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Work Wife

The Power of Female Friendship to Drive Successful Businesses

About the Book

Get inspired by the women who discovered that working with your best friend can be the secret to professional success—and maybe even the future of business, from the co-founders of the website Of a Kind.

When Erica Cerulo and Claire Mazur met in college, they bonded instantly. Fast-forward to 2010, when after almost a decade of friendship they founded the popular fashion and design website Of a Kind. Now, in their first book, Cerulo and Mazur bring to light the unique power of female friendship to fuel successful businesses. Drawing on their own experiences, as well as the stories of other thriving “work wives,” they highlight the ways in which vulnerability, openness, and compassion—qualities central to so many women’s relationships—lend themselves to professional accomplishment and innovation.

Featuring interviews with work wives such as Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs of the influential food community site Food52, Ann Friedman, Aminatou Sow, and Gina Delvac of the hit podcast Call Your Girlfriend, and Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh Jennings of Olympic volleyball fame, Work Wife addresses a range of topics vital to successful partnerships, such as being the bosses, tackling disagreements, dealing with money, and figuring in motherhood. Demonstrating how female partnerships in the office are productive, progressive, and empowering, Cerulo and Mazur offer an invaluable roadmap for a feminist reimagining of the workplace.

Fun, enlightening, and informative, Work Wife is a celebration of female friendship and collaboration proving that it's not just feasible but fruitful to mix BFFs with business.

Praise for Work Wife

“Work Wife is a whip-smart guide to cultivating a strong workplace marriage, complete with critical lessons about partnership and leadership that extend well beyond work wives. More than a how-to, it is a clarion call to reimagine and re-center leadership around communality, cooperation, and care. One cannot help but read this book and wonder what women would be able to accomplish if they were empowered to lead as they are.”
—Alicia Menendez, correspondent at PBS’s Amanpour & Co.

“Work Wife is a master class in being in business with your bestie—every bit of advice is honest, relatable, and actually useful. But what Erica Cerulo and Claire Mazur have done here is bigger than that. What truly lassoed my heart and enchanted me with this story from start to finish is their insistence that women leading together will redefine the working world. It's an essential and uplifting message; anyone who has a job or a dream or a person they Slack the second they get to the office must read this book.”
—Kayleen Schaefer, author of Text Me When You Get Home: The Evolution and Triumph of Modern Female Friendship

“Work Wife explores the potential magic (and the realities) that comes from the combination of two or more women who share a common vision and have turned that shared vision into an amazing business partnership. In sharing both the highs and lows, it’s an inspiring look at how women can be the best of teammates in work and in life.”
—Joy Cho, Founder and Creative Director of Oh Joy!

“Most of us spend the majority of our weekdays in an office—and in close proximity to our coworkers. So it’s only natural that our colleagues often become our confidants, pals, and in some very special cases, our work wives. In this book Erica Cerulo and Claire Mazur (cofounders of Of a Kind and bona fide work wives) explore this intricate relationship and how working with a friend can sometimes be the secret to professional success. In conversation with other remarkable duos, from the founders of Food52 to the cohosts of the Call Your Girlfriend podcast, they tackle the most important issues that female partnerships face. Read this, then plot your own work-wife-driven empire.”
—Glamour

“Friends since college, entrepreneurs Cerulo and Mazur . . . capture the energy of the current social climate of women empowering women in their first book. . . . Engaging and thoughtful, Work Wife champions strong relationships, healthy attitudes, and pragmatic decision-making—an excellent primer for women interested in creating their own opportunities.”
—Booklist (starred review)

“Is the old adage ‘Friends and business don’t mix’ true? Not according to college friends Cerulo and Mazur, who translated their love of fashion and desire to support emerging fashion designers into a successful business, the e-commerce site Of a Kind. . . . By exploring topics such as setting expectations, defining roles, dividing responsibility, dealing with finances, and addressing disputes, they deftly demonstrate how female friendships produce empowering business partnerships. . . . This insightful, engaging work is an essential guidebook for friends considering a business collaboration.”
—Library Journal (starred review)

Contact

Press: eisayeff@penguinrandomhouse.com

Speaking engagements: ksantora@penguinrandomhouse.com

All other inquiries: workwifehq@gmail.com

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