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Being a celebrity and a woman is no mean feat. Add to that, the throes of motherhood, and you have a recipe for disaster. Achieving success while juggling so many roles is ironically tough even for an actor. But, it’s exactly what makes these women worthy of a mention on Women’s Day.Here are our top picks:
1. Madonna
Image: IStock
- [Arts/Entertainment]
- Musician/Dancer/Actress//Producer/Mogul
- Children: Lourdes, Rocco, David, and Mercy
She is legendary! Madonna is the most influential woman artist in the past three decades. Her star power is still unbeatable while her oldest child is attending college and the little one is in high school. Her two other adopted children who are at primary school are from Malawi where Madonna often visits and funds several orphanages including the ones that these children were adopted from.
2. Kim Kardashian
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- [Arts/Entertainment]
- Reality Star/Retail Mogul/#1 Social Media Influencer
- Children: North
With 29 million followers on Instagram, and another 30 million plus on Twitter, ‘Keeping Up With The Kardashians’s Kim’, needs to be kept up with. Needless to say her endorsement deals, retail enterprises and even a video game to honor her are just some of the things she has going for herself. Breaking the internet, being married to Kanye West and going for a pilgrimage to pay homage to her anscestors in Armenia, Kim has done it all.
3. Angelina Jolie
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- [Arts/Entertainment]
- Actress/Producer/Writer/Director/
- Activist/Ambassador
- Children: Maddox, Pax, Zahara, Shiloh, Knox and Vivienne
The much acclaimed actor, writer, producer, director, and UN Ambassador with the undying zeal to better the world, Angelina Jolie is mother of six children. In the recent past she received praise for her work as the producer and director of Unbroken. She also received attention for her essay for the New York Times about her decision to surgically remove her breasts, followed by ovaries and fallopian tubes, thereby underscoring the health choices of women.
4. Beyoncé
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- [Arts/Entertainment]
- Musician/Actress/Producer
- Children: Blue Ivy,
She became the top earning women in the music industry according to Forbes in 2014, and made double of her $115 million salary in 2013. She is a super talented mom who finds joy in her marriage and motherhood, while extolling her feminism, advocating her support for anti-racism campaigns and draws inspiration from her family in the process of creating her niche as a hugely celebrated artist.
5. Yao Chen
- [Arts/Entertainment]
- Actress/Philanthropist
- Children: One
Dubbed by The Telegraph UK as “China’s answer to Angelina Jolie,” Yao Chen has also been hailed as one of Time’s Most Influential People on the Internet. Having starred in some of China’s biggest romantic comedies, Chen was also the UN Refugee Agency Goodwill Ambassador. She has following of 71 million on Weibo – the Chinese equivalent of Twitter- which she has used to address the environmental and social issues her country. She had humble beginnings before she studied at Beijing Film Academy until she dubuted on the big screen only to become a superstar later. She is married to a photographer through whom she has a son Xiao Tudou or ‘little potato’. Her happiest times are when she is cooking and spending time with her husband and baby, according to The Telegraph.
6. Emmanuelle Alt
Image: credit: www.photosbylei.com
- [Fashion/Tastemakers]
- Editor-In-Chief, Vogue Paris
- Children: Antonin and Françoise
Being at the helm of Vogue Paris for the past five years, Emanuelle prefers to stay out of limelight while bring to fore those featured in her publication. Instead of giving interviews, she’d rather prefer orienting her proverbial lens at high end fashion for women of all ages. A mother of two, Emmanuelle does not give room for regrets as working mother. She loves giving all her free time to her children as opposed to taking up leisure activities. She appreciates the fact that she leaves for work smiling while her kids draw their definition of work cum happiness through her.
7. Tory Burch
Image: credit: www.photosbylei.com
- [Fashion/Tastemakers]
- Designer and Founder, Tory Burch/Activist
- Children: Nick and Henry and Sawyer
This mother of two is the largest shareholder of the ubiquitous billion dollar brand that is upheld by more than 120 freestanding boutiques and 3,000 department stores around the world. Her trademark flip-flops and bags are popular among the female shoppers. She has pioneered the Tory Burch Foundation that partnered with the Bank of America to support female entrepreneurs by loaning out $10 million. Tory believes that there is no such thing as an overnight success, rather it’s ‘having a great idea, and an amazing team and being willing to work incredibly hard.
8. Joanna Coles
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- [Fashion/Tastemakers]
- Editor, Cosmopolitan, and Editorial Director, Seventeen
- Children: Thomas and Hugo
Known as America’s first feminist publication, Cosmopolitan undeniably holds a 128-year-old formidable sway over it readers. The magazine has a readership of upto 18 million a month with its portal (cosmo.com) attracting 30 million unique views per month. Its editor Joanna Coles is a master of creating the headlines. She has permeated an intellectual sensibility into the making of the brand called Cosmo with a well-regarded authors in her kitty. She believes that working on a Saturday and Sunday can get her fired, so she uses the weekends to restock her brain – rather use the weekends as a punctuation mark at the end of the week!
9. Mary Callahan Erdoes
- [Finance/Business]
- CEO, JPMorgan Asset Management, JPMorgan Chase
- Children: Mia, Morgan, and Mason
Known as the most powerful woman in finance, Mary is instrumental in managing the sixth-largest money-management operation in the US worth more than $2.5 trillion worth assets. She has also pioneered two programs for women employees in the area of finance to help them advance their careers. She also co-create a program called Women on the Move which is aimed at sending leading women at JPMorgan’s New York City headquarters on meeting other female staffers around the world. She also designed ReEntry, a program that helps women return to the field of asset management from their career breaks. This mom of three certainly understands what it takes to make a come-back for those who took breaks to raise a family or pursue other things in life.
10. Carolyn Everson
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- [News/Media/Advertising]
- VP of Global Marketing Solutions, Facebook
- Children: Daughters Kennedy and Taylor
A key player in Facebook’s global mobile ad sales team , she and her team were why Facebook has a revenue of $12.47 billion, which was a boost by 58 percent year after year. Thanks to her for floating in all those products that came up in your past search on your page. Prior to Facebook, Carolyn was CVP of global ad sales and strategy at Microsoft and EVP of strategy and operations at MTV Networks. She believes that it’s not the ‘work-life balance but the work-life integration’ that is the secret to being a successful working women and a mother at the same time.
