To ask whether employers generally don't have a problem with parents working from home?

[SuperTrumper]

I'm on maternity leave at the moment and hoping to return to work in April.

I'm really starting to worry about how the childcare will work; I do have options and I'm sure it will be fine but I am guess I am just anxious about how it will all work until it's in action.

I'm remaining full time; my plan is to utilise MiL for 1.5 days of the week, nursery for 2 days and then I'm hoping to work from home for 1.5 days.

I work for a large well known bank and generally they don't mind home working. I haven't yet asked my boss if my proposal to work 1.5 days at home will be ok, ordinarily I know he wouldn't mind as he knows I work hard at home and don't just sit there in my pyjamas watching daytime tv, however now I'm a mum to a small baby, he might be dubious about how much I can actually get done with a nearly-1 year old

In your experience do employees understand that parents will work at home with their baby in the background and do they just trust that your work gets done?

If he asks me how I propose to look after DS and do my work at the same time I don't know what I'll say other than I'll make sure i work whatever hours I have to work to ensure my work gets completed.

Are there parents here of young babies or toddlers working from home on some days and do you/the employer just accept that there are some days you are just not productive but that you make up for it??

Ps I can't ask my MiL to come over on the days I propose to be home as she has SILs kids on the other days and can't cope with a baby on top

I worked compressed hours and I'm full time. I currently work 5 days in 4. It's loonnngggg days, but it's worth it.

I used to work a 9 day fortnight which was more manageable, but I still had to pay for childcare on the day I wasn't using, so I had to switch to 5 in 4.

I have worked in banking all my working life and used manage a team, many of whom were working mums (as am I). I massively supported anyone who wanted to apply for flexible working and formally WFH (rather than just on ad hoc days). However what I did insist on (as did HR and senior management) was that there was proper childcare still in place on those days. You cannot WFH properly and look after a child - and I know that from experience. I child will not understand that you are working and quite honestly it's not fair on them to expect them to understand that you're there, but you can't play with them or do stuff with them! It will also cause a huge amount of resentment from co-workers who will think you're royally taking the piss. Sorry

I work 4 days and have dropped 3.5 hours. I work from home once in a while but I rarely have children around at that time and mine are older now. I have done it though and it's awkward. I was once on a voice conference trying to explain a complicated calculation with my dd stood beside me with an iced lolly on her hand asking if she could have it. I kept shaking my head at her but that just made her ask again and again and again until she cried.

It's explicit in the wfh policy at my work(a large bank) that you can't be doing childcare. The test you have to do to get a remote working fob uses examples of it too.
We're expected to work from home 1-2 days a week.

They are very happy to allow flexible hours, 4 long days etc though.

My employer is a fairly small consultancy, and we all work from home unless we're visiting clients. Weirdly, they encourage us to keep annual leave for ourselves and have the kids with us during school holidays. One of the girls works full time hours yet takes her kids to school and picks them up - she makes up the hours in the evening.

Maybe her children are more independent than mine, but I can't work for long without childcare. It's literally bursts of 30 minutes without interruption, then they want something or other.

Bottom line is, even though employer is fine with having kids around, I find it incredibly stressful so don't tend to do it unless desperate!

My husband and I adopted 2 under 2 last year and he is taking 12 months off as a SAHD. I returned to work after adoption leave and work flexi and compressed to fit in around family and nursery commitments.
Monday is 7 hours as kids are both home with DH all day. Tuesday I work 8.5 hours,Wednesday is 8 hours, Thursday 7.5 hours and Friday 4 hours, 10 - 2 working from home. Husband takes the kids out shopping and for lunch with his mum on a Friday so I have a quiet house while working. Once he starts looking for work again in a few months we might have to revisit it to fit in more nursery (both only attend couple of mornings a week at the moment) and probably me working 8-12 on a Friday so no childcare needed for the afternoon.
I have worked from home when we have had hospital, doctors or SW appointments with them there but its hard even with my husband there to look after them. Phone calls become a nightmare as one of them might start screaming or shouting in the background so I make sure any client calls are moved.

I can just about manage a half day from home with my 14 and 10 year old and that's mainly because they'll happily lie in best most of the morning but my nearly 7 year old goes to holiday club as he's still too demanding for me to work around

I have work from home when one of my DCs are off ill and mostly I find it pretty stressful. You are trying to be present for both your employer and your child at the same time and the situation isn't fair on either party. Sometimes it can work if you have a project to do that doesn't involve lots of instant phone or email responses but even then you can end up working in the evening to make sure you are not falling behind.

I'm glad you've decided not to do this. A boss would be concerned about a staff member who intended to either neglect their work or their child, which is what your plan would mean in practice!

The compressed hours is a good plan but chanie44 makes a good point about needing to stick to set days for nursery so a 4 day week may be better.

Your DH needs to step up and help solve this problem too. He could also investigate a compressed working week and then you could both do 9 days, covering the spare day between you on alternate weeks. That would be easier than a 4 day week which has long hours.

Don't use holiday to go PT as you may well need the holiday for the days your MIL can't do (holidays, illness or just when she has other plans which she probably will do from time to time).

I haven't read through all the comments but I work for a big bank and have a DS at nursery (and pregnant with second). I work 4 days a week compressed so I do 8-5 or 32 hours a week rather than 35. TBH I tend to have to leave at 4.30 and work through lunch but manager is fine as long as hours get done. I work at home 1 or 2 of those days where I'll do a longer day to make up any lost hours on days I need to travel to the office. I could never work from home with DS there, he's in nursery when I do that.

OP, I am glad you are reasonable and open to consider the best options.

Sadly, your original question is exactly the reason why so many companies refuse to allow employees to work from home. Some workers are as efficient, if not more, when they don't waste time commuting and can concentrate in the quiet of their own home, but others are confusing this with a duvet day.

Without childcare, you can work during nap times and at night. It's not always practical, and it's bloody exhausting.

DH can do the odd pick up and drop off here and there but not much else as his company isn't very flexible.

As PP said, I would challenge him on this. Has he actually asked? It's funny how many men seem to work in places that don't support flexible working. I would bet there are women in his company who have flexible hours.
Sharing pick ups and drop offs makes all the difference if you're both working full time. It's not fair for it all to fall on one parent.

I would challenge your husband on his job being flexible. We are quite flexible at work, yet I hear men feed their wives the same line all the time.

I've also seen this - men and women on the same team, doing pretty much the same job, the women manage to leave on time and do pick ups but the men tell their wives it just isn't possible.

I would look at compressed hours and getting your DH to do pick up on the longer days that you work.

DH and I each do one shorter day each week and then work late on the other's early finish day to make up the hours, so we can each pick up DS at 3pm on one day. Could you do nursery for 1 long + 2 shorter days, and could MiL do 2 days? I guess it might depend on your nursery schedule and if you can do part days.

I currently work FT hours but flexibly:
Mon-Thurs long days 8-5:30, and then 2 hours on a Friday at home, so 37 hours overall.
I have my 3 year old at home on the Friday but usually do one hour when she rests at midday and then 1 hour in the evening once she has gone to bed.
This works well for me.. Could you do something similar?

i work from home one day a week but my kid is at school. From experience you cannot work from home and have a kid at home. You just can't.

To put the other side of this - I am a man in team of childless men and women (mostly women) - we all work from home but despite scheduling the arrangements I have for collecting and depositing DD in our team calendar (they are very regular) I get requests to travel and/or attend teleconferences at these times and bafflement if I politely decline.

It's not all one-way traffic; despite paying lip service to flexibility and child friendliness, it's defintely career limiting for me not to be able to jump on a plane at a moment's notice.

You are not proposing to work from home!! You are proposing to work 3.5 days and spend the other 1.5 days looking after your child.

Most modern employers don't mind working for home depending on role

What they mind is people taking the utter piss by telling them they're 'working' when actually they are taking on childcare responsibilities!!

It's probably bollocks that DH employer isn't flexible. He has the same legal rights as anyone else with regards to requesting flexible working. I agree with PP - I bet if you made a few enquiries there would be people who do WFH or compressed hours. I have worked with enough men who assumed their wives would do all the adapting once DC came along when they could easily have done it themselves

If you think you actually can wfh with baby there, just say you want to wfh one day a week because the nursery can't accept DC until later that day or something. If not, you will have to look at compressed hours or getting DH to actually properly investigate what he can do?

Do you have room for an au pair?

It's probably bollocks that DH employer isn't flexible. He has the same legal rights as anyone else with regards to requesting flexible working

Same legal rights to ask. Employers have every right for business needs to say no.

I would never agree to this. If you work from home, fine, but you sort out childcare for your child when you are doing so. We're not paying you to look after your child, but to do a job.

You can't wfh and look after a child where I work and we have flexible working so loads of people wfh. A manager might agree for example if an older child is ill and you just need to be around but can work at the same time. But otherwise you can't combine it with childcare and children don't tend to remain in the background under any circumstances anyway!

Working from home is just that; working, kids in childcare, not at home with you

DPS work allow him to wfh when DD is poorly, most recently a week long stretch because of the pox (I teach so can't really be off) but DD is nearly 7 and can basically look after herself. It won't be possible with a young baby to do it constantly but you should get away with a few wfh days when he's sick.

I work from home, along with several thousand in my company, we all use childcare when working from home!! I work in an office mostly, on a seperate floor to living space and even with a nanny in the house I struggle to not be disturbed

In fact during school holidays colleagues with older children often seek refuge in their nearest office as they can't work from home.