To ask my employees why their DH’s aren’t pulling their weight when it comes to childcare?

[TheHoneyHunt]

So I know that my DH and me are fairly unusual in that we have a very equal approach to childcare and household chores. To be fair I wasn’t born lucky. My first H was an abusive freeloader, and I swore never to make that mistake again. However, I’ve now got so used to this way of living that I now find it normal.

I’m now lucky enough to have got to the stage in my career where I manage a large team. These are well paid jobs, paying £40k+, but do require some out of hours working.

Two of my team are on maternity leave. In discussing their return to work they both seem to be assuming that they will do all the childcare. Every pick up, every drop off. Their DH’s don’t seem to appear in the equation. As the employer of the mother, I am asked to accept all the flexibility required. And yet they are still talking about wanting to be treated as equals with their male counterparts.

If the want to be treated as equals in the workplace, AIBU to question why their childcare arrangements aren’t equal?

(I know there is an official “HR” answer to this...which will definitely go along the lines of “don’t even go there”....but what I want to know is am I being unreasonable to think this)

What do your male workers do?
When they come back from paternity leave, do they commit to doing either the drop off or pick up?
If not, do you (internally) question this?
Do you judge them for it?

“They want to? It works best for them? Their husbands have higher/lower/harder/easier jobs? Shifts? Transport? Husbands look after kids all weekend and do night feeds? A million gazzilion different reasons as to what their arrangement and circumstances are?”

This. Their husbands could be dicks who flatly refuse to do it, they could have split, you don’t know

Two things though are certain:

1. It’s none of your business

1. Making them feel shit for needing flexible working won’t help either the individual’s short term situation or the long term goal of achieving equality

You have no idea whatis going on in these womens families and their childcare arrangements has nothing to do with you what sort of questons are you asking these women that you know they willbe doing all this. Btw are you sure your own arrangements is 50/50 equal ?

Most women I know returned part time after the birth of their second child. I only know one SAHD.

I'm one of those £40k plus well paid women you refer to who works reduced hours. Yes it's a good salary and a good level. My DH earns over twice as much though so there's no contest we have to prioritise his salary. My employer gets plenty out of me beyond my reduced hours so they don't lose out at all.

Two of my team are on maternity leave. In discussing their return to work they both seem to be assuming that they will do all the childcare. Every pick up, every drop off. Their DH’s don’t seem to appear in the equation. As the employer of the mother, I am asked to accept all the flexibility required.

Based on that ^^, I'm not surprised you're questioning things. You know you can't go there though.

A lot of my staff have flexitime as standard, but we do have core hours and you must put in the required hours - unfortunately, this isn't available to all staff. The downside of flexitime though is that some people abuse it, then things get messy.

For all you know they could be lone parents. Separated, or have partners that work away, or even have other family commitments. Not everyone is as fortunate as you.
I had to change my hours to part time in work for two years. Not due to childcare but due to having to look after a relative due to ill health.

None of your business !!!

All the men on my team have a work from home day to facilitate some part of their child care routine and all will do a early leave or late start when needed. It’s normal from what I can see across the floor for men with young kids.

Does the flexibility they're looking for conflict with their contracted hours? Or is it that they need to reliably leave on time every day?

The thing is, if you raise it, it’s just an added pressure on these mothers- you know “there’s something wrong with your relationship dynamic that YOU need to fix to do your job here well”.

I’m a LP in a senior role- and do all of the pick ups, drop offs, sick days, last minute dashes to the nursery. I then work like a ducking Trojan to make up for it.

Being asked why my sons father wasn’t helping more would be utterly infuriating and demoralising.

As a female (and mother) employer if many women this drives me mad.

I am positive about supporting flexibility for parents, men and women. But why is it my workplace , every single fucking time, that is re-organising, finding cover, accommodating sudden absence when a child is ill, and I know (from open conversation ) that the fathers working elsewhere are not putting the same pressure in their employers.

There’s always a reason why the job done by the man can’t be compromised!

(DH and I have always shared the parenting load equally and my job could not be what it is without this)

DH and I earn about the same in senior positions. He has a longer commute than I do but we split the childcare and house stuff pretty equally. We’re able to do that because we both ask for that flexibility from work. I imagine that very many men don’t for one reason or the other, but predominantly because they’re not expected to by their partners or employers.

It seems you're trying to be progressive but actually you're being very ignorant.

YANBU to question it. And for 'but he earns more' - I know plenty of women who out-earn their husbands. In none of those families is the husband 100% responsible for childcare, drop offs, sick days etc, like it often is if the DH is higher earner. For most people, it's just the mother's responsibility and they won't even consider other options.

YANBU to think it.
YWBVU to question it. And put unfair pressure on them.

As the employer of the mother, I am asked to accept all the flexibility required

I know it's not quite what you asked, but I hope you realise you don't have to agree to every single request if it impacts the business?

IME a reasonable amount of flexibility is a wonderful thing - especially in keeping staff motivated - but if requests turn into expectations it can sometimes cause problems

So will you be supportive of your male staff taking on equal responsibility for their childcare and reducing their hours at work to accommodate it?

There’s always a reason why the job done by the man can’t be compromised!

Exactly. On another thread, someone mentioned 2 couples. On one, wife was GP, so she could work flexibly because of childcare. In other, the wife did all the childcare as husband was a GP and therefore of course couldn't work flexibly..

MN is a strange place. You get a thread from a woman who feels her job is in jeopardy due to her taking time off when children are sick and you get a whole raft of MNers howling about how the husband/partner should be doing his share by taking an equal number of days off work. Bizarre. 🤔

As the employer of the mother, I am asked to accept all the flexibility required. And yet they are still talking about wanting to be treated as equals with their male counterparts.

you manage a large team?

how many fathers?

Please explain exactly what measures you have put in place to encourage fathers to take parental leave, or to be given the option of flexible hours to drop off and pick up children, or to contribute more evenly to child care and family life in any other way.

Thank you

I’m a teacher and at my school if your dc are sick then if you have a partner they are expected to take approximately equal amounts of time off to care for them.

Shark. You sound delightful. I pity your employer.

I've been a manager with employees who often needed flexibility in their hours for childcare - one was a single mum with young DC and an exH who regularly took her to court, another a dad whose DW didn't have much flexibility in her job. My boss kept telling me I was too lenient, my view was it worked both ways, they were flexible when I needed it, so I should give it in return. Often they worked from home if needs be, the job enabled them to do that.

But it's right that flexible working needs to be more equal. I work for a very amenable employer (apart from that boss, she's gone now!) who encourages flexible working. I do 2 days working from home, for a combination of health and work/life balance. Even though I have no children to look after. For a long time my colleagues (all male) resented me, until I pointed out any of them could make the same request. I have managed to help a few organise flexible working to help balance work/family/health. But still, most of the staff doing P/T, compressed hours, or WFH are women (even though a lot of us have no child or carer responsibilities) - absolutely no reason why the men can't request the same, but most of them seem to think they can't/shouldn't.