To wonder how women in the city with kids manage

[Jadefeather7]

If you work in the city (or indeed have a job that requires long hours and an hour or more commute) how do you manage? I guess many will have nannies. Do you not see your kids during the week? I’m planning to go back in a few months. I will likely get a nanny but if I carried on as before I would get home by 7 or later by which time baby would be in bed. I’m thinking off asking for 3 days working from home so that I can work 9-5 and then 7-9. That way I can have some time in the morning, at lunch and in the evening with the baby. Not sure if my request will be accepted. Interested in how others manage.

I went back to my job in the city full time after my first child. Focus on being there for one end of the day - so for me that meant going to work early and leaving the morning parenting to my husband, then I'd leave work in time to collect my daughter and do all the evening parenting. So we both got some daily contact with our baby and were both able to carry on with careers. I found I became a lot more focused at achieving things in my contracted hours too.

Do you have a partner?

I work from home one day a week (with childcare) so I'm around mornings and evening which helps.

Outsource as much as possible so that the time I'm at home is spent with the children, not on chores. Do most life admin. on the commute for the same reason.

My DH has one day a week off with the children.

@bobbletrouble tbh I’ve always worked really efficiently and managed my work quicker than a lot of my colleagues. I would rarely stay past 7 and if I did have extra work I would usually do it after getting home and having my dinner rather than staying in the office until 1am or whatever. The culture at my work however is very much one of presenteeism. I know people who stay late for the sake of showing that they’re working hard even though they don’t have much to do. It’s the only thing I hate about an otherwise fantastic workplace.

DH actually works from home a lot but the problem is that he does go in for a day or two every other week or so for meetings but this is totally random and unpredictable. Sometimes he might be at home for three weeks straight other times he may go into his office in London for a full day or need to travel to another city for 3 days etc. He also travels abroad 4-5 times a year for 3-4 weeks.

I work in the city and I had to get a nanny to manage it. A lot of the replies on here don’t understand the hours culture or demands of the role in the city. It was totally exhausting when they were young. I have a less busy role now but it still has its moments.

I’d say if you can get part time, do it.

@zsazsajuju were you able to see the kids at all during the week? How long before you decided to take the less busy role?

I work 4 days

My husband went part time and also works 4 days and does 50% of drop offs/pick ups

Drives me nuts when i see women making all the compromises, we made it work by both pitching in

I work in the city. My commute is 45mins. We had a nanny so I saw dd in the morning and left for work at 8. DH got home first but I would try to be back to help with bath time/ last bottle before bed at 8.30. I also wfh at least one day a week and had to be very strict to not stay too late and leave the office at 6pm. Good luck!

Unfortunately, OP, I know a number of female colleagues who only manage with 2 nannies

Ps I have a friend who seems to be managing the balance well. She is in a senior role at bank - her and her DH both work 4 days and do 1 day each from home. She often works during nap time on her day off but manages to do all of the nursery drop offs/ her DH does all of the pick ups.

I don’t work in London but myself and dh have long hours professional jobs in our city. I work two days from home and work from 8am on the days I go in so I can get out early. Dh does the mornings i am I’m the office and drops to Creche and breakfast club at school. I am gone before anyone is up but I have put the foot down with my team as I leave on time every evening so I can collect and do dinner etc. it’s hard going. My dh will often not be home until 11pm on week nights.

We have a comfortable and happy life and we look on this time as setting ourselves up for middle age and the more expensive teenage years!

I dropped down to 4 days, and do 3 in the office and one WFH. On the day I WFH I do nursery drop off and pick up.
On the three days I'm in the office I moved my 'official' hours to be 8-4, which means leaving at 6.15am so don't see the kids before work but DH gets them ready and does nursery drop off on his way. I get home about 5.15 and do pick up and spend the evening with them (well until 7.30 when they go to bed!)
It's not easy but we personally preferred the idea of a good nursery to a nanny so had to find a way to make it work despite the lengthy commute into town.

I'm rural and commute 90 minutes each way into work to earn a half decent salary. I leave at 6.30am and get back at 18.30 every night. I would love to have a nanny or some other stable care giver in my kids life, but I'm only on £26k (which is very good money for Cornwall) and childcare availability is very limited. DH and I rely on a series of complicated reciprocal favours from friends and family.

I'm in and out of the city for client meetings. The women I know who are balancing kids and senior roles either have FT help - nannies, cleaners - and outsource as much as possible (ironing, gardening, food shop) so that evenings and weekends are purely for family time rather than chores. Or they compress their hours and make up their time during evenings or very early mornings.

Working from home wasn’t allowed in my job or DH’s. I reduced my days to three days a week. DH worked full time. I had a childminder, not a nanny. Childminder was a five-minute walk from home.

MIL put DP in full time nursery care from 6 months old and then before and after school club and a childminder. In summer he went to residential camps.

Maybe the question is more what will your employer think of it? I’ve done a lot of juggling childcare over the years - it has been exhausting. I’ve got a full-on job with anti-social hours and no breaks. The trouble is so much still falls on the mums and dads don’t often do their share in terms of reducing hours. I’d say the long hours culture and evening entertaining expected in The City shores up the gender pay gap.

My advice:

Working from home does not work brilliantly with having a nanny - most nannies hate it, unless you are very disciplined about disappearing to your home office and not popping in to see the baby.

Arriving home at 6.45 just to see the baby for 10 minutes is shit (this is what I did). It works ok when they are tiny but not later. Better to have some days where you work long hours and other days where you get home in time to have a good chunk of time with them.

Leaving home early and working from home in the evenings works ok if 1) you are senior enough to arrange your own workload and it won’t cause problems if people have to wait an extra few hours for your output and 2) your baby sleeps well. I had 1) but not 2).

Make sure your DH also asks his work for a flexible arrangement/reduced hours. Yes this will dent his career prospects but believe me, it is much better if you both take a small dent than you taking a big dent and him taking none. I didn’t do this and regret it, with hindsight it was a slippery slope to SAHM. In your case it is your DH’s travel periods that will cause a big problem- can he reduce it?

A nanny is far more sensible than nursery if you want to keep up your career, as they are flexible if you run late and you can still go to work when the baby gets a bug - this happens a LOT especially if they go to nursery. I know some women who were barely at work the first winter they returned because their child was off nursery so much.

Splitting shifts with your DH is good - so either he goes in early and finishes early and you go in late and finish late or vice versa.

Sorry that should say leaving the office early.

Full time nursery and a DH who whilst also working full-time can do all nursery drop-offs/pick-ups.

Out of house from 07:00 until 19:00/19:30 5 days a week.

I negotiated flexible working without a paydrop.

City firm partner - I had a live in nanny. She had previously worked for a banker so understood my issues. I also lived a 30 minute commute from the office - a deliberate choice when looking for a house.

I got dc up and gave breakfast - nanny started at just before 8am and I was out of the door at 8 and at my desk at 8.30. I left at 5.30/6 and set an alarm on my computer for 5pm so I knew I needed to start winding down. I'd be home to put dc to bed. I worked from home in the evening most nights - I actually found it quite productive. I negotiated down to 4 days after 6 months and on the advice of more experienced women I took Wednesdays as most clients would wait a day to speak to me but not over the weekends (so Fridays not a good day to take off). My clients were aware of my working arrangements so were usually pretty happy knowing that if I wasn't around at 6pm I would get back to them at 8.30pm when I was working at home. I also had a brilliant secretary who worked 10 -6 (her preference rather than my imposing it on her) which made a huge difference.

I found it usually boiled down to making sure everyone knew when I would be working in the office and when I would be working from home. As far as the presentee culture went my billings went up and my time sheets spoke for themselves. Also the couple of hours working at home in the evening were always a hell of a lot more productive than time in the office so I was always seen as an efficient pair of hands.

I was on the committee of a working mother's group for women working in the City of London when my children were smaller. It has always been difficult for women and for men too of course - even in the 1980s fathers had the same issues in non sexist marriages of course. It is only if you have a non feminist set up where your awful husband seems to think only women are in charge of children that this is ever a women's issue surely.

My children's father found the childcare for example and we tried to alternate who would get home first.

People use all kinds of different things. Some live extremely close to work. Others have an hour's commuting as I had. We had a daily nanny who left when the first of us got home. We both tried to leave work at a reasonable time when we could. I took 2 weeks off - working until I went into Labour and back full time after 2 weeks of annual leave and expressed milk at work. I just mention that to show that that is one alternative for women not just taking a year plus off and working short hours.

DH is lucky to be able to work from home so much and he will help out a lot on those days however I don’t want him to ask for reduced hours or to stop his travel because it’s necessary for progression in his career. He’s very ambitious and still has far to go. On the other hand I’ve got to a point in my career where after several promotions I’m really happy with my position and I don’t want additional responsibility or promotions ( at least not for the time being). We have discussed this openly and honestly and he’s offered to take a step back in his career if I want to push on with mine but I really don’t want to be doing what my boss does as it’s really not for me.