I LOVED BEING A FACILITIES MANAGER

Despite so many of my friends never really having a clue about what I actually did - I loved it.

It required leadership, problem solving, negotiation, project-planning and patience.

The nature of facilities management and the fact that no two days were EVER the same suited me all those years ago.

So, becoming a Mum AND returning to work in this industry should have been pretty straight-forward.

I perfected those skills I just listed when I had my kids...in fact...they were tested...TO THE MAX!

So, I returned to my FM job with readily prepared and sharpened skills and even adopted some new ones under my belt like crisis management, people management, event management and new-found creative talent.

But returning wasn't the smooth ride I'd expected.

Lots had changed....

Processes,

People,

Contractors

Objectives,

Colleagues,

My actual flippen' desk too! (It was replaced with a hot-desk system which they'd omitted to warn me about prior to returning).

And me...

I'd changed. I wasn't that confident springy 'Tigger' they'd remembered "pre-kids".

I was lacking self-belief, worried about what others thought about me and my work. I felt lost AND unsupported.

They expected me to come back to my FM job as if I'd just popped to the toilet.

So when I asked for help, support, understanding and flexibility and received the answer no, it was devastating.

Life-changing in fact.

That was the catalyst for the change in my career direction and because of their lack of belief in me, I adopted the same set of beliefs about myself.

To be honest...I use the term "career direction" but effectively, that's where I saw my career as a facilities manager ended.

The job I had grown to love and ended up in completely by accident (as is the way with lots of other FMs!) had gone...just like that.

After a long while in a very dark mental state, I took on a lower-paid job in a school, with zero opportunity to progress upwards, where 85% of the workforce was made up of mums, who were just like me.

They felt forced out of their "pre-kids" career.

Cheated out of an income they once were proud of.

Compelled to take on a job that fitted around their children but gave them no sense of purpose and a lack of self-worth.

Victimised because they 'chose' to have children and go on maternity leave.

I started to miss using my skill-set I had perfected over the years...

I felt like it was all going to waste.

I became withdrawn, bored, sad and disillusioned with where I'd ended up.

And as I looked around me and saw the other women all feeling the same, I realised that right there...under my nose...was my answer...

My REAL purpose.

I started being an avid listener for other Mums I worked with.

They told me of their failed attempts at returning to their corporate and skilled careers and how they used to be "different" and how they couldn't even imagine going back to doing that now.

And that's where the idea of "The Mum Almighty" came from.

I'm not making this stuff up...

60% of women are making the same decision - to leave based on the lack of support from their employers.

Yet, 85% of women want to return to their pre-kids career for several reasons:

• To make an impact
• To have a challenge
• To feel they are contributing to a cause, to their life and their family
• To be a role model for their children
• To make their own money

So, "The Mum Almighty" helps to support those women who want that all back...

Whether they were a facilities manager, a receptionist, a building surveyor, a fundraiser, or whatever...

As long as they are committed to working for it...

It works.