Genevieve Piturro to host inaugural Find Your Purpose career summit in White Plains
2021, for many workers, proved to be the year of the “Great Resignation,” a term coined to describe the staggering number of workers who have decided to leave their jobs this year.
The Covid-19 pandemic and its resultant workplace shifts, or even lack thereof, have led workers to examine their relationship to work — and many don”™t like what they are seeing.
Genevieve Piturro is no stranger to career shifts, and intends to use her own experience to help others see that a more fulfilling career is possible. On Oct. 2, Piturro will host the inaugural Find Your Purpose Summit at City Square in White Plains.
Piturro, of Irvington, was raised in Yonkers, where her parents, including her Italian immigrant father, expected her and her siblings to get an education, get married and have kids. Piturro instead chose the corporate path, working in the entertainment business as a television marketing executive in Manhattan for over a decade.
“I loved it until literally one afternoon,” Piturro said. “And I heard a voice in me ask: ‘If this is the next 30 years of your life, is this enough?’ And that stopped me cold.”
Inspired by the more traditional family-centered lives that her parents had experienced and that her siblings were leading at the time, Piturro sought more involvement with children in her life, and began to volunteer in children”™s emergency shelters across Westchester and New York City.
There, she read books to children and began to bring pairs of pajamas to give to those in the shelters after noticing that they were heading to their sleeping quarters in the same clothes in which they had been taken to the shelter, or otherwise were wearing clothes that were dirty or ill-fitting.
“There was a little girl who was so afraid of me, just so, so afraid and kept saying no, that she didn’t want (the pajamas),” Piturro said. “And her shirt was dirty and her shoes were like size 10. She must have been about six. And finally, I had her touch them and see how soft these pink pajamas were that I thought would fit her and that she would have taken easily. And she just looked at me and she whispered, ”˜What are pajamas? What are these?”™
“That changed everything,” Piturro said. “My life never got back on the corporate track. I had to work, but my heart wasn’t in it. And I just couldn’t wait for the day when I was brave enough to jump.”
That jump was starting her nonprofit, the Pajama Program, which now operates nationally to coordinate pajama and book distributions and other fundraisers for children, along with sleep health and educational programs for children, caregivers and teachers.
Nowadays, Piturro spends her time helping others find their purpose, as an author, speaker and consultant. Her book, “Purpose Passion and Pajamas,” was published in August of last year.
She hopes that her book can help provide others who seek greater purpose in their lives, as she once did, as well as the skills and direction necessary to make the steps ”” large or small ”” to meet their goals.
“It’s about how to transform your life, embrace the human connection and lead with meaning,” she said. “Twenty years of embarking on this journey where I’ve never had a safety net ”” I never knew what a nonprofit was, I never knew it was going to be a nonprofit, I never knew anything. I had no idea what I was getting into. That’s what was frightening and exciting at the same time.”
She will bring her career expertise to the summit in White Plains this weekend, which she is looking forward to as an intimate conference focused around community and sharing stories.
Piturro said that the topics to be discussed at the summit will include confidence-building, how to tell people in your life you”™re ready to make a change, finance and marketing, which were decided as focus points by input from attendees.
“It’s for them to understand and hear from every person who is a successful entrepreneur and who has been through the darkness and come into the light so that they feel they’re not being talked to by somebody who has no idea how scary it is, (and how hard it is) to ask for help, because I didn’t know how to ask for help,” she said. “So it’s bringing together a community ”” those who’ve been there, who’ve come out the other side and who want to give back, and those who now need that support, that camaraderie, that mentorship, that education in various topics.”
Other presenters
The event will feature a variety of speakers, presenting lectures, workshops and roundtable discussions.
Risa Hoag, president of GMG Public Relations in Nyack, will lead a marketing workshop, and was attracted to present at the summit because of its emphasis on following one”™s passion.
“When people find their passion and turn it into a career, it is powerful, having a lasting positive impact,” Hoag said. “I am looking forward to showing attendees how they can share their stories through marketing and public relations.”
Jacqueline Vazquez, owner and CEO of Lifetime Events by Jacqueline, and motivational speaker Darryl Gaines will lead an interactive workshop to teach attendees how to shape their purpose.
“My first career in accounting was just a job that I had the skills for, but not the passion,” Vazquez said. “After 10 years, I discovered my true passion when I turned my creative mindset and skills into the start of my passion career.
“When Genevieve reached out to me and described the goals behind her Find Your Purpose Summit, I immediately said, ”˜Sign me up’,” she continued. “I wanted to share how finding your purpose can change your life and make a difference in the world. It is one thing one when you learn a skill set and apply it, but it”™s another to truly find your purpose and walk in it.”
Other speakers include Mary Shomon, a New York Times-bestselling author and patient advocate; Wiley Harrison, president of accounting at small business consulting firm Business of Your Business; Thomas Morley, director of the Rockland Community College Small Business Development Center; and Jennifer Safara Perry, CEO of skin care company Sacred Seeds Enterprises.
Piturro noted that the summit is not only for those looking to make a career pivot, but also for those already in positions of leadership hoping to keep team members happy in their jobs and keep teams functioning in harmony.
Because many of the speakers are from Westchester and the surrounding area, part of the focus will also be on the climate of job satisfaction locally. Piturro said that she believes there is a willingness for greater success on the part of team leaders as well as people who want to stay as part of a team, and the summit can educate attendees on how to foster that.
“I think that that’s strong in Westchester,” she said. “I think that there’s so much promise here with the companies that are here and their attitude of, ‘Let’s build this together from today, moving forward. We have work to do, and let’s make it the best experience, the most honest and valuable experience for each other and for the people we’re serving.’
“There’s so much good in being part of a team,” she added. “There’s value involved in following your heart and doing something on your own and starting to build, but at some point successful entrepreneurs are going to build a company and it’s going to be the same. They’re going to build a culture and they’re going to have employees, and they’re going to have to find a way to include everyone and make everyone feel that they matter and that they’re heard, and that they’re part of the whole mission and the whole purpose of what they’re doing.”