To be narked by this woman’s attitude? Working parents v child free employees

[SJaneS49]

Not a biggie, at the moment I’ve got a lot going on in the background and am generally hacked of with the world .. but this response has generated a real ‘oh ffs’ reaction in me just now.

Expectations of working parents, especially women as typically (but not obviously always ) we have to date carried more of the childcare burden and been the ones taking the compromises has always been of interest to me & something I think we have got wrong in Britain. I posted something on LinkedIn earlier about how society expects parents to work as if they don’t have children and to parent as if they don’t work. Until I started working from home 14 years ago, that was my experience as a professional working in London, working all hours in the office while also being the sole parent at home, getting in about 7.30/8pm & going straight into helping out with homework.

So I put out a question on LinkedIn, asking parents if their recent experience of working in the new normal had changed what they themselves would be looking for in their next role in terms of flexibility of hours worked when or where they carried out their work. Plenty of employers are currently offering flexibility..but are pretty woolly & vague on what the expectations will be in the longer term. Quite possibly as a number haven’t really worked that out themselves yet! As well as interesting me on a personal level, as I advise my clients on how to make their roles more attractive, I wanted to gauge what changes 2020/21 had made to attracting candidates who if they were parents might not now (having experienced the opportunity to be more ‘present’) want to go back to how it was. Potentially!

Anyway. I have had a reply from someone who is child free who I worked with on a project years ago basically saying special measures should not be made for parents and therefore burdening their childless colleagues. Flexibility if it was being offered should be for all.

While I completely agree with her that parents should not be offered special measures or more flexible options than others, I wasn’t suggesting that at all! Which has me wondering whether this would read like this to others? This particular woman seems to spend a lot of her time writing ranty comments on LinkedIn posts judging by my feed so feeling a bit 🙄 about implications made in her post that the child free ‘carry’ more workload than working parents.

Basically, is she being a knob? Or was it fair enough! Just brought back memories of some of the attitudes around years ago of some of the women I worked with, making bitchy comments about women who had to head out at dead on 5 to relieve the childminder.

Eh?

[quote MeAndDebbieMcGee]@Allergictoironing what does any of that have to do with the OP?[/quote]
Nothing, it's directed at your frankly insulting post that anyone without children who objects to having to base their lives around others all the time must have "issues".

Flexibility needs to be for all workers across the organisation. It's completely unfair and unacceptable for certain groups of employees to be given more flexibility re working hours or more preference re holidays etc.

You really can't let Fred change his working hours to be "family friendly" around school times, if you don't allow Bill (who has no children) to do the same to work around his hobby or to fit in with his partner's working hours.

Likewise with holidays, why should Bill never get the opportunity to go on holiday in half terms just because Fred and other parents get priority due to being a parent. It's nonsensical.

I don’t get why people are being so chippy- the OP was asking a specific demographic of people their opinion/experience of something?

Flexibility in the workplace should be offered on need - but why shouldn’t the OP ask parents about it ? Some else who cares for a disabled sibling may well seek opinions and discussion from other carers , should that not be allowed too?

I think she’s being a bit nit-picky. You were asking specifically about parents’ views on something, that doesn’t mean you don’t think other people should have it. I don’t think it evens sounds like your question implies that.

It’s ok to ask a specific group about their opinions without it being a slight on those not in that group. I saw an article on the bbc today where a survey was done about women’s attitudes to wfh. You can ask women that without men piping up saying “excuse me, I also like to wfh!”

My employers are bringing in flexible working and as a child free employee it makes me apprehensive. As an employer, they were great to parents and those with caring responsibilities during the pandemic awarding extra paid leave and numerous flexible options. Anyone who didn’t have access to these had work loads doubled over night and were picking up stuff during office hours for colleagues working late/weekends instead of during the day. So I can see why that post might have hit a nerve. Very few of my colleagues without children want to apply for flexible working and so the effect of that will be others picking up extra tasks in a job that needs a presence during office hours.

As someone who has adult children (and took an income hit to ensure I was at home for my kids) I get a bit annoyed when I'm meant to wait until all the parents have chosen holiday dates before I get to pick, have to do anti social shifts etc. I've changed jobs so it's not an issue currently but I think everyone should be treated equally, some of us who are older want flexibility for other reasons!

I'm coming to parenthood later in life and am in the process of figuring out how I'll be able to balance work and home commitments. It's not simple.

That said, for 20 years I've been the one expected to pick up the slack for all the arrangements made to support working parents in the workplace, and it has often felt unfair. I'm really conscious of not becoming "that person" - whose need for flexibility imposes further constraints on colleagues without children. That manager who isn't around for full office hours? Their team still needs supervising and their questions answering when the manager is picking up their child from school. The work they do at weekends doesn't make up for that at all.
In my experience it's definitely not related to mothers specifically, some of the biggest overheads I've experienced have come from allowances made for male colleagues. So I'm not surprised someone commented!
Some workers without children may feel there have been comparatively so many allowances made for parents already, they're about to get an even worse deal.
I personally don't feel that's the case, as flexibility options for all have made things easier overall I think. Spending most of the pandemic wfh and without children, I've experienced that parents are actually more in synch with general working hours now and therefore their necessary flexibility requirements are less problematic for the rest of the team.

Well OP seems like you've got plenty of responses from childless people even though that's not what you asked for, both on LinkedIn and on here

I do get pissed off when it's automatically assumed that those without children will be more flexible. An example is we were talking about Christmas leave the other day and straight away someone said that obviously Kate will want more time off over Christmas because she has kids.

Well actually I'd also like Christmas off even if it is to sit in my pyjamas eating quality street and bitching about how fucking shit Love Actually is.
Kate doesn't get to have Christmas off automatically.

OP I fully agree with that person who responded - all employers need to try and be flexible with staff, regardless of their parental status. Otherwise it could be seen as discriminatory. Equality legislation here in NI specifically has 'those with or without dependents' as a protected characteristic to try and prevent this. I am not quite sure why their opinion has rattled you so much, you did post it presumably to hear different opinions?

you did post it presumably to hear different opinions?

.. from parents ...

@MeAndDebbieMcGee

you did post it presumably to hear different opinions?

.. from parents ...

Ah, so because I don't agree with the op, I must be a 'non parent' as you put it, and with fertility issues as you nicely went on to suggest? Perhaps tell my 3 children that

No.

I agree with PPs here - it gets wearing when people on a professional site like LinkedIn only want opinions from parents. At least on mumsnet there is the argument that the content is parenting-related, LinkedIn is supposed to be for everyone.

And yes I agree with those who said they're sick of being the last in line for holidays and picking up the slack for others - you can really tell in our workplace which managers are quietly disappearing while they're working at home for time with their kids. I get messages saying managers will be late for meetings because they're still out at a family event, on a day when they're supposed to be working and available. Meanwhile if I was to be late because of a nail appointment I'd be getting pulled up about it.

Look at it from another angle.....
When my kids were growing up I had to miss a fair few Christmases with them due to work.
My kids are now adults, am I supposed to work Christmas to enable a colleague with young children Christmas off?
Don't you think that I might perhaps want to spend Christmas with my children, grandchildren and husband?
It should be flexible and open to all employees.
I often worked during the school holidays to enable parents to have time off, am I not entitled now to have a week or two off myself in the summer?
Parents can't expect others to dance to their tune due to their choices.

I can see both sides of this.

I'm sick of picking up the slack for working parents now that their kids are back at school/ nursery. Obv lockdown was a national emergency, so completely different. Now there is no excuse/

But I do think employers should be flexible FOR EVERYONE. Not just for the people who they deem worthy.

I'm a parent but on the other side of the fence to most. I think those with kids under 11 should have preference for flexibility as they have no choice but to be there for school runs etc.

Once kids are 11 or over they can get themselves hole from school, survive a few hours home alone etc.

With only a few years to go until we are in that category and I honestly cannot wait, I'm 8 years I've took 4 emergency days to cover childcare but always feel guilty about it despite usually using annual leave.

I also can't wait to not have to pay 1-2k extra for school holidays the parents can have it!

@vickyc90

I'm a parent but on the other side of the fence to most. I think those with kids under 11 should have preference for flexibility as they have no choice but to be there for school runs etc.

Once kids are 11 or over they can get themselves hole from school, survive a few hours home alone etc.

With only a few years to go until we are in that category and I honestly cannot wait, I'm 8 years I've took 4 emergency days to cover childcare but always feel guilty about it despite usually using annual leave.

I also can't wait to not have to pay 1-2k extra for school holidays the parents can have it!

But that simply isn't true, of course parents don't have to be there for every single school run That is why wraparound care exists!

I really wish I’d never posted this, bad call on my post.

Just to be clear head - my post was completely centred on my experiences as a mother and how working from home had allowed me to be more actively involved in my younger DD’s day to day life and school than I had been able to previously when completely Office based and working long hours.

The question I asked was specifically (to other parents yes) whether having now had the chance to work from home and switch their hours around a bit (some of them) & therefore be more physically ‘present’ in the day to day whether flexibility was something that they would look for now when it came to finding a new job. Or would it simply not matter. It was an open question.

It wasn’t we parents deserve special measures and greater flexibility, it was asking for opinions on whether greater flexibility would matter in terms of selecting opportunities. Or not.

Bad call on my part not post! Or maybe I subconsciously got it right with post. So don’t have it together.

Before I had children it didnt bother me if my colleagues with children had flexible working hours. I didn't have to arrange drop offs or pick ups or arrange childcare if child was sick. I just had myself to look after. It's extremely difficult for working parents so yes they should get more flexibility.

And clear hear not clear head while I’m on the sense edit..

You didn't do anything wrong op. Other people just got fucked off because you didn't ask the question to them specifically. And then gave you an answer anyway. To a completely different question. 🤣🤣

@vickyc90

Of course parents of under 11s have choices! they can pay for childcare, or their child’s other parent can do school runs or they can have help from their own parents or make arrangements to share cover with friends.