"Honestly? I think we're all just winging it!"
Before anyone cries because I haven't included Dads here; don't. I wrote a blog post on my personal blog a few weeks ago about dealing with being a Mum on World Book Day and you'd honestly think the message behind it was 'I HATE DADS AND BOOKS'. Let's not take this out of context, okay?
I write from experience and unfortunately, as much as I'd love to be a Mum and Dad all at the same time - I can't be (and I'm not). I'm a Mum and not a Dad and I'd therefore find it incredibly difficult to write from (lack of) experience of being a Dad. This totally applies to Dad's, too, if you fancy, but I've written it as a Mum. Yes, they're very similar roles and no, I don't want to debate modern day gender roles within the family unit.
Given the increasing stats and figures (and interest!) surrounding the benefits of being able to work flexibly and more people than ever sighting flexible working as one of their top focus points when looking for a new job, I wanted to take a quick look at how this lends itself to Recruitment Consultants - and specifically those in an agency environment.
We've all had that one bad day when three of your temps land their dream perm jobs and can't go back on Monday, or your Manager (usually due to pressure from above, let's be honest) has cracked the whip and asked for your eighteen month forecast - down to the very last penny and probability calculation - by the close of play. You're contemplating whether or not you're actually any good at Recruitment at all and the advert on Indeed which states:
We're looking for motivated, driven and proven successful billers to operate a warm desk from home and we'll pay you ￡100k base for the privilege."
is looking incredibly attractive right now. Yes - you. You've been there just like the rest of us.
I digress. The point here is that working from home and flexible working in general is something that allows us to be productive at work, yet present at home and is particularly useful for working parents. With The ONE Group recently introducing flexible working for much of its workforce, I spoke with some of our working Mums and asked for their top tips on balancing a (very) busy day job and a (usually pretty chaotic) home life. Caution: this post is very borderline between LinkedIn/Facebook territory.
Network - create the best parent network you can. Everyone struggles to balance work and children, so offering to help when you can and calling in alllllllll the favours the other way can seriously make a significant difference to your general well-being. They weren't kidding when they said it takes a village to raise a child and this is more important now than ever before. All working parents have the same challenges. Building a solid parent network consisting of mums and dads will allow you to help each other out, call upon each other for emergencies and best still, have some bloody good friends above everything else.
Turn your phone off during the teatime/bathtime/bedtime routine. Lol, no - not your bedtime. I mean your kids', obviously. Recruitment can be totally all-consuming (making an offer call on the school run, anyone?) so ensuring you are fully present and offering your full attention during these important times in your children's routine, is likely to alleviate some of the guilt you felt when you left your three year old at the front door screaming when you rushed into the office this morning. Also - and I know we all need reminding sometimes - it's good to have some down time for yourself during these moments. You're still a person as well as Recruiter Parent, remember?
Plan, prepare and literally lay it out the night before. School uniforms, lunches, bookbags, whatevs. Getting yourself together the night before and ensuring you have everything as ready as possible to get up and go can really help to stick to schedules and being organised can only ever be a good thing! As a Recruiter, it's a key skill that will transfer across from home to office very easily - and let's face it, it's easier to be organised at work than at home, because at least at work you know what you're doing! Parenting is just a guessing game, really.
Sleeeeeeeeeeep. Yep. It seems so simple, doesn't it? But are we all getting enough? I'm incredibly guilty of wasting the one night in ten that my kids actually go to bed on time, by then pottering around the house, watching some TV, tidying up or anything else that seems to take three hours rather than the ten minutes I thought it would. Going to bed at a good time and getting an early night might eat into the latest Game of Thrones episode (will you even make it through the week without someone at work spilling the plot?), but it's absolutely essential to your health, happiness and well-being on so many levels. I'm not a sleep expert but if nothing else, waking up early with enough time to slap on the make-up (no, I'm not being sexist, I'm speaking from experience), get a good breakfast and leave the house ready to smash the day ahead, definitely leaves me in a better and more productive mood than scraping myself off the shower screen because I've had to spend 45 minutes in it just to open one eye. Get sleep, work smarter, parent better.
Pick your fights. This was one my favourite answers when I asked the Mums I work with for their top tips on this subject. Arguing about everything, all the time is soul destroying and tiring. It can create more problems through the knock-on effect of making you and the kids absolutely shattered through non-stop telling-offs. ME, ME, ME! Some days I feel like I've spent the entire day just telling my kids 'no', 'stop', 'pick it up', 'turn it off', 'tidy it', 'shut the door', the list goes on. This is draining and actually, this is the one piece of advice I've taken and put into practice since I asked for these responses - and here I am, fellow Recruiter Parent Ninjas, living the dream. Call me Super-Nanny.
Finally...
Dry shampoo is your friend, but honestly, I think we're all just winging it! (I know I said this applies to Dads, too, but I did say "if you fancy".) But we are, aren't we? Just making it up as we go along. Parenting, working, parenting, working, getting it right, getting it wrong, forgetting the homework, dropping the (candidate) ball. We're just here doing our best, making the best of the chaotic work/life balancing act we're constantly striving to nail.
Flexible working makes our jobs easier, but not easy. It makes our lives manageable but not perfect. Flexible working makes our days a lot of things but if there's one thing it doesn't make it, it's harder.
If you're a Recruiter Parent (or even just a Recruiter non-parent) and you think flexible working is something that could add huge value (and time) to your work and home life, then The ONE Group is hiring now. I'm not promising you a ￡100k base (I'm a bit too honest for that), but the OTE will make up for that! We're working, parenting and succeeding - and we want to hear from you.