Is your life out of balance? Does your work life feel like it does not fit? But how to get it right?
Start by defining your priorities. Yes, you do have to make a choice. Coach Anna Meller created a fantastic tool to made a fantastic tool to help you The Work Life Balance Workbook
Wondering what sort of work life balance you want? Should you return to work? Work less hour? Should you husband work less hours and what do you really miss in your life right now?
Do this fun quiz from Working Families to quickly assess your priorities and find out what needs to change first
I was delighted to be invited to the Working Mothers Lunch by the SocGen’s family network. I headed a panel discussing tips and solutions to the top 3 issues for working mothers: juggling time, confidence and partner support. Juggling time turned out to be the top issue for almost every working mother and in the discussion that followed issues and advice were shared openly.
What really struck me was how flexible many jobs seemed to be. There were women working at 80%, coming in at 9.30, working 4 days a week, leaving at 3pm, and leaving early and making up time from home later in the evening. Clearly this is all possible in SocGen. Still, it is not possible in every job, it is harder at more senior levels and it also requires intelligent management by the individual to get a manager to agree.
So, yes, on the surface it seems there is a lot of flexibility, but it does come with it’s own issues that working mothers have to sort, often with little support, training or role-models. These are some of the issues that came up in our discussion:
It was clear during the panel input and the discussion that it really helps to share, and learn from each other. It helps to know you are not the only one but also gives you the courage and motivation to help you carve your own path. I would love to share some of the best tips and insights that I heard:
Participants left reflective, energised and motivated. Knowing that it isn’t easy, and it’s sometimes a steep learning curve, but it’s worth it. The event was very well organised, and participants felt it was excellent and they would love to see more similar events.
The family network and women’s network at SocGen are very active, and always have well-attended, lively events. They find that it works to:
Author: Inge Woudstra, Working Women’s Expert and Director of Mum & Career
There has been a lot of talk about Sheryl Sandberg’s new book ‘Lean in: Women, Work and the Will to Lead’. In the book the CEO of Facebook (and mother of 2) explains what’s holding women back. One of her key lessons is one I advocate all the time too…but what has that got to do with chocolate? Find out from Jenny Garrett.
Find out from Aparajita Ajit how she does it – She is Vice President and Head Banking & Capital Markets UK and Europe at MphasiS, an HP company based in Bank, London. She works flexibly and has a three-year-old son and lives in New Malden, Surrey. She volunteers for the Mayor’s Mentor Programme.
Judith Zerdin, journalist, went to find out how she manages it, and when, if ever she ever gets to see her son.
Part of my job involves looking at new client acquisitions, and that does mean a fair bit of travelling. I was in France last week, next week I’m in Edinburgh, after that I’m in Luxembourg.
I could have a week when I have to visit two or three countries, but I tend to make them day trips rather than staying over. I’ll catch the first flight out in the morning and the last flight back at night.
My boss is based in New York and my team is scattered between the UK and Europe, but we do have a few members in India too. We have to speak at a time that works for everybody, so we’ll often get on to a team call at about 9pm. Once my son’s in bed I’ll go back to work.
I try to avoid working weekends if I can, unless there’s a major bid or some urgent time-consuming project.
I get up at about 5.30 – quite often I have to make early morning calls then to my Indian colleagues.
My son wakes up between 6.30 and 7am and then we’re getting ready and out of the house by 8am.
I drop him off at his day care and then I catch the train to Waterloo and then the tube to Bank. I’m in the office by 9am.
I use my commute to catch up on a lot of my business reading; keeping abreast of what’s going on in the markets. I check my phone, but I try to avoid doing emails as I deal with a lot of confidential information.
I don’t usually take a lunch break; I’ll just grab a salad or sandwich and have it at my desk, and then I leave at 4.30 to pick my son up from day-care.
I like to spend 2-3 quality hours with him before he goes to bed, after which my husband and I will have dinner and then I’ll catch up on work I’ve missed from the two hours not being in the office, and make any conference calls to the US or Canada.
I have a cook who comes once a week and the rest of the week my husband and I share the cooking. I also have a cleaner once a week.
It’s about juggling it all, but the good news is, as long as the work gets done and I put in the hours, my company doesn’t clock-watch. It helps that it’s a trust-filled atmosphere.
Weekends for sure – on Saturday nights my husband and I catch up with friends either at our place or go out for dinner, or go to the theatre. I go to a zumba class on Saturday mornings and Wednesday nights and I also go to the gym on Mondays after my son’s in bed and my husband’s home from work. I’ll fit my work around it.
My husband and I try to take off at least one Friday every three months to get some “us” time, too. Then we might go and see a film, or just chill out.
Each week we’ll share our schedules for the next week or couple of weeks so we can plan our diaries. We make sure, as best we can, that if I have to travel somewhere he will pick our son up, and he can work a bit from home.
My husband and I share responsibilities equally and he is extremely supportive and understanding. I do pick-up more often because my husband works for an Investment Bank and it does make it quite difficult to leave as early as me. However on days that I travel, he plans his schedule accordingly.
It depends on how you define ‘tough’! For example, my son had chickenpox not that long ago. We had all our annual leave planned already and I only had three or four days to spare, but I decided to work from home, and my husband took some days off.
His company also offers an emergency nanny service, so we got one for the last three or four days.
I think drawing on any flexibility your employer gives you is very important. It’s all about having a very understanding employer, and an extremely helpful and reliable husband. We don’t have our parents in this country so we can’t rely on them.
When things get tough I just have to deal with it – it’s a bit of a trade-off. When it comes to childcare it’s just really important that we’re planned and organised.
I grew up in India and I didn’t have everything just given to me; I had to work hard for it. Moreover, my parents were role models and I learnt a lot from them.
I’ve got two Master degrees and I was studying while looking after a baby and working full time, but I invested in all of that and started to see the results of my efforts and I realised the sky’s the limit. I believed that all the way through it.
Many of my friends are highly educated, while some of them decide to stop working out of choice, many of them feel they have to give up their career once they have a family. A lot of the time we presume that’s how it has to be, but I think you need to talk about your aspirations with your family.
Look for other options: working flexibly/part-time/job sharing, and be a bit shameless with the resources made available to you at work.
For many people childcare is very expensive – you should work out how many days you can afford it and see what options are available for the other days.
There are days when I really wish I could just put my feet up and go to the Bahamas! On the other hand, we do make the most of our holidays, and I love spa days – I’d be lying if I said not. But I’m very happy as a mother, wife and professional woman. I’m very pleased with the life I have.
Talking about being a working mum at the BBC ‘Women at the top’ programme triggered senior manager Paula Leach to think about female leadership and motherhood. This is what she learned about being a working mum in her own words.
Being a working mum for me the key challenges have come down to Time. I’m nearly 7 years into my parenting journey, with 2 beautiful daughters and a worklife balance many would envy, combining my part time senior management role with being an involved and present parent to my girls. So what’s the problem? Haven’t I ‘got it all’? Haven’t I ‘got the best of both worlds’? Well, it’s an interesting question, and one I have a bit of a constant wrestle with myself.
In a quest to try to work out why I feel like this, I recently tentatively took part in the filming of a BBC documentary which was examining the reasons why so few women are represented at the senior levels of management in business. Scary as it was to put myself ‘out there’ and actively join the debate, I wanted to share my perspectives, experience and optimism and learn as much as I could on the way.
The process of being filmed and trying to work out in my head what was my overriding perspective on the subject of combining motherhood and career, was all a bit of a new step in a new journey for me. Of course I was only going to be featured on the programme for 3 minutes or so, and I was happy with the footage (although I just find watching myself very uncomfortable …. Surely I don’t really look or sound like that??!!). However, the finished programme was one thing, the journey that asking these questions has started to send me on, is something else.
So …. Back to Time. I have always known, ever since I returned to work after my first daughter was about 1 year old, that it was about time. There are only so many hours in a day, and I was already madly busy with all my work commitments before I then had to fit in my new job as Mum. I’m super organised though, so went about the process of creating a jigsaw of childcare, greater efficiency, working different times of the day to make up for dashing out of the office early to get to a nursery pick up etc. We all do it- it’s how it works. And over that period where I have continued to make this jigsaw of activity squeeze into my 24 hours, I, like many other women I know (and probably countless more I don’t know), have felt various new emotions about my working and home life such as guilt, low-confidence and questioning what other people were thinking of me, feeling not quite as reliable as I always had been (or the risk that I wasn’t that reliable) amongst other things. A wise friend once told me, it takes 5 years to come to terms with the situation of this balance and feel at peace with it rather than trying to be everything you were at work before.
So, I am a reflector, and this has all got me reflecting a lot about Time. I actually know for a fact, that I am equally if not more capable at delivering in my chosen profession than I was 7 years ago. And I feel optimistic about those contributions. I simply am not in a position to work the same days and hours, or work between “9 – 5” in the accepted business tradition. Interestingly, where I have felt a dip in confidence or worried about my reliability or felt guilty …. Pretty much all of this is rooted in Time – or lack of it!
Coupled with that realisation, I was interested to explore whether this perceived issue of time was external or internal to myself. Generally, there is some expectation from others, but on the whole, my reflection leads me to conclude that most of the pressure I feel regarding time is actually pressure I am putting on myself.
Light bulb moment! (I had this a couple of years ago). Just forget about worrying about the time -what I can’t fit in that I used to, how to be like everyone else (or as I perceive everyone else) – and get on with the excellent outputs and contributions that I make, focusing on my energy and quality and creativity. Let go of that guilt and that lower confidence and see what happens – I would soon work out whether this was mostly me putting that pressure on, or whether it truly was real. Result: Yep – mostly me!
So, my feeling is really this: As a professional woman, I have certain expectations of myself which I literally could not replicate once time got squeezed. I wasn’t prepared to make the sacrifices so many women did a generation ago with regard to seeing their family grow up … surely they had no choice, but because they did that, it has paved the way for women and mums like me to have a choice and take on the mantle of the next challenge with confidence and energy! That challenge being the challenge of demonstrating that Time is Not the issue … having personal confidence, and the confidence of others, in output, creativity, leadership, quality – these are the things business should be really interested in and I for one plan to demonstrate that it doesn’t always need to matter that you are seen to be doing the 9 – 5.
Having confidence to do it my way will hopefully open the eyes of business that mums and business can work and can thrive, with a little open-mindedness on both sides to being flexible and focusing on the output. By having the confidence to be doing, delivering and succeeding, we can perhaps grow and open up the opportunities to work flexibly, be involved with our families at the times that we need to be during the 24 hours we have, and still achieve what we need to at work (and beyond!). I don’t see working flexibly as simply a temporary accommodation to ‘help’ me – I see it as a win-win for me and the business. I achieve everything that is required of my role and beyond. I cost less than a full-time resource. I am committed to making that work and being the most efficient that I can be. The biggest barrier I believe I truly have faced is actually my own personal perceptions and expectations limiting myself, so I am taking deep breaths and not apologising for working a different schedule – I am embracing it and demonstrating it’s value! And at the same time I am very present in my children’s lives and fully engaged in their school life and activities which is important for me.
Obviously I appreciate that I am fortunate to work with an enlightened employer where the foundational elements of flexible working and empowerment mean I can take responsibility for my own schedule and working my way to achieve success. Technology is such an enabler here to allow us to move forwards – so we don’t waste the talent that is out there with so many people who have chosen Motherhood. My mantra moving forwards … it is ‘Mum AND career’ not ‘Mum OR Career’!
And what about me ‘having it all’ already? …. Yep that’s all fine and maybe a perception could be that I do, but I have ambition to progress in my career, learn more, take on interesting challenges and add greater value – and I plan to do that still with only 24 hours in the day!
I have learnt so much about myself, and others, over the last few years having become a parent. Perhaps I may continue to progress my career because I have children, and not in spite of it.
Author: Paula Leach, She has 2 beautiful daughters aged 6 and 3 and works 3 1/2 days per week in a senior leadership role as Learning & Development Manager at a large Multi-National automotive organisation. Since having her daughters, she juggles her career with her family and is constantly striving towards achieving a balance which means she can be present and involved in her children’s lives, schooling etc, in addition to not only ‘holding down’ her role, but continuing to develop, grow and contribute professionally. As part of this journey, she recently took part in the filming of the BBC2 documentary ‘Hilary Devey’s Women at the Top’.
You are not alone, a fifth of women in the UK are the breadwinner, and the number is growing.
Not sure if the term breadwinner fits for you? If you’re a working woman from any background, class, heritage and culture, married or co-habiting, with or without children, and you are the main or sole income earner in your home, then I am talking to you. Surprisingly, being a female breadwinner is one of the last taboos in society.
Often juggling work, life and family in secrecy, you’ll rarely discuss or seek coping strategies for your complex role in the world.
Rhonda, a successful business woman, working in a male dominated environment, with a child under one year old sums up the challenge of being the breadwinner eloquently:
“By being a working career woman or career mum, I’m trying to get the best out of both worlds. I’m trying to be true to who I am, not to who other people want me to be or what people think people I should be. And that is difficult”
Jenny Garrett, executive coach and author of Rocking Your Role, the ‘how to’ guide to success for female breadwinners, shares 5 tips to success from her experience of coaching hundreds of female breadwinners.
Victoria, a 40 year old entrepreneur with one child, has a growing training company found that earning the bulk of the income was giving her an over inflated ego, she decorated her home around her husband, after all it was ‘her’ money. It’s only when the cracks started showing in her relationship that she realised her husband was resenting her behavior.
The combination of your role at work and being the breadwinner at home can become a heady cocktail intoxicating you into thinking that you are the only one who has something valid to say in your relationship. If you notice yourself thinking that your opinion is the only one matters because you’re the one holding the purse strings, it’s time to check your ego.
Femi, an accountant, in her thirties with two boys, found that her husband was waiting for her to come home to decide what to cook for dinner. She understood that she had created this problem, always wanting to be in control and make sure things were done ‘properly’. She had to take a step back and give her husband permission to cook.
“Now the children are fed before I get home in the evening, it’s not always what I would have chosen, but they’re happy and healthy and it’s one less thing for me to worry about.”
Listen and listen carefully, it’s OK not to be able to do it all. Repeat after me, it’s OK not to be able to do it all. Now say it out loud, it’s OK not to do be able to do it all. Trust others to do it their way, you might even learn something.
Andrea said:
“subconsciously I just don’t talk about any element of my work success. I would say I work mainly because it’s interesting, it’s never because it’s financially lucrative, it’s paid for the extension or it’s paid for the car”.
Don’t let money be the elephant in the room, talk about money with your partner. Decide who manages money, how it’s managed and how you will make financial decisions. Ensure you have two-way communication about finances, your relationship and your work.
Connie, married with grown up children, has a senior strategic role in education. She found that contracting our chores like the gardening and visiting the hairdresser were life savers for her.
“That little bit of me time restored my sanity”
You physical, mental and spiritual health are critical, investing in you now will avoid painful derailment of your work and family life later. Take time for you, it could be with dance classes, developing yourself through courses, dates with your partner or even full on retreats. My thing is meditation.
Do whatever restores balance, gives you space to breathe and let go of all the roles you play in life.
Sally, an interim manager recalls times when she was trying to work with the children climbing on top of her for attention. She has come to recognise that it is quality rather than quantity that matters.
“We’ve had really good weekends where I’ve just been able to focus on the family possibly better than if I spent more time with them feeling distracted. Yes, I think I’m finally learning that one”
If you’re feeling torn between many roles, such as: spouse, carer, mother, home-maker, career woman, guilt will drain your energy and take away from the freedom up have to enjoy your life and time with loved ones. Choose quality time over quantity of time.
Author: Jenny Garrett is a female breadwinners and leadership specialist, and motivates women to live their best life. She is the author of ‘Rocking Your Role’, she’s appeared on Radio 4’s ‘Woman’s Hour’ and mentors for the Cherie Blair Foundation. Find out more about her, and her specialist programmes and one to one coaching at Reflexion Associates
Jenny has kindly offered to give away a free 30 minute One to One Rocking and Shocking Consultation via Skype, and a copy of her new book ‘Rocking Your Role’, to anyone signing up to our Monthly Update in September. Read more
Looking for more tips, guidance and insights on Navigating your Career and Children? Why not join us for a high-impact fun workshop on 9 October in Central London. Speakers from Ernst&Young, Sapphire Partners and more
Find out from the interview with Vanessa Vallely how she does it – Vanessa is Head of Business Management at Aviva Investors 4 days/week, she is also the founder of leading women’s network and website, www.wearethecity.com which serves an audience of over 100,000 City Women. She co-founded the City wide diversity network, The Network of Networks which includes the Diversity heads and heads of women’s networks from 45 FTSE firms.
Vanessa has won a number of prizes and awards, most recently the Champion for Women award at the 2011 Women in Banking and Finance Awards. She is regularly featured in the media and is often called upon to speak at corporate and charity events.
Vanessa has a husband and 2 daughters (aged 8 and 11). She is a school governor and Non Executive Director for the National Youth Music Theatre and the Prostate Cancer Charity. Just this Sunday she ran the London Marathon. So I went to find out for you how on earth one single person can manage this.
I am highly organised, I keep lists and even keep lists of lists, and I have two smartphones. I guess I have always been capable of a lot of output and get more done than others. My current boss said: ‘What she does in 4 days, others do in 5 or 6’. I never waste any time, you don’t find me dreaming on the train, I am planning my next meeting or working out a plan. I always write things down: ideas and actions.
Not often. I run for relaxation, when I run I am in my own world, listening to my own music. Four days in on holidays I start to relax, however in down-time I generate more ideas, which means more work, so I feel it’s not so good for me to relax.
I do find me-time in pockets. I am an only child and enjoy being on my own. This Sunday morning I relaxed, sitting back with my laptop on my lap, catching up on e-mail on my own, which was lovely as I feel on top of things now. Sometimes I take a special moment of relaxation in the bath with candles.
5.30 Get up, do my make-up and get dressed
6.00 Wake up my eldest daughter, check their lunches and bags (but they do it themselves)
6.30 My child minder (live out nanny) arrives and I hand over to her
6.45 Catch a train
7.30 Breakfast in the office and start work, or a networking breakfast externally - I usually meet people for lunch and/or before I go home, that’s where I fit my networking in
9.00 Start work
18.30 Leave work
19.15 Home, Child minder goes home and I talk with my 2 girls and catch up on their day
Later my personal trainer comes. I train in the conservatory with the children around so I don’t have to go out again. In the rest of the evening I fit 1 or 2 hours work in, Skype or do some work for We Are the City.
22.00 Go to bed
I am away about 1 evening per week, when I do networking or go to an event. I usually do fit in a few hours of work on Saturday and Sunday as well. On Saturday I get up at 6.00 and fit in a few hours for non-work things such as We Are the City before my daughters wake up.
I have a child minder who comes to my house, and she has been there for many years. I also have a cleaner 4 hours/week and someone who comes to pick up my ironing every Sunday.
My mum works full-time so she can only baby-sit occasionally.
My husband has a senior position at the FSA, and his work is not very flexible. So we sit down every Sunday to look 2 weeks ahead and plan which one of us has more space to take full responsibility (for the children) that week.
I do see them every day at the end of the day, and on Saturday we do things together, I take them to drama, or we go climbing at the climbing wall.
And of course Friday is my day off from work, I do the school drop-off and pick-up and have an Open House, where they can bring any friends they like, to compensate for the other days when I am not there for play dates.
I am also at assemblies and sports days, I won’t miss those and as a school governor I feel I have to be there. When I was less senior I often pretended they were other meetings, now I don’t care and just tell people at work where I am.
I travel with them too. I put up a world map and they choose where we go. Up front we read up on those places. That way they have already seen a lot of the world.
We talk in the mornings when we travel to work and at lunch-time. He doesn’t miss out at all. We work in the same industry so he understands what it takes. We have an agreement we work hard now and one day life will be easier.
It works well for me. I am at least 9 hours a day at work, but not on a Friday. I make sure I get the work done.
When I reached COO level at a major retail bank I realised I didn’t want to go any higher and that if ever I was to become a CEO it would be for a charity and not a bank. I am an individual who gets the job done and who can sit behind someone and make them hugely successful, and I actually enjoy playing that role. I realised that if I was to go for the big office and the big chair, I would have to severely compromise my family time and some of the things I love doing, like my community and charity work, I am not prepared to do that.
I think when you hit 40 you look around and you appreciate life a little more. Work is a massively important aspect of my world, and I don’t doubt I will always be in senior roles in the City, however I now appreciate balance, so if a job doesn’t give me that balance I don’t take it.
All the time, either about work or about the children. I don’t think I or they miss out though, it’s just a different view. My children understand I need to go to work and why. We’ve had that conversation. I explained the things we can do now, with the extra income. One of them said ‘you’d better go to work then’and the other said ‘fine, you can stay at home’. They understand it’s a trade-off.
Most of my career happened after children. When I had my first child I was a team leader/supervisor, I returned to work after 3 months and did a step back to a more administrative role. Initially I worked 3 days/week, after 4 months 4 days/week and then back full-time. I did the same with my second daughter.
I used to think working less and having a family would harm my career. I guess it’s also about how hard you are prepared to work. If I’d missed a meeting when working part-time, I made sure I would know who was there and what was discussed.
I never thought we would have children. Then I met my husband and it did happen. As a result I think I was very maternal. Having children became a reason to achieve, to show it to my children. I come from a humble background and have a strong driver to give them a better background and better opportunities.
Emergency moments, you just can’t plan for them. When your child is ill your child minder will not have them, and your mates will not take them either, so it’s down to you. It’s a nightmare and I have missed many work things because of it. I am glad we are clear about that one now as they are older.
Then there are the sleepless nights, they never tell you they go on for a number of years.
Last there is the tension in your relationship, about one partner doing more than the other. We have had regular discussions about whose meeting is more important. Once we both had a key meeting on the same day. We solved it by becoming a tag-team, me going in in the morning and straight back home as soon as I had the US delegation on the plane in the early afternoon. My husband joined his key meeting once I got home.
I learned 80% is enough, for your children and at work. They don’t have to be immaculately dressed, and you don’t have to be at every single school event or meeting at work.
Your house doesn’t have to be 100% either. For me, I have learned to enjoy those rare moments when there is no e-mail waiting, the house is tidy and clean and all jobs are done. I have learned to treasure those moments, rather than expect this is the normal state of affairs.
If I would do it all again I would probably take a year off, I returned to quickly after maternity leave. I don’t think it harms your career, if you have the right employer. That’s the key, to choose the right employer. I changed employers several times and it can make a big difference.
I would also recommend not to wait for your boss, I have always taken my own advancement in my own hands. I kept a network outside of work, looked after my education and build my own profile. When you work part-time or are on leave you can still go to training events, for instance.
My daughters do want children. They see me doing charity events, help out with We Are the City events and come into work at Christmas. They see me and don’t want to do it like that, it sounds like too much hard work 
. I would advise them to do what makes them happy. I was just never going to be a coffee-morning mum, this worked for me.
About the interview: Vanessa Vallely was interviewed by Inge Woudstra, founding Director of Mum & Career on 27 April 2012. Vanessa is Head of Business Management at Aviva Investors, founder of leading women’s network and website We Are the City, and she co-founded The Network of Networks which includes the Diversity heads and heads of women’s networks from 45 FTSE firms. She is a school governor and Non Executive Director for the National Youth Music Theatre and the Prostate Cancer Charity.
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