to think there is a massive disconnect between being a parent and working and this needs to be taught emphatically at school

[theremustbeanotherway]

So that my people like me, as so many of you are, don't spend decades getting those top GCSEs, A-levels, the Oxbridge degree, the high-flying legal career, only to feel like I need to massively downgrade/quit work in order to have anything approaching a balanced life with my growing family? Tis truly miserable. I know part-time is a possibility but certainly not at my firm and they are like gold dust elsewhere. DH very supportive and does more than his fair share but it's not working at present and I can only see it getting worse in future.

Are there parts of the world where society is set-up so as to allow both parents to work without the family suffering? Is it because our society lacks the support of a strong extended family and community network or because our jobs are more demanding and don't acknowledge the competing demands of a young family?

You're a cheerful breakfast companion Toby

Can I interest you in some porridge?

(You're quite right, though )

No, you can't have it all I'm afraid. The top jobs require you to put the hours in. I'm stuck at the level I am because I choose to be there. The next step up would require full-time working and a degree of travelling I'm not willing to do. Life is difficult enough with the 2 of us working. The only other option would be to get a nanny and that would probably wipe out my salary increase anyway.

I do know what you mean though. It does piss me off that I worked like a dog for years and it's not really been worth the bother.

Excellent post on previous page bytobysmum about Victorian era.

Also the top jobs require you to put the hours in sadly, too, do many of the "bottom" jobs.
Capitalism and patriarchy remain our enemies imho.

OP- you have trained for a high flying legal career. Remember: it's not too many years since that wouldn't even have been open to you- only to men. There then followed a long period of time when even though technically you could have had such a career, the lack of maternity rights, lack of regulated childcare etc would have made it nigh on impossible to continue after having children.

Whatever you may think, parental rights have never been stronger than they are now. Up to a year off after having a baby, and within a few months, couples can transfer parental leave between them. Childcare is far more widely available and there is a greater range of types. Childcare costs continue to be an issue, I know, though less so for those in top careers.

I really don't think now is the point in time when teenagers should be given a message about lack of opportunities and choices

Actually, on the subject of the victorian era, that was when the basis of modern business practice evolved, when the suburbs exploded and the clerical classes ballooned. All of which was designed to cater for a sole earner, patriarchal model.

So; homes were separated from work places on a mass scale (growth of railways) which was fine as the children were out in the fresh air of the suburbs cared for by plentiful free female (family and otherwise) labour, whilst the men worked 9-5 and undertook hefty commutes to central business districts, because they were free to do so.

None of this infrastructure works so well now there are school-runs, and nursery pick ups and educational hours of 9-3 to accomodate within the same framework.

accommodate^ grrr

I don't like the assumption that highly educated women are the ones who lean in and continue with the high flying career post giving birth. I'm a bit at the notion of parenthood as something you fit in at some point in your late thirties, take a bit of time off then return as if nothing happened. And pretend (at work) that your kids don't exist so as not to alienate childless colleagues. My interpretation of 'lean in' is 'pretend you didn't have kids' cos you can't 'lean it' at work without 'leaning out' at home. Something has to give. Work or kids. You can't split yourself in two. Unless you're Sheryl Sandbergh and have your own custom built office creche at work
specifically for your offspring so you can work a gazillion hours and pop your head around the door occasionally.
The do it all and lean in philosophy is fine if you don't mind just seeing your kids at the weekend cos they're asleep when you leave and straight to bed when you get home. I work part time and even that's a big distraction. Even that takes.me away from my three children too much.

I disagree.

There are plenty of parents in my office. They work flexible hours, compressed hours, part time etc and all enjoy rewarding jobs.

The issue is with your employer.

But theres a difference between a rewarding, interesting job and a "high flying job" in the way that I think the OP means. My PT job is rewarding and relatively well paid (I'm a higher rate tax payer despite working PT hours) but I don't think anyone would point at me and go "Wow, she really knocked the lights out, didnt she?" The issue is not at this level (i.e. top 10% of earners) but the top 1%, or 0.1%- the public company directors, city law firm partners, managing director level investment bankers- that's the level at which I genuinely dont believe a family can have 2 careers at that level and that's where the women drop out. There's no point in pretending it's not happening because the numbers speak for themselves

Totally agree with nooka

Unfortunately a high flying legal career is not really compatible with anything other than total dedication to your firm I'm afraid.

But I think it should be - if the above is the case there is a problem. It comes from (some) employers being so dinosaur-like and inflexible they can't see that someone could work part-time and still be extremely valuable. There is often a culture of "you are a better employee if you show more dedication" – i.e. you turn up to every work event and your jacket is always on the back of your chair – even if you are actually less good at your job.

I can't understand why we don't change to a 4-day week, or at the very least, everyone should legally have the option of a 4-day week. We need to spread the work out among more people and drop the idea that you are only any good if your job is the only thing in your life.

For this to work, there would have to be better pay at the lower end but I would also argue that's important.

I also agree with teaching kids when they are making career choices that they may want to think about flexibility and having a family (and I mean both boys and girls). I have a freelance job that means I can work part-time and my own hours - it's the only way I can work really as we have no family support, and no money/space for an au pair or nanny. I tell both my DC now that building up freelance skills is one of the best things they can do for their career. Also I do think employers will slooooooowly wake up to the fact that part-time and home-based working is often more efficient and results in a happy worker and not a burned-out husk.

Law firms are not the most imaginative places when it comes to designing flexible working arrangements despite all the guff they try to peddle to new joiners. If you go into certain areas of the law, like Private Client or Family, you must get do slightly better but otherwise I think you are looking at a straight choice between keeping up the long hours and travel to advance your career or side stepping fir a few years into another role like PSL as suggested above. Pretty much always you can move back to fee earning when the time is right because at least you are up to speed on changes in the law etc. Not a perfect solution obviously as you will almost certainly take a pay cut, although it may only reflect the reduction in your hours but a decent compromise short term if you want to maintain some sort of work/family balance.

Sorry I didn't mean to post and then run. To come come back on some of the points made, I'm well aware that having a high flying legal career is not compatible with having a balanced family life. I always planned to make my exit at a junior level to somewhere I could have more time for my personal life. What I've found depressing in my search for a new job is just how far down the ladder I have to go to find somewhere I can expect regular hours or flexibility on a regular basis to in order to be able to see my child/children on a regular basis. This goes for both private practice and in house. And then there's the response I get when enquiring with recruiters about the possibility of working 4 days or dare I say it 3 days a week instead of full-time. The universal response is to begin full-time then ask to work flexibly/go down to 4 days further down the line.

I would be very uncomfortable with schools getting involved in the warning off about certain types of job.

Because you can bet that before long it would be women and poor people being discouraged, whilst the rich boys continued to hoover up the best paid work.

Some people manage a high flying career and a thriving family. My DH is the senior partner in a city law firm and came home last night to feed the kids so I could go out with mates (ok he bought fish and chips). He does the school run regularly.

Meechimoo, it is a misleading line that all high flying jobs are like Sheryl Sandberg's and it is all or nothing. There is no law that decrees women have to choose between a job and children. There are lots and lots of jobs out there which can combine ft working and decent family time, which may not be the obvious choice, but which can easily be done with the childcare support that the relatively high salary that the OP will get can buy or with a partner who has a less demanding job.

If "high flying" women think SAHP is the only other option to their first choice City career, then it is a lack of imagination that holds these women back, not the lack of choices available to them.

Yes the lean out parent may have taken a hit re career progression but the lean in one misses out too - nobody wins. Dd2 drew a picture of her house the other day in it were her, dd1 and me. Poor old dh doesn't feature.

The structure of billable hours, having to provide seamless service to clients paying high fees does make flexible working difficult in corporate law firms. Door closed on that one at my old firm you were in or out. When I left there were 50 partners in the department. 2 were women one of those 2 off with stress. That said some companies with in house lawyers were really flexible so not all doom and gloom

OP: "The universal response is to begin full-time then ask to work flexibly/go down to 4 days further down the line."

This is correct. Further down the line could just be 6 months or a year later. I floated the idea at the interview but said I wanted to learn as much as I could first (I was shifting sideways) and then after a short period in the job ft raise the issue of flexible working.

That way, the employer can see your commitment yet understand you will be raising the issue later. I have done this twice and each time, went flexi after 3 months. If they want you enough, they will agree. I have to say that these are not client-facing fee-earning roles and so can inherently be done flexibly.

OP, do you already have children?

OP the only woman I know in your position who would say she made it work (most of the time...) set up her own practice so she could write the rules herself.

Contrast with another solicitor friend who is very high up in a good firm and is miserable because the job is (she now says, after 4 years of trying every way she can to find a balance) not compatible with parenthood, let alone motherhood.

I know other women in other professions who have more of a balance (although they too would say they struggle a lot) but the legal career does seem particularly inflexible for parents.

Or work for yourself? Really like the I earn I keep it model (hmrc excepted of course)

Also I think my slightly ranty comment about teaching in schools is a bit of a red herring. I agree it would be hard to teach in practice and looking back at my girls' school we were fairly aware of the difficulties that came with having careers and children and were probably a bit rose-tinted in our expectations that we would be able to stay at home with our young babies and pick up the career further down the line.

Flexibility all round is the key.

Flexible in approach to work whilst children are young - side shifting etc. Flexibility in education - we are still trapped in an archaic industrial schooling model with the academic day and year structured in a very peculiar way.
Flexibility at work - flexi-time, homeworking etc.

It requires a concerted effort to reinvent how our society functions.
Not holding my breath though - with that cunt Cameron banging on about how they want to get more women into the workplace and then doing absolutely fuck all about it.

Studying and working hard all those years has given you choice. You can't have everything or be in more than one place at once but you do have a number of options available. I cashed out of the legal business at about 8 year PQE. It had given me enough money to do a more flexible and enjoyable (but far worse paid) job for a few years, then be a SAHM for a few years. It gave me enough self-confidence and savings to now be studying something else and getting ready to set up my own business. I cringed when my MIL said "Oo, yes, I was so glad my daughter chose X career because it is so compatible with having children." I would hate to give my daughter a message like that. It is difficult to get out of the mindset of seeing work/life as a "ladder", and career choice as a one-off thing when you leave school - law firms sell you that view of life, but it's not really like that for most people.

The only couples I know who BOTH manage to combine 'high flying' full time careers and children have live-in nannies and have made peace with not seeing a huge amount of their kids in the week. I envy them their career progression, but tjeir lifestyles seem absolutely brutal and exhausting.

Most other couples I know? The woman has made the compromise (reduced hours or career changed to a more family-friendly line of work).

This troubles me, although I have done it myself. Left a demanding media career after my second child was born as I couldn't hack the long hours and assumption that the business should take priority over every area of my life at almost all times. Funnily enough, this didnt affect any of the men with children I worked with, who a decade later are almost all at the top of their game, with wives who work part-time, freelance or not at all in order to pick up the slack at home.

It brings it home to you, really. Capitalism still rules - profit over people etc. and the patriarchy is still running very smoothly!

Lots of jobs are hostile to good family life: shift work on a ward in the NHS? Shift work in a care home? Not well paid and really unsocial hours.

When I was watching the Edwardian Farm I remember Ruth Goodman talking about the hours worked by domestic staff - all the seamstresses, maids and laundresses for example were women. She said that firms/households had a time they expected unmarried women to turn up and the time for married women to start was 2 hours later due to the acknowledgement that a married woman had to do stuff round her house first.

What we seem to have done is say women can have jobs - but they are all based on a long hours, 40 years uninterrupted work to get a pension, someone at home doing the domestic support functions which evolved years ago.

What we need is to challenge society to change those working models.