Navigating Parenting, Leadership & Work Life Balance.

Navigating parenting, leadership and work-life balance is no easy feat in everyday life, let alone in an epic pandemic. Let’s start by giving a shout out to all the parents out there. Every parent is likely facing some form of struggle right now. If they aren’t, then they are likely not being open about it or not yet aware of the true impact. The working parent struggle is real. It is often not discussed and often organizations and leaders would prefer not to talk about the challenges because they are not easily solved without having to address some deeply held systemic assumptions and toxic organizational cultural artifacts. There is still a stark dichotomy between people’s working lives and personal lives being somewhat separate, or for the expectation thereof. There are outdated ideas about parenting focusing on the gender debate. That is not to dispel the very real issues and historical and current bias that exists around working mothers even in 2020! Furthermore, the debates around work-life balance have moved onto work-life integration or work-life harmony. Whatever you call it, the challenges are the same for most parents. Changing the name of work-life balance does nothing to actually address the issues. There is just not enough time in the day to successfully manage all the competing demands. Something has to give and often the ‘give’ is typically on the family side of the equation.

Then 2020 delivered us all the greatest challenge yet, a global pandemic that has forever changed our lives.

We have seen a loss of social and psychological supports. The world is experiencing some level of grief not only in terms of perhaps grieving the loss of family members, or friends, but also the real loss of how we live our lives, our hopes and expectations, our very sense of reality and freedoms. We are grieving the loss of trust in leaders, organizations and politicians. The very psychological and social contracts which we live our lives by are slowly eroding and being torn apart.

If that wasn’t enough, parents are having to face the ultimate challenge. Managing a full-time role and parenting can certainly seem like a herculean task, even at the best of times, and then that is intensified dramatically in times of crisis and pandemic and having to work from home and take on teaching responsibilities! All can be more than full time jobs in and of themselves, and while we typically have some structures and levels of support in place, many of those supports have gone away with COVID-19.

The situation is intensifying. Parents are worried about losing their jobs and then feeling they need to be even more visible and work even longer hours to demonstrate how they are adding value, so that they won’t be let go or furloughed. Parents are worried about the physical and mental health of themselves and their children. They are worrying about the future, how to keep their families safe and for some they are worrying about basic needs such as safe and appropriate living arrangements and where their next meal is coming from. These are all huge triggers. Parents are facing the need to get back to work but also having to manage family and parenting life, made even more challenging when schools are not reopening but in person businesses are or the necessity to work from home. Our systems are broken and set working parents up for failure. Parenting is a taboo topic in leadership boardrooms. That’s where the challenge starts and needs to end.

Parents and children are both being forced to be at home, with each other all the time. This is not a normal or typical scenario. Most parents (and most children) are just not equipped to deal with this level of closeness, intimacy and togetherness ALL DAY and ALL NIGHT for weeks to months on end. It is natural for feelings and tempers to be flaring. It is normal for parents and children to be needing time alone. None of this pandemic is normal and typical. Who wouldn’t be questioning their sanity or ability to do it another day?!

Parents want to do best by the children, families and their jobs. There are loyalties that are being pulled and tested daily. There hardly seems enough time to get it all done and at the end of the day, most parents let the multiple demands corrode on their own time and personal well-being.  For some parents, they are battling this journey alone as single parents. I think we need to approach the topic of parenting and working with an openness, with transparency and with kindness, compassion and empathy. Everyone is likely doing the very best they can. It is all about balance. Not everyone can afford domestic help or an Au pair. Some parents are trudging this road alone.

Given the changing circumstances, and reflecting on our current situation amidst a global pandemic and watching a lot of parents post their struggles on social media, I decided to gather some of my thoughts around parenting. I do honestly believe that parenting is not just about parenting, it is essentially a conversation about balance, well-being, wellness, relationships, support and thriving. I spent quite a few years as a teacher working closely with parents at a special education school, where part of my role was helping and coaching parents on home visits how to relate to their children and to managing the special demands and challenges of parenting a special needs child. While training to be a clinical psychologist I had a clinical residency at a Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service and another residency at a Family Therapy Service. I was trained in The Solihull Approach which is a parenting model based on the psychoanalytic ideas of containment and reciprocity, and I was also trained in systemic, narrative and family therapy traditions. I co-authored a contribution to a book chapter on the history of parenting. I also worked at a specialist Systemic Family Therapy Service working with parents and families. While I no longer work as a clinical psychologist, I have worked and helped hundreds of parents, families and leaders to work towards building healthy relationships with their children and setting appropriate boundaries in their relationships.  As a leadership coach I work with clients all the time, and so often the conversations around competing demands, and work-life balance come up as a key focal areas and challenges. The struggle is real. At the end of this article, I will offer some recommendations that leaders and organizations can also reflect on in how they approach working parents.

You Don’t Need To Be A Superhero

For me it’s about knowing you are doing your best, being kinder to yourself and giving yourself permission to just be you. No one is looking or expecting a superhero, so stop trying to be one. Don’t add additional pressure onto an already full plate. Check out this post here.

Have A Sense Of Humor

You will hear everyone spout the importance of being grateful for your blessings (and that is great advice), but right now, finding the humor is likely more important to maintaining a sense of sanity. It is OK to feel overwhelmed and sometimes we need to sit and feel that feeling in all it’s richness, Other times we need to laugh. Laughter is good medicine. So, laugh loudly and laugh a lot. We really can’t take this too seriously others we will drown in the absurdity of it all.

Be Intentional About Working Toward Balance

Be intentional about working towards balance even if you never attain it. Remember your priority is always your family and your children. They will be around for your life. Jobs and work won’t be. By all means, do a great job at work but not at the cost of your children or family. No job is worth that sacrifice. Some relationships are too close and others are too distant, the most optimal relationship is one that is balanced. That goes for both work and for parenting relationships.

Where we shine the focus is where we will spend our time. We need to be intentional about finding balance. Balance doesn’t mean 50% here and 50% there, it’s about negotiating that need for balance daily, sometimes multiple times a day. It is about being flexible and willing to give and take here and there. Balance is not perfect, sometimes it gets messy. Sometimes you may ace being a parent and other days barely scrape through. Some days you may be a super effective leader and other days less so. So be it.

Stop The Blame Culture

When we talk about these issues it is very easy to blame organizations about why they aren’t flexible and what they aren’t doing to support parents. This clearly is an important part of the conversation and equation on working parents, but in terms of balance some of the imbalance is set up and maintained in our own households and in the broader systemic narratives and systems of which our organizations are part of. There is no judgement in that statement- just a statement of facts.

We all have differing ideas about the roles and responsibilities of parents. Some of these follow relatively traditional views based on gender split around who is the primary parent, caregiver and breadwinner. This just doesn’t account for the diversity in parenting styles and perceptions, but also does not account for the fact that many couples themselves hold very fixed ideas about parenting roles and who is the caregiver/primary parent.

The conversation about balance needs to start at home. Be open and transparent with your partners and spouses about parenting ideas, roles and responsibilities because it should not always fall to one parent. Have these conversations without judgement and without blame. Ideas about parenting are passed down transgenerationally and so it’s really important to talk about how ideas about parenting may be different and how they may contribute to imbalance in your relationship, and then the roll over to imbalance in your jobs. We need to stop the blame culture and focus on how to work towards solutions. We need to stop talking about parenting as if it’s something separate to working and personal lives. There is no separation between these.

Perfect Parenting Is A Myth

Give yourself a break. There is no such thing as a perfect parent. Sure, some PTA parents and busy-body neighbors and family members may claim there is such a thing, but there isn’t. All parents generally do as best a job as they can with what they have. Mistakes are OK. You are doing the best you can given the circumstances. Change is hard and no one is expecting you to be that perfect parent, apart from maybe yourself. Remember our ideas of what good and bad parenting looks like are based on our own experience of being parented. We all have different experiences and there is no one right way to parent.

Create And Enforce Consistent Boundaries

This is harder said than done, but creating boundaries is an important way to manage all your competing demands. Remember that you alone are the one that can teach people how they should engage with you. You determine how you want to engage at work or in your job or as a spouse and parent. You alone let organizations take advantage or convince you to prioritize them over your family. The struggle is real, and only you have the power to prioritize what is truly important to you. It may be about the need to learn how to say no, or not now. It may be about learning how to challenge the bias or the status quo, or helping others understand your capacity and competing demands. No parent should ever feel ashamed of being a parent and facing the perennial challenge of how to manage their time. Being a parent is an important part of who you are and your narrative. Let’s change the narrative about the value of parents in the workplace. The parents who manage these demands very successfully are the ones who are empowered and skilled in setting clear boundaries and expectations about what it important to them and how others should engage with them. Family and work can BOTH be equally important.

Talk About Well-being And Normalize Feelings

Make time for your own and your child’s mental well-being. Do something fun and creative, Create time for rest and relaxation. This is not the time to push your child (or yourself) to develop new skills. Remember teaching your child resiliency and mental wellness in times of crisis is far more important than making sure that they emerge as the next Mozart, Steve Jobs or the future presidential candidate. Teaching and modeling wellness, coping strategies and resilience will set you and them up for success now and in the future. More than ever parents need to be the role model and to normalize feelings by talking about them and inviting and encouraging open and transparent conversation about feelings- not only the good or happy feelings, but all the feelings.

Eyes And Ears See And Hear All

Remember your children are always listening or watching, even if they look busy. That means limit their exposure to distressing news and media. It means monitor access to online. It means being mindful about how you are talking about the situation, or perhaps about how you feel they are coping (or not) or the challenges they are facing. It could be about ensuring when you are having conversations about job loss, or death, or how you are struggling right now as a parent or difficult financial conversations that these are best done out of eyesight and ear shot. It’s normal in relationships to have conflict, especially in trying times. Couples are facing the same stressors, but we need to be mindful not to let that conflict spill over in front of your children.  Children (including teenagers) do not need the additional stress of being exposed to adult parent talk and/or conflict.

Build An Appropriate Parental Relationship

If you haven’t already done this, do it (no judgement). Some parents don’t have the kind of relationship with their children.  Now is the time and opportunity to build appropriate parental relationships. Dependent on the age of your child, your child is not your best friend. It is not their responsibility to look after you or your mental health or to be your sounding board for all your own stressors right now. Certainly, this dynamic may change as they grow up, but sometimes parents get this wrong. Right now, parents need to be role models and to be parents, not friends. That means setting boundaries, being supportive, setting expectations, being available and addressing any challenges.

Be Authentically Human

Your children are looking to you to see how you are reacting to the situation. They are taking cues from you. This is about balance. Being authentically human can be a challenge because as an adult you need to be able to allow your children to see how you respond and manage stress and crises, while not doing so in an overly alarming or distressing manner. That’s a big ask. Parents don’t always get the balance right, and that is OK. Tomorrow is always a new day to try again. Parenting is a journey not a sprint.

Be Transparent About The Whys

Don’t candy coat the severity of the issues because you want to make sure that your children understand the risk around the COVID-19 situation. Of course, the level of this is different dependent on the age of the child. They need to understand the importance of social distancing, or washing hands and why they can’t socialize with their friends. They need to understand why they can’t go to school or why they are suddenly stuck at home. They may need to understand why they are experiencing new complex feelings or thoughts that they are unaccustomed too. This is a major change for everyone. Talk about it. Be honest but also be sensible about the level of detail. There is a need to explain and teach but there is no need to overwhelm or distress. Applying filters to the level of detail is an important parenting skill.

Create Routine And Certainty In The Face Of Uncertainty

Humans generally love routines as it provides certainly. Not knowing or loss of routine and certainly is a major trigger for stress. Creating routine for yourself and your children is key. Children thrive on routine. Right now, COVID-19 has brought with it massive upheavals in routine and brings more uncertainty. your regular working routines are also likely in turmoil. Create routine and certainty through sleep and waking times, meals or play times, together and alone times. Being consistent in routines is the key to creating a sense of stability and certainty. It doesn’t really matter what the routine is per se, it’s more the fact of having a routine. Children will then get a sense of certainty and know what is expected and when. They will thrive with routine in the face of uncertainty. Creating routines will also allow help you to plan around work needs. Make sure you are also making time to sleep yourself. Check out my article on sleep hygiene here.

Respect Space And Time To Be Alone

We all need time away and time alone. This is healthy. It is very health at any time, not just in a crisis and not just in our personal relationships. The challenge is when parents need time alone, sometimes children can feel abandoned or uncontained. When children need time alone, parents can sometimes take it personally and get anxious that it means something about their relationships. It generally doesn’t. While humans thrive in connection and through relationships, it’s also very normal and expected to have time alone. Talking about the need for and respecting requests for time out are vital for all relationships. Perhaps even invite and encourage your children to take time to themselves or to engage in some activity that they love that they can pursue alone. This will also give you time.

However, it is about balance, parents also need to recognize when the need for time alone (either in themselves or their children) is more problematic and may indicate decline in mental wellness. Isolating oneself is different to needing time away.

Remember that most introverts would love time alone to recharge and get energy. Conversely those extroverted parents and children may be quite challenged right now by the lack of social exposure.

We also need time away and apart from work which is becoming more of a challenge when working from home and the expectation to be seen online. Make a routine and ritual of starting and finishing work. Read my article here on how to survive and thrive working from home.

Know When to Draw Close And Lean In

It is totally fine and preferable to set expectations and to create healthy boundaries with children and teenagers. Though let them know that you are always there to listen without judgement. This may be different or new for many parents, so it may be something that you intentionally have to think about how to raise. Creating a psychologically safe space for children to explore their thoughts and feelings is vital. Respect the trust and vulnerability that they are showing in wanting to share their thoughts and feelings- especially since for many children they have not had the opportunity to learn how to manage and normalize those experiences or complex feelings yet. Sometimes using games and art can invite children to express very complex emotions, thoughts and experiences.

Acknowledging, Understanding and Respecting Needs

Parents and children both have needs. There is a narrative out there among a lot of parents that their children’s needs come first. While there is truth to this need and sentiment, AND it is probably more helpful to ensure that everyone’s needs are understood and met. Just because you are a parent does not mean that you no longer have needs, or that you should simply abandon your personal needs. It is not always possible, but best attempts are better than living with unmet needs which ultimately lead to resentment, disappointment and feeling unfulfilled. Parents have needs, whatever they are you must work at meeting those. Children also have needs and it’s the parent’s job to make sure that those are also met. No one benefits from unmet needs. Unmet needs fester and then they spread like wildfire into our relationships through resentment. It may be about seeing where there are similar or joint needs or finding creative ways to schedule in those needs at different times. They don’t all need to be met at the same time.

Time With Friends

Families are important, but so are friends. Socialization with friends are so important to a child’s development of self and having fun is just as important! While they may not be able to meet with their friends, find creative ways to allow them to meet with their friends virtually. Remember time with friends has the same benefits for both parents and the children. It is time away from the stress and to just enjoy and have fun. It’s time that both parent and child can enjoy, and it opens the currently limited social sphere up. It can provide some very needed well-being benefits and time away! Remember that time you wanted to yourself? Remember that meeting that you can’t miss? Get your child on a video call with their friends. You may both come back and be more present, kind and more open for having had that social time away…

Your Teenager Doesn’t Really Hate You…

…and if they do, that’s OK too, it doesn’t mean you are a bad parent and it doesn’t mean they are a bad teenager. I know parents of any teenager can account for a time where their teen raged against the system or lashed out against them. This is normal and expected. Don’t get caught up. Teenagers will be teenagers and for many that means a relatively tumultuous relationships with their parents. Don’t fall trap to believing what they say to you in the heat of the moment to be anything other than letting off steam. They don’t really hate you. This normal process is likely being further exacerbated by the normal stress responses and being in lock down in close quarters. Even the best of relationships are fraying at the ends. While your first instinct is to want to respond emotionally, perhaps some space and time is what is most warranted. The second instinct may be the desperate need to repair that rupture immediately. Again, perhaps space and time is needed there too. Nothing is ever accomplished in the heat of the moment. Rather than trying to fix it, accept it and understand it. That does not mean however to turn a blind eye to inappropriate behavior or boundary violations- remember boundaries and setting appropriate expectations are all part and parcel of being a parent. Even when it sucks.

WHAT CAN LEADERS AND ORGANIZATIONS DO?

The struggle is real and often the conversations are not had for several reasons. However, parenting is a conversation about balancing competing demands and wellness and well-being. Conversations about parenting relate directly to productivity, diversity, inclusion, organizational and leadership culture, access to rewards and promotion and bottom-line issues. Parenting conversations go beyond the boundary of the home, they are a very real reality of the workforce. Here are some basic suggestions to help leaders and organizations begin to reflect on what they can do to support working parents:

• Leaders should address cultural expectations and barriers that make it difficult for parents to be honest about the challenges of being a parent and working a full-time job at any time, not just during a pandemic.
• Leaders must be flexible. Enforcing something with a parent does nothing other than to alienate a parent. We should never be asking or expecting a parent to prioritize work over a child, and yet that is what happens daily in organizations around the world when you set calls at unsociable hours, or don’t allow flexibility in working schedules etc.
• Leaders fear that openly talking about the challenges will mean a loss in productivity as they will need to address the issues. Being a parent is not a hindrance to business. We need to address and overcome this unhelpful narrative.
• Leaders must be mindful in how they approach the conversations about parenting. There are so many hidden narratives in the work-life balance movement. We need to be mindful that we are not controlling anything, that we are supporting parents to bring their best selves to their work and to their families. This is not an EITHER/OR situation, it is a BOTH/AND.
• As leaders we must own and acknowledge that parenting roles and expectations have disadvantaged women and same-sex parents historically and that while there is more acknowledgment of this today, there is a still a long way to go to correct the situation.
• In addition, we need to address the narratives around parenting only focusing on mothers. Fathers are parents too. This should be reflected in paternity time policies.
• Parents take all forms, not just traditional mums and dads and inclusion and diversity teams need to account for all experiences of parenting. Families come in a full range of diverse beauty and we need to be mindful that most systems are still not set up to account for diversity and inclusion in a real true sense.
• Address fair and equal benefits around parental leave and access to opportunities.
• We need to provide real opportunities to parents returning to the workforce and not expect them to take lower or lesser value roles based on the fact they took time to be a parent. This should be celebrated, not demonized or punished.
• We need to understand that how parents choose to parent their children may be entirely different to how you choose to parent, and so while you may be happy to prioritize work or something else, we should not be expecting all parents to be willing or able to do the same.
• Leaders set the tone and expectations around how and when work is done, and how parents are perceived and treated. We need to be mindful that starting and ending times or the need for breaks or to get family things completed is vital. Right now, many of this is happening during work hours. We need to be mindful to set the right tone and guard against old school attitudes, judgement and toxic cultures that perceive that parents are offering less value because they may need to start later or end earlier, or not be able to make that meeting because they have some parenting responsibility to attend to.
• Leaders need to revisit their total compensation, and rewards processes and packages and take a hard look and acknowledge the deep bias built into these packages and processes.
• I think many organizations and leaders may be very well intended, but we need to know our limits and blind areas and stop offering mental health and well-being advice to parents and employees without being appropriately trained in the area. There is a lot of bad advice out there and it’s being shared widely by leaders in organizations. We need to challenge the status quo where mental health leaders in organizations have no actual experience or history of working in mental health or no appropriate training. There is so much to know and it’s important to understand and draw from the evidence base. While anecdotal suggestions can often be helpful, they are often heavily biased by people’s own experiences of parenting and may not necessarily be the most optimal for everyone. I think leaders should know their limitations and their parenting biases.
• As leaders we must also recognize that some employees may not be parents but do hold primary caregiver roles looking after sick family members or elderly parents. The same flexibility and attitude needs to apply to all employees in supporting them manage their multiple demands.

COVID-19 has brought with it many changes, many of which are clearly terrible. Though there are some things such as families getting to spend more quality time with each other and learn about each other, that are good. Though change is hard and can certainly test even the strongest of relationships in close proximity. These are all very normal experiences given the circumstances.

Before we all rush back to “normal”, let’s take a moment to reset and determine how we want to redefine our families and our relationships with our children and spouses post COVID-19. This is such an opportunity for us to proceed with developing healthy and balanced relationships with our families, children and our employers. Let’s not rush back to return to dysfunction, being overworked, prioritizing work over family and unbalanced lives. Let’s take this moment to find insight and clarity into what matters most and what is essential. Society and business does not exist without relationships and families at their nucleus. Things will only change if we make them change. We need to let go of the agendas and politics of parenting and approach the challenges of parenting as real thinking and feeling human beings.

Image courtesy of DrBrucePereira ©