Breaking Point

This post was written in association with LinkedIn

“So what do you do?”. A question I could once answer with the gusto of a West End-bound RADA student. “I’m a journalist!”. Now after quitting my copywriting job at the L’Oreal Group, I’m trying to Sellotape together a career from branded content, radio work and a multitude of ‘things with words’.

“I’m an influencer,” I mutter, explaining to people my company is ‘Mother Pukka’, which my grandfather – somewhat aghast – responded with, ‘you realize that’s a French expletive?”

I am happy but it’s certainly not the career I grafted for; the path I pondered, furrow-browed over my GCSE choices for, thinking they’d make or break my big job in the big smoke with my own telephone and computer. (The career that would make my grandfather proud.)

It’s not the career I’d have chosen; ‘choice’ being high on the chalk board here.

It’s a career that stemmed from failing to pick-up my daughter on time from nursery in 2015. I landed in a sweaty, mangled maternal heap at 6.13pm, apologising profusely and uttering excuses (‘Tube, meeting, late, dog, leaves on line, battery died, chewing gum-on-shoe’) to the matronly response from the duty manager of: “It’s not ideal.”

It flipped a switch. I took out all frustration of this inflexible, expensive daycare system on this poor woman who is simply a cog in a hulking great machine that needs oil – a system that left me earning approximately ￡3 an hour after nursery costs were paid.

It’s a system that’s priced nearly half a million British mothers out of work according to think tank IPPR (Institute for Public Policy Research) and it’s a system that leaves parents frazzled and shouting at those who are there to help, not hinder. It’s a system that led me to launching Flex Appeal – a campaign to push for flexible working for all. For those with mental health issues, for those with caring responsibilities, for those living with disabilities; for those simply wanting to live.

For me, there’s 18 years before my two girls potentially dip their toes into employment waters. If they choose to have a kid, then by my appalling maths, we’ve got around 30 years for the UK workplace to give itself a proper flexible working MOT. That’s three decades to stop the flood of mothers being elbowed out of jobs – for an abundance of reasons, each inextricably linked to raising the next generation. That’s three decades to help businesses see this is not a ‘mummy wants to see more of her Weetabix-smattered child’ issue but a people issue, a retention issue and ultimately a bottom line issue. (See Pursuit Marketing in Glasgow that went down to a 4-day week on the same pay and saw productivity increase by 30% and turnover double to ￡5 million.)

Sure the troupe of people launching businesses in the wake of this stark inflexibility is nothing short of brilliant. Whether a mum boss or mum-don’t-give-a-toss, there’s a slew of folk rolling up their sleeves and making work actually work for them.

But it’s the archaic companies and the ‘traditional’ media hubs – with hordes of less yoghurt-stained twenty somethings vying for your position – that are akin to the hulking great Titanic to manoeuvre; they’re the ones I’m after. Where it was once talk of pay rises and benefits, it’s now words like ‘retention’, ‘flexibility’ and ‘support’ that get me fired up.

And these conversations can’t keep happening on my Instagram where it’s essentially an echo chamber of ‘yes we agree there’s a huge issue’.

In partnership with LinkedIn, we’re going to ensure the flexible working message is heard by those who need to hear it. And this is not a lambasting exercise, this is a hand-holding exercise with the sole aim of showing businesses how to be human/humane and, in turn, increase that bottom line. I’ve been asked time over why I’m not focusing more on LinkedInbecause it’s THE place to have discussions and debate around workplace issues. So here I am. And I want to hear from you (use @LinkedIn and #ParentsAtWork), your experiences of balancing a career and family, your frustrations and I want to harness that on a platform that has the ear of those running today’s business.

“I had one senior sales director refer to me only as ‘mummy’ when I returned from maternity leave,” one anonymous follower (from a leading law firm) messaged me recently. Another said her boss mentioned only her ‘leaving’, never going on ‘maternity leave’.

This isn’t some knackered mother slobbering on about flexible working because she likes emailing in her pyjamas and watching Homes Under The Hammer before a conference call.This is a cost to business; the companies refusing to find solutions to accommodate basic human nature. A primal need to feed/ bathe/ care for a child that can’t manage those things for him or her self. This is about supporting your employees to build your business, while enabling them to build lives.

If you had to stand back from it all – and envision the dulcet tones of David Attenborough trickling through – life is surely of the essence here, not an Excel spreadsheet. 

But that’s not to say we’re work shy. God no. As parents we can accomplish an entire house clean (often with a solitary wet wipe), while Skyping Aunty Janet for her birthday, doing a supermarket order with one hand and changing a nappy with the other. We come back from maternity leave stronger and infinitely more capable of handling excrement that hits the fan.

There’s less emotional space for office politics, more for getting things done. Give an inch of flexibility, we’ll return a mile. If we don’t? In the words of that irksome Frozen earworm, ‘Let it go” – let us go. But give us a chance first.

And it’s not fair to point the finger solely at the top dogs here. It’s a combined effort. It’s as much to do with the raised eyebrows from colleagues as you exit the building at 5pm – looks that assume you’re off to plunge head first into a pubhappy hour. It’s about education within businesses and a shift in attitude from the top – from the nucleus; from the board.

For every one that is getting it right, there are 7,689 that fear change; that can’t trust those they bizarrely trust every day to hold their baby, their business. But what if they relinquish that strict 9-6pm policy? What if people – not just parents – ebbed and flowed into the building, ensuring i’s were dotted and t’s were crossed? Is a world where bums-on-seats doesn’t equal a pay rise but results and output does so far off?

I don’t believe allowing people to work solely from home is the answer – there’s a camaraderie in an office and I do love a communal packet of hob nobs for sorting the givers from the takers. But there has to be a mid-way ground. There has to be a way to enable those who want to work for you to continue doing so. Like with the best relationships, it’s two-way traffic. 

For now, if there are any CEOs, HR managers, folk from big companies reading this, take a look at the Parenting in the Workplace Institute guidelines for ideas on how other companies are making flexible working work. Have a think. Because, really, this isn’t all about us, it’s more about you – what we can do for you?

Share your experiences in the comments below using the #ParentsAtWork

The Flex Appeal business case:

Save rent

For most businesses, the two main costs are people and property. Flexible working lets employers lower the latter. Lambeth Council claims it will save ￡4.5 million per year in property running costs by making sure that no more than 60% of its staff are in at one time.

Attract talent

Some 30% of the UK’s working population (8.7 million people) wants flexible working but doesn’t have it, yet only 6% of advertised jobs with a salary above ￡20,000 actually offer it.

Retain talent

It costs more than ￡5,000 to hire a new employee in the UK. When you add costs associated with getting the newbie up to speed that cost exceeds ￡30,000, arbitration service Acas recently reported, and more than ￡35,000, according to analysts CEBR. In it’s 2012 study, HR institute the CIPD found that 76% of employers saw staff retention improve when they offered flexible working.

Improve productivity

This argument has become as undeniable as the case for climate change: 81% of senior managers believe flexible working improves productivity. Three in five people who work flexibly put in more hours as a result of being allowed to do so. Another report found that 72% of businesses reported increased productivity as a direct result of flexible working.