Each month, we profile members of the BWF community in our "Member Spotlight" series.  This month, meet Macken Toussaint, an attorney and partner at Riemer & Braunstein LLP.  Macken is a BWF Board Member, past BWF President, and BWF Advisory Council member.  In addition to sharing her time BWF members, Macken is sharing her interest in crypto currency and its potential with us by organizing our May 12th webinar "Back to Basics with Crypto : What's it all About and How Does It Impact My Company". Get to know her a bit better and attend the webinar!

Attorney | Partner, Riemer & Braunstein 

BWF Board Member | Past BWF President |BWF Advisory Council Member

• ·What is your favorite BWF program to date?  What were your memorable takeaways? 

• I have enjoyed every BWF program over the years, whether it is about financial topic, personal development, or current event/ “hot topic”.  Going back to 2014, I really enjoyed “Getting to Yes: Persuasion, Negotiation and Collaboration.”  I was impressed with the quality of the panelists and they did such a great job sharing ideas and best practices which can be helpful for dealing with not only workplace issues but also in our personal lives. Also, BWF’s recent program about “Securing The Remote Workforce: Cyber Security in a Pandemic Word” was another great one. It was timely and relevant considering the new normal in our professional and everyday  lives. I have learned about a bunch of things I have been doing wrong!

  
  

• What is your #1 work from home tool?  

• Zoom or any of the other video conferencing platforms that I have used so far. Before the pandemic I didn’t use them much. Now I can attend all sorts of events and programs that I am interested in (even better I can do so off camera when needed).

  
  

• Tell us about something you are most proud of in your career?

• Whenever I have the chance to help a small business owner, whether through my work with social impact lenders or otherwise. Economic empowerment of others is a great way for lasting impact.  The ability to use my legal experience and my business degree to assist a small or struggling business always sounded good to me. 

  
  

• Tell us about a new or existing hobby?

• I am fascinated by the whole idea of cryptocurrency and digital currencies (and everything in between). I am not a tech-savvy person so it will take a lot of time to make sense of it all. 

  
  

• What has been the biggest /most unexpected change or challenge in your personal/work life in the past year?

I have naively expected work/ life balance to be less of a struggle when working from home. It can actually get worse since there is no cut off time at the end of the day to go home. Working on it!