Feeling like it's impossible to work as much as my company needs me to

[careerwam]

I've got two children, 1 and 3. I work full time and I'm pretty ambitious but I just can't seem to put extra hours in.

I'm a single parent.

We had a team call with one of our VPs this morning who told us that everyone needs to dig deep if they want to really excel. This means doing extra trainings and work after hours.

I just can't do anything after hours. When I finish work, I get my kids and give them dinner and get them ready for bed. They don't sleep until 8 unfortunately. I then usually fall asleep with them or shortly after, as they are both bad sleepers and keep me up at night.

Then it's up again the next morning and getting them ready for nursery and that's all the time I have at the moment. I don't know how I can give any more, but I know I need to if I want to get to where I want to be.

I know other mums can do it, but I'm just so tired.

Any advice ?

Oh do think carefully about your ambition and what you think it is 'costing you' is it worh it ?Really should you be working to live or living to work? Do take csre we only have one life.

I’m afraid this is a thing especially in Tech. The field is vast and it’s hard to do all the training required to stay current during working hours. Hence the need for additional hours.
You can fit them in as you need to though - weekends in the early mornings, during nap times..
These are the hard years so hang in there.

The stage of your life you are currently in- your children are very young and need you and your time, fair enough work full time but it’s not fair to them to have a mum who is totally frazzled and you will regret missing out on time with them. I went back to work party time as it fits in with my son and school hours, I don’t want him to look back and feel he never saw me and I’m not prepared to miss out on him
growning up. You can’t do it all so Ned to decide what us important to you

What about your kids dad? When does he have them? Can you utilise his time with them to do some extra?

for example if he takes them on a Wednesday could you use Wednesday evening to « get ahead »?

I have kids the same age (including one that doesn’t sleep) and have a similar sounding job/pay. I feel constantly like I’m not on top of my work and I rarely have the energy to log on after kids bedtime (despite the regular intention) AND I have a husband who helps a lot when he is around (he works away 2 days a week). It sounds like you’re doing amazing juggling everything. I have a very understanding supportive manager - I think you need to be open with your manager about everything you have to juggle. It might be that you have to ‘coast’ at work for a few years whilst the kids are young and focus on promotions etc in a few years. I once had advice from a very senior female at my company who said you can’t always push, you’ll be working for another 20+ years

To be fair, if it's a relatively new start tech company, then part of the reason they are paying big bucks is because they expect the staff to have a passion for, and stay up to date with new technologies.

At this level it's not around attending training courses I think ( because I'm not at that level) but more about having a genuine curiosity around what the latest trends are.

Some people are quite naive with their take it to HR and working smarter not harder, it's easy enough to get rid of someone if you put your mind to it.

Right now it's about perception. Send a few emails at 10 o clock at night and/or 5 in the morning , read the latest article and circulate any interesting points. Sure it's all game play, but you are getting paid enough to make it worth your while.

OP, I feel for you. My job sounds very much like yours in terms of commitment and money (although different industry). I also have a 1 and 3 year old, the youngest of whom isn’t the best sleeper. It’s 8pm by the time they’re both in bed, although youngest goes down at 7.30pm. They don’t get home from nursery until 6pm so can’t get them to bed any earlier. You say you know other people manage. I just wanted to say - they don’t. I am only able to keep up with my career because my husband (who also has a high pressured job) does 50% of the night wakes. Even then, I’m exhausted all the time. Work in the evenings maybe once or twice a week for an hour or so, but couldn’t manage any more than that. If you’re doing this on your own, you’re a superwoman. I do understand your feelings as I am also super ambitious & often feel I’m falling behind. I have resigned myself to the fact that I will be able to keep up for the next few years but nothing more, until the children are a bit older. It will mean less advancement in my career right now but I’m doing the best I can. To those people who say you should demand extra money, I don’t think that’s realistic - there is always an element of doing some unpaid work if you are an ambitious, driven person, and it’s that kind of thing that sees you climb the ladder. Hang in there OP, it’s not forever and you’re doing great.

I think you need to be realistic about what you can maintain. Not all 100k jobs require extra out of hours work, it depends on the culture. You mentioned being on a call with a VP so am I right to think culturally your firm is quite ‘American’? Are all firms in your sector likely to be similar in terms of culture? I think start ups tend to be more demanding than larger more established firms which can sometimes have better accommodation for people with caring responsibilities. I used to work loads of extra hours as I liked my job and I progressed well. I now earn about 150k a year and do far fewer hours than I used to because I have a child to take care of in the mornings / evenings and I don’t want to miss on on what time I do have with him outside of standard working hours. If you don’t think you are going to do what is necessary to progress I would probably think about moving firms or even industries if there are ways you can utilise your experience in other sectors.

Unless you’re on an “hours as required” contract, and your salary and benefits reflect this, work your agreed hours only and dont worry about it. Your time outside of working hours is just that, your time. Spend it with your kids and dont feel guilty.

Yanbu. I'm a lone parent and no amount of money would have allowed me to "dig deep". My dc's still needed feeding, bathing and putting to bed. It's not you, it's them who don't have a clue.

You shouldn't be expected to work after your working hours.

I earn over £100k and don't do any more than standard 9-5 hours because of the above: I'm paid for results

Same here. I'm happy to work flexibly and work more if working towards something but I'll do less hours at a different time.

Doesn’t matter how much money you’re earning, I was also a single parent earning your salary and I only worked overtime in exceptional circumstances.

Your employer is paying you for your specific skill set and I’m sick and tired of all these companies expecting more than what we are contracted for

Does their dad play any role in their life, OP?

I agree with you re doing your training in the morning when your brain is fresh, then doing other stuff in the evening. You shouldn't have to, of course, but if that's the way it is then it's probably the only thing you can do.

This is management speak for “we want to grow and make more money but we cannot/do not want to invest in the appropriate resource”.

my advice is to get a new job.

I am /will be in a similar boat to you but have a DH to share the load and do half the night wakes. I struggle with 1 child and expect to be hanging on by a thread in 18m... I am amazed at how well you are doing.

I really feel sorry for you as this is a big load to carry and yourboss sounds delusional and old school.

I currently have a 1 year old and when I go back after mat leave wil leave i will have a 1 and 3 year old. i'm in tech, post layoffs my level in the company is fairly saturated and competition to "exceed expectations" on bonus and for promotion is HOT. My line manager basically said "if you get a "meets expectations" be happy"

I have just mentally adjusted myself for the fact I am not getting promotion for a few years unless I change jobs or neglect my home life completely (which I am not prepared to do)

The reality is childless/child free co-workers can give more, the men with children have wives with bit jobs (2 days in an art gallery /i part time interior designer type stuff) or are separated so have their child 1 day in 7. They can give more than I am prepared to.

In your situation you boss is totally unreasonable and potentially getting into HR violation type territory with his ridiculous "motivational chat"

My advice is:
Accept your career is going no where at this particular company.
Keep your head above water and do "enough" until your youngest is 2 or so then get a new job.

What she should be doing at any point in her life is entirely for her to judge, not others. Just because a woman has children does not mean she should shelve her ambitions. We are women, not simply mothers. There is enough of a struggle for those of us ‘career women’ to get ahead without being told by other women that we shouldn’t even be trying to.

I earn 50% more than this and do not spend my evenings working or binge watching training. Your boss sounds mad.

Yes an odd deadline will require very occasional weekend or evening work but its not all the time.

This is how it works if you're a professional and want to get ahead,you have to put in the extra work which means ,as in my husbands contract " the hours the job requires. " You can work to rule and show a total lack of ambition and commitment, or accept that you have to prove yourself if you want to get ahead

This is just balls! I earn half again more and never do this shit & don't expect it of my team either. Never have. Dh doesn't either.

They will do that too. However, like with everything else people who do extra will get further. It’s why certain people become the best golfer in the world. They play and practice every hour of every waking day. Someone who practices 10 hours a day will improve quicker than someone who only does 2 hours.

Thats what happens at work. If someone asked me how to get on at work I’d say they would have to do more than other people as it’s a competition.

It sucks when you have children and the 20 year old doesn’t. But it’s not permanent and you have to get past it.

I work in tech, fairly well progressed in my career. I earn less than you OP, but if I had London weighting, I wouldn't be far off.

I also have 2 kids, and pets, and a household to run. I finish work, cook dinner (often while checking my laptop for build progress, testing reports etc) but once we've eaten, I'm done. No way could I try training on anything at that time and expect any of it to stick.

What I try to do is wake about 5.30, have a wash, grab a coffee, log on and check messages, then hit my to do list of things I need to read up on, difficult issues that have been escalated to me, and any blockers for my team. On a good morning, I'll sip my coffee while blasting through some training. On a bad morning, I've triaged things before my day starts.

I will then shower, dress, sort my DC, do school runs, etc then get home for my first meeting.

I do go to bed fairly early so I can wake early, but I am really strict that 8-9pm is fir relaxing. Netflix, face mask, read a book, whatever I need.

I also refuse to work weekends. Our entire product would need to be out of service for me to reconsider.

Seems a bit inefficient for you all to be off training and researching the same stuff in your evenings. Could you maybe suggest, and champion, a skill share initiative? You each take a subject, do the training and research, then do a group meeting, 20-30 min presentation, the follow up questions/discussion, to concisely share what you've learnt, and how it affects your team. Would serve you all better, you'd only have to learn the things that actually matter to your company, and you'd all skill up faster. Your boss might even be impressed.

I’ve worked in tech and tech related
fields for nearly 30 years. All my contracts since around 2010 have stated that I must
“do the hours the company requires me to do”.

The days of 9-5 (if you’re a higher earner) are long gone.

Having said that, I do think you need more help, OP. An au pair sounds like it might be a good solution: s/he can do bath, dinner and bed one night a week so you can do some training. They can tidy up between cleaner visits, put an online shop away, start dinner - things that would make your life easier. And crucially, they could be on call childcare if the kids get sick and can’t go to nursery / school. (I used to be an au pair and that’s a lot less than I did)

I stayed at the same grade for many years when my kids were younger, for exactly those reasons. I was a single parent and back in those days we didn’t have laptops at home and even if I did I was busy with my kids and didn’t want to put more hours in after working full time already. I’d just say thanks but no thanks, you can’t excel at the moment due to outside commitments. Something has to give when kids are little and for me it meant I stalled my career but since they got older I was able to put more into it and got a promotion last year and hopefully maybe look for another in the next 2-3yrs. I don’t regret it. Their dad put his career first and spent 7yrs overseas. He missed out on a lot and the kids naturally prefer to live with me

I just don't think you can do both. Plenty of time to advance your career when your kids are older.
Focus on them for now, and make peace with it.
They can't expect you to do unpaid work, so let everyone else 'dig deep' and advance their career,s,and you just focus on keeping food on the table and bringing up your kids.

I was in exactly the same position as you with kids the same age and I was doing 4 days a week in the office and was a single parent and I suffered burnout because I just couldn’t do it. I too was ambitious but in the end I accepted that it was beyond me and I needed to look after myself before the sake of the children. Please be kind to yourself.