WFH with children

[Annie232]

On many threads I hear women pop up and mention how they WFH x number of days and so don't need childcare on x number of days. Incidentally, within my NCT group on discussions on return to work a few of the women have said similar and that they plan to WFH 1/2 days a week and therefore save on childcare. Is this a thing now?

Why bother asking then?

you can ‘buy’ it all you want, you clearly have 0 understanding of roles outside of your immediate bubble, as I said, it’s not uncommon. I have a handful of working parents under me that do the same. They’re specialists in their own right and have the autonomy to decide when and where to work, as long as their goals are met I don’t care what hours they work.

Some less so as the needs of the business mean they need to be more available. I’m lucky I don’t have many external meetings and often consult internally, others in departments such as sales where lots of their contact is external don’t often have this flexibility.

I think in the times of cost of living crisis, energy crisis, inflation, house price drop, highest childcare fees in Europe, people do what they have to and provided the job is getting done and you’re otherwise a good employee most employers will turn a blind eye. I couldn’t do it all day in my job as I have too many meetings, but I think many people tend to front load meetings in the morning and do childcare in the afternoon, then catch up in the evenings and I don’t see much wrong with this.

It depends on the work. If you can do your work in your own time without needing to phone anyone or meet online then you can work when they are in bed. That might work if you are contracted to do 16hrs per week/flexible.

But if you will have to do phone calls or online meetings you can forget it.

You'd either have to cancel the meeting or hang up the phone call, or let the baby cry in the other room.

I havent rtft sorry but we worked from home during covid with a 3 and 6 year old and it was a nightmare and thats even with very supportive employers. There is no way someone can effectivley wfh with babies/toddlers. It just cannot be done and most employers will not allow it.

I wfh before covid but my DC were in nursery or with my parents. Now they are 9 and 6 so I do save on wrap around care as both DH and I wfh on flexible hours with control over our diaries so one does school drop off and then works later while the other works from very early and then finishes to do school pick up.

Sometimes we have to work late, over our contracted hours and in that case our DC will sit and watch TV or play their switches while we work, our employers know about this and know that if they don't allow it then we can't work late and the deadlines aren't met. This is ok as it isn't all the time and a 9 and 6 year old are independent enough to get their own snacks etc. Occassionally my parents will take them.

Not everyone works in dated, old fashioned jobs where you have to be doing anything particularly for hours on end.

And you're accusing other people for not understanding that jobs are different 🙄

In most professions a full time contract means just that. I have complete flexibility apart from when i'm teaching ( I work for a university) but I still have other things to do which are very difficult to do while also looking after a child. My job isn't dated or old fashioned but I get paid to work full time so that's what my employer expects.

My job is fairly flexible in that in theory I can work whatever hours I want as long as the job gets done.

This idea falls down as soon as you need to organise a meeting with other people (at least 3-4 hours for me on the average day) as you can only have a meeting with other people if they all attend at the same time. And for most people that's within the standard 9-5 type day (with some amendments for time zones if that's applicable).
I don't think having meetings is considered "old fashioned" yet, is it?

And unfortunately the average pre-school child (unlike older children) doesn't understand that between 2 and 3 Mummy is busy so please could they have a little nap then and not choose that moment to explosively fill their nappy and have a tantrum.

To wfh, you need to both have a very flexible job and minimal meetings. And probably also have a baby that reliably sleeps through the night (or a 2 hour a day job) or you will be permanently exhausted with the juggling.

I know there are people on here that claim to be doing it. I remain sceptical that they are as efficient and productive (which is not the same as getting the minimum requested done) as when they are not juggling childminding. I also remain sceptical that parents who pick up younger school age (4 or 5) children and claim they can go back to no work while their child occupies themselves for 2 hours are being fully honest either. Maybe the world of work has changed to be more accommodating to people doing less? And maybe that is a good thing, but people should be honest and not try to admit they could do as much as before.

Many threads on MN where the poster's husband has got home and been annoyed that the poster was so busy with their baby they had not time to run the hoover round (or whatever). The refrain is always that looking after the child is a full time job and housework sometimes has to be left. But now we've gone so far the other way, that it's considered actually possible to work full time all day as well? I don't think this is progress.

I've WFH for the last 7 years and had two children in that time with zero childcare.

I'm basically a SAHM with a job on top, took 1-2 weeks off when they were born then back to it!

It’s a stupid idea and their work will suffer, and once the employer cottons on, they won’t be happy either.

I work 4 days a week. Last week, I had to do some work on my non working day. It took me an entire morning to draft a 2 page document because DS needed constant attention. Could not do that regularly.

I WFH full time but my kids are 9 and 12. There’s absolutely no way I could do it with a baby or a toddler. My job is very demanding and requires a high level of concentration. I cannot be interrupted by kids all the time. Until you’ve had a toddler you cannot understand how much attention they require. Take your eye off then and they are up to all sorts. It’s a safety issue. They can get into real danger in the blink of an eye.

DH started WFH with our DCs when they were 6 and 9. The first summer holidays were pretty stressful for him but nowadays they entertain each other and are pretty self sufficient. We have to break up the odd fight and make lunch for them, that’s about it!

😂😂
Oh I’m sooooo sorry I don’t helicopter parent and follow around my 9yo and almost 6yo 🤣🤣🤣🤣 they’d die of embarrasment if I did that.

But yeah I’m a shit parent to taking them somewhere FUN for a whole day. Excuse me while I fetch my MN branded cat-o-nine tails and self flaggelate because some judgmental weirdo on the internet doesn’t think I’m a good mummy 😭😭😭

Wfh is no substitute for proper childcare
Few employers will tolerate that arrangement nor should they be expected to theyre paying for your time and commitment. Noone can give their work and child the requisite attention at the same time and do either justice.

I agree with this and though my kids are older and can be left for several hours now (despite @luxxlisbon thinking I should stand over them like some overbearing creep) when I was in paid employment I’d only ever had WFH I’d DH was around so I could be locked away in the home office and truly left alone. I think COVID taught people it’s ok to WFH and have a toddler hanging off your arm because we all made it through lockdown but I can’t be convinced it’s conducive to good working.

It can mean not needing before and after school care for older children.

But otherwise you need child care to work. I wfh long before Covid. That meant driving dc to care and then going back home to work.

There's no way I could work with either my toddler and my 6 year old at home or even just one of them.

I have not read the whole thread but it seems that there are people cleaning to have jobs that they can do without childcare. That sounds like nonsense to me. No matter what job you have - if your employer is paying you for, say 6 hours, you need to be fully focused on your job during those hours.

See I don't call bullshit on this. But I do suspect you have niche knowledge and experience which allows you to command that role/salary.

That's not something your average person is going to walk into as a WFH role.

My actual task based work probably takes less than a few hours a day, but I'm online for specific hours to manage a team and I need to be around online for that.

I read on a thread recently that apparently it’s a ‘thing’ now to work less if you’re super efficient even though you are contracted to 40 hours a week because people are so super dooper good at their job and the only person on the planet that can do it that working 2 hours a day on a FT contract is fine.

I mean I call total BS but whatever.

Also it’s easy peasy to work FT and still do the school run and have full family life because they WFH. Which makes me think “but either you make up the 30 minutes you’ve taken to do the school run later or you just skive every day”. But neither is true apparently 😂

I think this train of thought only happens in MN world and in reality kids are forever in after school clubs

I do indeed have specialist knowledge and skills, but as do quite a few people.

The entire tech marketing space is being impacted by skills shortages, across multiple sectors and countries.

This is why I just find it a bit odd how people on here claim it’s impossible and no employer would allow it, when they have no idea about the role the OP or other posters have, what their skills are and their company policies.

even outside of this many friends who work in the charity sector have employers that allow them to WFH with kids, they’re not niche in terms of their skillset but charities often need to be competitive outside of salary.

Sorry you just can't. It's not fair on your children, your employer and it feeds into the narrative that women are not properly committed to their working roles and deserve the gender pay gap!

A couple of people who worked in my team have saved money by not arranging school holiday childcare for primary age children and its been horrendous. Their recordable time (we are lawyers) drops well below target. Others have to pick up for them or clients get cross. They have had phone calls or Teams calls with children crying or shrieking in the background. They "can't" come in to the office when required to meet a business need. They thought it was OK because it was allowed in lockdown when there was no childcare but that was exceptional (and hell on earth in my experience!)

One of them recently left after realising what thin ice she was on. The other has just been put on performance review. I have limited sympathy as I have to fork out for holiday childcare.

I will say that if you have older children (post infant school) who can occupy themselves for a couple of hours that is usually manageable. We used to have an evening nanny twice a week to cover longer days in the office but now one or both of us is wfh we can manage without nanny. But whole days juggling work and children, especially babies and toddlers - just no.

My colleagues don't do childcare for older children during school holidays if they work from home because they (mostly) entertain themselves. With the younger children most use nursery but save by not using wraparound because they can do the nursery run and start working again a bit later when spouse is home. Even the most senior managers have children wander into zoom meetings occasionally so it's not a disaster if it happens.

Give over. There's a massive difference between helicopter parenting and sticking on headphones and leaving them to it.

It's just goady bollocks to suggest otherwise.

None of the mums I know do this. My job certainly doesn't allow for it. I do have a friend who planned to use no childcare and return to work when she had her baby. She had it all planned out and I just smiled and nodded. He's now at nursery of course!

We can do this now that our kids are seven and nine and it’s been fine for the last twelve months. Before then no way.

They’re 9 and almost 6. They don’t need me to always have eyes on them in a room they can’t leave.do you follow your children at soft play the whole time?

I’ve worked in a law firm where one float legal Secretary with kids did overflow work WFH 5 days week, she was best mates with the boss’s wife who didn’t work and had no kids. All the other legal secs were jealous of her as they weren’t allowed to WFH.

A lot of legal secs in law firms can WFH 2-3 days but as the work is full on it needs to be done, no slacking! I did used to have a friend who worked as a legal sec full time wfh but lived not far from the office and was very conscientious.

a friend and neighbour works for Barclays as a greeter/cashier and WFH one day a week and says Barclays monitor their time very strictly when at home.

its all very well if employers do allow WFH with children and if they have lots of overseas calls then yes a day can be split up to factor this in.

but there are lots of firms where they still like presenteeism whether WFH or in the office and for work to be done and not skimped on.