Before you have a baby, it’s not unusual to assume that you’ll be happy to get back to work just as soon as your bundle of joy is ready for proper childcare. After all, you love your career, and you might even like the idea of getting your purpose back.
Unfortunately, as countless mothers quickly realize, juggling parenthood with a demanding career is a lot harder than it might sound, and not even for the reasons that you may expect. After all, what mothers-to-be can’t possibly anticipate is the fact that emotionally speaking, priorities change when there are kids in the picture. This isn’t to say that you won’t still love your job, but it does mean that you’ll probably want to do less of it so that you can see more of your family.
Despite shame around this desire, many moms are speaking out about their wish for more flexible work/life arrangements to facilitate it, and many of them are doing so with high levels of success. Here, we consider how they’re finally winning the battle for flexible hours, and how you could joining them.
Sticking to their guns
Any mom achieving a decent work/life balance right now will tell you one simple thing – stick to your guns. Or, more simply, outline the hours that you can work in a meeting before your return to work, and be clear that you aren’t willing to go outside of those right now. It’s important that when your children are young in particular you take pains not to stray from this for even ‘special occasions’. Instead, stick to those hours, set your out-of-office when you go home, and make it clear that you won’t be picking up calls, emails, etc. until you arrive at the office tomorrow.
Taking the time to delegate
Regardless of whether you’re a CEO or a lawyer, delegation is alo key to improving time management, and overall work performance after kids. If you have a team behind you, this may mean simply perfecting a new approach to in-office delegation. Equally, outsourcing IT, as well as focuses like PR with the help of companies such as elitelawyermanagement.com, can be a lifesaver in this respect. That way, your manager (or your team, if you’re at the top of the chain) is unlikely to begrudge your requests for flexible hours that buy you all-important family time.
Excelling during working hours
Excellent work performance means that flexible hours are unlikely to cause ruptions. Making sure to get yourself into a working headspace before entering the office is perhaps the best way to ensure this, as is taking the time to pursue refresher courses like those found at drexel.edu. Either way, crossing off every task on your to-do list to the highest possible standard means that, even if you leave the office a little earlier these days, everyone will be glad to have you back.
Speaking to your boss about flexible hours can be difficult, but it’ll be a whole lot easier if you have the backing of these winning arguments behind you!
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