the videos for all 8 days:
Risky Business
Jaws
Big
Home Alone
Back to the Future
Say Anything
Wayne’s World
Scream