Senior “career” women - what did you do/how did you do it?

[2yearoldbattler]

Looking for experiences of both mothers who are in the thick of it and those whose babies are long grown up.

Am a very senior exec, currently on mat leave from a COO role in a very high growth, high profile business with my second baby. Have fun a number of mediums big (£500m+) businesses in the past as either CEO or divisional MD. Will be back to work in a couple of weeks. Also sit on 2 boards, one a charity non profit, the other a FTSE 100 coy.

My husband is also a career person (professional services) and we are having some discussions at the moment about how we make our lives work. Tbh the period in between me returning from mat leave with no 1 and leaving on mat leave with number 2 was not a success - we felt so stretched and it was primarily our relationship with each other that suffered.

So, what did you do and how did you do it? Both stayed full time and ground through it? One dropped to part time? How much help did you have? Would love to hear what worked and didn’t.

Have NCed so only have one post under this name, but am a longtime MNer - defo not a journalist. I just don’t have that many friends who are operating like I do (that sounds arrogant and wanky, but you know what I mean) to be able to have a wide pool of experiences.

Childcare could be tax deductable. That would help a lot.

Some people do get help with childcare though don’t they if they are on lower income?

I assume the problem is mainly with people in the middle income bracket who don’t qualify for that help.

If you are earning in the 7 figure bracket I don’t think you should be getting subsidised childcare.

Personally I wouldn't support tax deductible childcare. I'd sooner see that money used for other things like the NHS or schools. I'm a middle earner too - certainly not in the OP's league.

I guess this just comes down to personal politics at the end of the day though so this might be an "agree to disagree" situation!

What I would like to see is more employers offering genuine flexible working options, and more men taking these up and/or being the one in the relationship who takes a career break or goes part-time after childcare. But I don't know how you go about achieving a cultural shift like that.

If you are earning in the 7 figure bracket I don’t think you should be getting subsidised childcare

No. But those salaries are exceptional and for many childcare is prohibitive especially if you work long hours.

I believe I'd currently have to earn about £90k just to pay what I paid my last nanny. That's a luxury available to very few and doesn't help the vast majority of professional woman.

OP I'm interested in your progression into NED roles? I'd like to head in that direction. Could you give some advice on how to pursue that? How did you get your first role?

I think it's very much possible to recognise the value of childcare providers and expect them to be well remunerated, whilst also appreciating that the cost of childcare is prohibitive for many women and an important factor of keeping women out of the workplace.
Yes - I would never say the wonderful people who care for my child are underpaid.

Women on Boards is a really useful organisation and their Getting Started workshop is highly recommended. www.womenonboards.net/en-gb/home

I think the change from exec to full-time portfolio career of NED roles would be a significant salary drop for the OP though as 5/6 part-time NED roles is the max and they pay around £15k each.

One of the things this thread has made me reflect on is how hard it would have been for me to go from junior to middle management if I’d have had children at that point. I think the assumption was everyone was young and could do silly hours if they wanted to get ahead. I remeber regularly finishing at midnight etc but just wouldn’t have had the salary at that point to pay out for the childcare needed. I guess at least for the jump from middle to senior most women are on a decent salary (obviously the OP is on a different scale here with hers) but still find it to be a hefty cost- especially nannies who offer more flex than nurseries.

I'm in the in-between period now - going off on second mat leave from December. Both DH and I work - he is a director, I'm not particularly senior but run my own department.

We barely cope, but we put DS in nursery 8am - 6pm 3 days a week, and we're lucky to have grandmothers who will look after him a day a week each too. I asked for flexi hours so I get into work very early every day but can leave at 5 to do the nursery pick up. DH drops him at nursery in the mornings, but isn't home until 8 or 9pm most nights (our commute is also only 30 minutes, so that helps).

Our marriage is suffering, to be honest, as we barely see each other Monday - Friday and then weekends are taken up with life admin. We have a cleaner once a week to make sure our flat is actually clean, but it looks like a pigsty most of the time which I hate. We live off takeaways and very rarely make time for each other, let alone some time for ourselves!

For us, we've decided what's best is if I take a step back once no.2 arrives, either going part time or more likely stopping work for a few years until DS is in school. I'm not brilliantly happy about this, but his career has a much better trajectory than mine, so it makes sense for me to put things on hold.

I really hope it works out for you and that you can find a better solution - and I'd love to hear about it if you do

ArtichokeAardvark That sounds so familiar- although I’m already part time and that hasn’t been the magic solution. It’s so hard isn’t it. I have no doubt that the rest of my family would probably be happier if I didn’t return after mat leave but I feel too ambitious not to, I want to have a decent pension, possibly the option of private school later on and my sector is more secure. I’m just really struggling to find the right balance between career progression and having a pleasant home life. I’m having an absolutely lovely time on mat leave at the moment.

Gosh this is such an interesting thread.

All DCs sound loved and cared for but I'm just baffled at the lives many of you lead. I couldn't do it I admit. I think a lot of the tips here apply to anyone with a demanding job, whatever level they are, providing it's affordable. I think flexibility is the key to everything in the workplace and hopefully more firms are cottoning on to this to keep the best talent.

I think flexibility is the key to everything in the workplace and hopefully more firms are cottoning on to this to keep the best talent.

I disagree.

I think work full time /full days/unpaid overtime as required or don't work at all if you have a professional career.

Unless you are in an industry where part time working is the normal from board downwards.

But don't work part-time and whinge about not having time for the family or a career or not progressing at the same rate etc. Or expect people to make allowances because you have children, most people have children, they have taken different choices.

We used a nursery when I went back to work after having DS, our salaries were nowhere in the region of the OP’s so a nanny wasn’t a possibility. I felt that DS was caught up in the same rat race as us at 3 years old! The hours and commute were the same. When he went to pre school we used nursery day care to cover the school holidays, so had the same holidays as us. Obviously he was having more fun at nursery and pre school than we were, but still it didn’t really sit right with me. I then got made redundant so we had a re-evaluation of our lives and I became a SAHM.

Sorry @Maudiemay but your post makes you sound like a bit of a dick. Apologies if you actually aren't one.

Flexibility isn't just about working part time or full time. It's about options and quid pro quo. Productivity, results and morale are crucial business drivers and can be massively improved by employees being able to flex around their families and work objectives. As long as they're achieving what they need to does it matter if they're working at home, started at 8, left at 3, finished at 1am, worked Mon to Fri or Tues to Fri? There isn't a one size fits all set up for every person or business but it's about trust and being open to the options that are possible. However small they might appear.

What’s interesting to me is what has and hasn’t changed since I had my babies. Maternity provisions were much less generous then and I was back at work when they were 3 months old. This did mean that I wasn’t out of the business for long enough for it to be too much of a career track hit - particularly since dh did his share which included all the evening nanny handovers. So in many respects I was able to ‘work like a man’ which i’m sure helped. But childcare was still expensive. I remember each pay rise working out how much of a rise I could give my nanny taking into account all the tax. It was usually split 50:50 between the taxman and nanny - but keeping my career going was worth it as childcare costs end and my pay kept going up. It was depressing at the time though.

I think what @Maudiemay is saying is that most careers involve a race. If you're in that race, sign up and run the course like everyone else. If you're running half the race, that's fine too but you can't expect the same medal and finishing time as everyone running the full course..

I've done full and part-time roles and knew that there was a trade-off when part-time: I didn't get promotions or fast track options because people had to work around me and my reduced hpurs. These opportunities appeared again when I was able to devote more time to work. It worked for me because I didn't see part-time as a failure to progress but a temporary state to keep me sane! I wouldn't have changed it looking back as keeping my foot in the door became very important later on.

But surely the "race" is achieving/over achieving on the objectives you're set by the organisation and how you get there is unique to each individual?

I think flexible working is, in most industries, easy to implement and a huge boon. Remote working and being able to manage my own hours was essential. I can't imagine any senior role not enjoying that sort of flexibility these days.

Part time on the other hand is more tricky I think. In my industry, client's expectations and the time sensitivity of the work simply aren't really compatible with part time work. At the time I was pretty resentful about that, but looking back I genuinely struggle to see how it could be improved.

I was in the first wave of women for whom flexible working was a theoretical possibility- but it was very hard to argue for it as a senior person. They could just about get their heads round the idea of typists doing it...(and yes- it was that long ago-typists were definitely a thing......)

One of the things this thread has made me reflect on is how hard it would have been for me to go from junior to middle management if I’d have had children at that point.

But career men and working fathers have never had this problem. In my experience, men are more likely to progress at work once they have children (in direct contrast to women).

This is why I think looking to subsidised childcare as the answer is just putting a sticking plaster over the problem rather than solving the underlying issues. It removes men from the equation and throws all the responsibility back to women.

On working part-time, I totally agree it's fair to assume that this might slow your career progression down. What I don't think is fair is the prevailing assumption that it will be the woman who will go part-time if needed. When I was pregnant I was asked by dozens of collagues, friends and acquaintances if I'd returning to work part time. My DH was never asked once.

DS is 14 and I was only the second person in my department to ever work part-time!

And I only knew one person in the regional offices connected to mine who managed to get term-time working.

One alternative to part-time, I think, is jobshares. When they work well, they're brilliant. There were a few of them when I worked in the public sector including at pretty senior levels (although always women, obviously...) but not so much now I've moved industries. I think it's a better option for everyone than the typical "drop one day a week and get 80% pay for full-time responsibilities" model.

It’s sobering to think that 1970s feminists like me barely gave a thought to having babies and childcare. When we did, we just assumed there would be free 24 hour childcare....

I was a v high earner mid 80s to mid 90s (City) DH was a young barrister. When we got married I had the equity and higher salary. DS was a poorly baby (went back 3.5 dYs when he was 4 months). Very stretched and couldn't be reliable. DH's career was taking off. We reviswd priorities and I decided I wanted to be a full time mummy. Stuck working for a year.

Had 7 years off and went back to work when dd was settled in reception. Part-time, right at the bottom, took prof quals within 4 years and qas full-time two years into return.

It was a compromise because I worked locally to make things work, we had an au-pair and cleaner/ironer. Ten years into career 2 I was a Director.

I still subcontract cleaning, ironing, gardening, odd jobs etc. Without compromise I think you need a high end nanny or a standard nanny and v supportive parents.

Hardest thing I've ever done is to work part time. Not fully engaged at work and feel inadequate at home because it's difficult to subcontract to others - for me any way.

I'm not a fan of working PT, either for myself or my senior team. It adds an extra level of complexity that becomes difficult to manage.