A feminist discriminating against women.....

[TheRealTillyMinto]

...oh yes... and the feminist is... me.

I run my own company in a male industry. we are small but growing and have really large, demanding clients. i am in my mid/late thirties. i want to have children. i will have to work as much as possible. thats ok as it is my choice to be an employer & women in my family have worked for generations so i grew up with a working mother, grandmothers, aunts etc.

but my company is not large enough to have me working as much as possible, and another woman on maternity leave. very few women apply for jobs in my industry, so this is only theortical, but for the time being i would not employ a women if i thought there was any chance of them needing mat leave at the same time as me.

it is a terrible thing to say but i dont have much time left so i am prioritising me & my life over the employment equality of other women.

generally speaking as an employer, i think ML is good for business as it creates change within an organisation.

your thoughts please.

[sunhat]

Excellent posts SardineQueen

Poor hiring indeed.

[Hullygully]

What the OP really highlights is how rubbish the entire structure of work is in this country, and most others, and how unaccommodating and unrealistic it is with regards to human beings.

[Takver]

Tilly, I think you have to separate three things:

a) maternity leave for a potential employee
b) whether as a self employed person your maternity leave is funded by the govt
c) whether functionally you can leave your own business for an extended period.

TBH, and speaking as someone who runs a business, there is nothing that anyone except you can do about c). Either you are able to/wish to develop other employees to the point where they can replace you when you are not there, or you can't/won't. We haven't (so far) and therefore I worked from when dd was about 2 weeks old, which was fine as DH & I run the business so we split childcare & work 50/50, and we were working from home.

b) if you set up the business as a ltd co so that you are an employee, then you receive employees' benefits. We used to be self emp (partnership) but we are now employed by the company. Obviously there are advantages and disadvantages on both sides (from a tax POV etc).

Re. a) - from a purely practical POV I see mat leave as an opportunity to scope out a new potential employee at the govts. expense - beyond that, it has to be on your conscience (sp?) I guess.

[Hullygully]

It is still designed (as we know) around the model of man at work, woman in home. That's why it not work.

And it is a real problem for small businesses in particular.

[Hullygully]

Not just re pregnancy etc, but long-term sick leave, holidays etc etc

[suzikettles]

To be honest, I think the op is also falling into the trap of assuming that a female employee has a well paid man behind her and is just working for pin money.

Yes you can take 12 months mat leave, and yes you can get 39 weeks paid at the SMP rate, but in practice the hypothetical female employee may well be the main breadwinner in her relationship and not be able to afford to take more than the initial 6 weeks paid at 90% salary.

So not that much different from the poor op.

As someone who earns considerably more than my partner I would love to see the law changed to allow me to share leave, although I'm lucky enough to work for an employer who has an enhanced maternity package and family friendly policies.

Still don't get how the original post relates to the op's subsequent complaints about maternity benefits for the self employed though. Unless she's not employing women because they might get (as she sees it) more than her - which isn't particularly feminist.

[ThePosieParker]

Whether we like it or not this is true for many employers. Why wouldn't it be? You spend a whack to interview and train and then they piss off for six months, leaving a gap. In addition many women come back part time or not at all. Until the system is fairer for both employer and employee it will always be the same.

[TheRealTillyMinto]

look i know i started this debate really badly & i acknowledge some of hte things i thought were facts were wrong. my friends in RL told me what i said at the top is wrong. i do know that & acknowledged that in the OP.

i did post here because i want the debate - so i get to develop my thinking.

yes of course i need to develop my business so it can function without me. i am working my arse off doing that but it takes years & dont have years left.

of course it is not the end of the world having only 2 weeks ML but i hear about what other women get & it is completely alien.

[Hullygully]

Tilly - it's the difference between trying to operate in the world actual, and thinking about how things should be.

[ThePosieParker]

Real tilly....How about being ageist instead and employing a few older women? Surely these are the most overlooked group in employment and have loads to offer. Then you don't suffer from an all male work force?

[SardineQueen]

I just think that you ought to find out in detail what the various entitlements are, before making any decisions.

And TBH your main beef seems to be that as a self-employed person with your own business you can't take mat leave in the same was as an employed person can.

But that has nothing to do with whether you employ a woman of child-bearing age or not - it's a completely separate issue.

You say you don't begrudge employed women their entitlements, but it is starting to sound like actually you rather do!

[Hullygully]

Brilliant idea Posie.

[Takver]

"of course it is not the end of the world having only 2 weeks ML but i hear about what other women get & it is completely alien."

That's about running your own business, not about maternity leave! Like working til 11 at night, never taking holiday, waking up in the night wondering about how to pay bill X etc, etc etc.

And also not having a boss, being able to walk out of the office & go for a walk if there's a quiet day, making the decisions yourself, rather than implementing someone else's ideas, and all other the good bits :)

[TheRealTillyMinto]

yes Takver - thare are many things to enjoy about running your own business. what i do is very analytical & creative.

Leningard - my company exists to provide services for clients. clients dont have any interest in flexibility so i just have to make the best of it. one sounded obviously disinterested when i said i was sorry that some work was delayed but my dad had just died.

SardineQueen - i think you are correct. my only interaction with women at work is my clients (1) two of my oldest, actually favourite contacts sat me in a meeting one day & asked me if i were planning on having children. not in a friendly way. more like in a job interview - like if you say yes you wont get the contract (2) i rarely take holiday, clients know this. two female contacts get pissed off when i take a day's holiday because noone in the office could answer their query. it was not a life or death sitution. they were just making demands because they are the client so can. one day!

all these 4 women have taken ML at least once in the last 3 years but arent interested in me having any life & i do resent that.

i have zero sense of sisterhood with women who are clients because of the nature of the relationship. i will hide pregnacy from all my clients as much as possible.

[MoreBeta]

Erm..... I think you really need to look at why you have your own business if you cannot take a holiday and your clients will dump you if you had a child.

Frankly, this sounds like you are being exploited by your clients in a way they could not do if you were their employee.

Is this one of those creative industries where a lot of people have been 'outsourced' which is code for dumping employees to cut costs and then rehiring them freelance, paying them less and demanding they work like dogs and be at the beck and call 24/7?

[SardineQueen]

I think that maybe you need to get some professional distance between yourself and your clients? I understand how easy it can be for barriers to break down when you have been working with a client for a long time, but (bad) experience has taught me that keeping them at arms length is always the best policy. If you don't it invariably comes and bites you on the arse.

The two things you mention in your post - not being sympathetic when your father died & not wanting you to take time off for children - they are things that you would expect an employer to treat you well with but not necessarily a client IYSWIM. They are interested in getting out of you what they can. They don't care about your personal life. BUT actually it's none of their business and you should not be having those conversations with them IYSWIM.

What were the queries only you could answer - why? Can't you train up a second in command to handle these things?

[TheRealTillyMinto]

SQ - the client raised the child topic with me..! but yes on the general professional distance. i let them get away with murder 'oh did we not tell you RTM we are opening an office in Shanghai on Monday' said the Thursday before....

no i am not in the 'creative' industries haha the thought. a small part of IT outsourcing. i find it creative ....

generally I love it. i am the Queen. my company is only 4 people but my two largest clients turnover over a combined £400m pa so we are doing well.

running your own business is great but commercial realities mean i do read most stuff on MN a think 'oh my god other women live on another planet than the one i live on'.

thank you for the comments. what i have learnt is:

1. i should not be resentful of my female clients over ML. they chose their job & i dont want their job.
   

1. if i want to work with women other than in a client/supplier relationship, i need to hire than & if they arent applying i need to look at how i change the offering to attract them.
   

1. i should learn about maternity law - i clearly know diddly.
   

1. i need to grow my business (knew that anyway but no harm reenforcing)
   

1. keep better lines with clients.
   

1. i need to crack open the Bank of Minto and learn the phrase 'yes i know a night nanny may seem a little excessive BUT IT WORKED FOR ME! '

[Blackduck]

Employ me Tilly. I am a woman, had my child, won't have any more.....(used to work in IT - but probably not same sector as you :) )

[minipie]

I don't quite understand why the OP here is getting such a hard time. Ok she could do with getting her facts straight. But even with the facts straight, it is true that ML remains a pain in the arse for small businesses. It is not easy to simply hire a temporary replacement, especially given the lack of certainty over how long the mother will be off work for, and it is certainly not paid for by taxpayers the government.

Realistically I don't think we can simply expect small businesses to ignore the fact that one employee may well cause them difficulty by taking ML and another will not.

IMO the way to solve the problem involves (1) making sure that men take their fair share of parental leave and (2) (much more difficult) reforming job structures so that they are more flexible and can accommodate part time, career breaks, etc.

[AlysWorld]

What in MoreBeta's business reasons for hiring women did you disagree with minipie?

[BecauseImWorthIt]

Tilly - as someone who has run her own business for the last 13 years, I know where you're coming from.

However, just because it's difficult doesn't mean to say it's not possible.

When you say i am the Queen this is a real giveaway. There are four of you, therefore you should be delegating and training your staff to take the burden from you. You are not the queen! And if you continue to take this role, then it will be ever more difficult for you and your clients to work any differently.

Forget clients being interested in your personal life. Why should they be?

You need to develop a business structure that means you are dispensable. Only in that way can you ever hope to do anything like sell your business, should you need to.

But to consider not employing women because they might want to have a baby is a dreadful thing to even contemplate.

[minipie]

I don't necessarily disagree with them Alys. But they are generalisations and there will be exceptions - so there are some loyal men out there too. If an employer can find a man who they think will be loyal, and will definitely not be wanting ML, then that man will be more desirable as an employee than a woman who they think will be loyal, but may well be wanting ML in future.