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- The New York Times also launched The Working Woman's Handbook.
- Fast Company provided the 25 best cities for job seekers.
- Harvard Business Review asked why women's self-awareness isn't more of an asset when it comes to their careers.
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anon
I love love love that stores are using different kinds of mannequins. I love that my daughter will grow up in an environment where different types of bodies are celebrated, she will be able to find off the rack clothing for whatever her body type ends of being, and not be boxed into thinking only 1 type of beauty is beautiful. Now if we could just get the focus of of beauty (in all its forms) as the number one goal for women… that would make me a happy lady.
Anon
I like that stores are starting to use a wider variety of body shapes in their pictures and mannequins. But we are a long, long, long way off from having “an environment where different types of bodies are celebrated.” These little changes are good, but until and unless they become the norm instead of a notable alternative (and stop all the diet talk and stop complaining about how we look fat today/our X body part is fat), we are not going to make any real progress from being a society that prizes thinness above all other body types
Ellen
I agree, but it is a little strange to me to go into a store and see a big chubby male nerd mannequin next to a little cute female manequin in a tight sheath dress, b/c this does not often happen in real life unless the male is an internet millionaire or an MD. I know b/c I have often had that kind of male pursuing me (other than an MD, who was NOT interested in me), and it is difficult to constantly rebuff those guys. Does anyone else agree with me?
anon biglaw partner
TL;DR: how do I advise an associate whose childcare responsibilities are negatively affecting her work performance?
Need some advice on a complicated management issue. I am a partner in a transactional practice. One of my senior associates has a two-year-old. Her husband has a completely inflexible job (ER attending physician), and as a result she is fully the primary parent . If her child is sick and has to go home from daycare, she leaves and is at home for the remainder of the day taking care of the child or taking her to the doctor. She tries to work while she’s home with her baby, but that is understandably very hard and practically, she’s not available. Obviously, her kid is young and in daycare, so she’s sick a lot. Sometimes there’s no issue for a few months, but in a typical month she has to leave unexpectedly at least twice, and in the last 3-4 months there have been two occasions where she was out for over a week. (I don’t know if this is a normal level of sickness for a baby – I assume it is because she’s not indicated that there is any more significant issue.)
The problem is that at this point, it’s starting to become a career issue: she is of a seniority level where she should be solely managing projects, but because she has unexpected absences so often, partners are reluctant to give her sole responsibility for a project or to give her a client-facing role. She’s behind on assignments and people are ending up covering for her a lot, which is leading to some frustration.
I don’t know what to do here. We have excellent family benefits – we offer 16 weeks of paid maternity leave and she took an additional 4 unpaid (we also offer – and our male associates do use – 6 weeks of paternity leave); we also offer subsidized daycare and the daycare also has emergency in-home care for a certain number of days a year, which I assume she’s used. We are very supportive of families and all of our other associates except the first-years have kids, including young kids, and she’s not going to lose her job over this, but the unpredictable unavailability is directly impacting the opportunities that she’s offered and how she’s perceived. She has less than 2 years before she must enter the partnership process or she’ll have to move into a non-partner-track role (she’s halfway through year 8 and you have to enter the process by year 10).
I really like her and I don’t want to tell her how to manage her personal life – and I don’t have kids so I don’t even have experience or advice to offer – but I am her primary supervisor and I need to find a way to communicate with her about this, particularly because she’s at an important career point and negative opinions are accumulating. (I should note that she lateraled to us less than a year before she had her child, so she didn’t have an extensive pre-kids track record with the group.) I guess I’m looking for advice or experiences from women who’ve been in her position who might be able to tell me what would have been helpful to hear. One of my colleagues sort of lost it the other day after he had to step in to smooth things over with a client after she was unprepared for a meeting and said, “the fact that her husband is completely unable to help out shouldn’t be my problem,” and that has further caused me to feel like I need to find a way to talk with her about this.
Another Partner
Interesting issues. I’d repost on the Weekend Open Thread.
The original Scarlett
I would try to support her more, and try to push for less of a facetime culture at your firm. With the technology today, there’s no reason why she can’t both be home on an emergency basis and also responsive to clients. If you’re not looking to make your culture more flexible, you will lose talent like her. As a client, I’d rather have you support women for real in your firm (it goes far beyond having decent maternity leave). I’d also look to create a culture of helping each other out – today, she might need help because of child care, but tomorrow someone else might need help because of life. When we don’t do everything in our power to support other women at work, we force moms like her to make a choice – stay in the game or quit/ lean way out because it’s just too hard. You might think, so what, I’ve still got my job, but we all lose our networks every time this happens. One by one, our potential contacts drop and get less powerful. So do everything you can to help her. Back her up, staff cases better, encourage flexibility for everyone so it’s not a stigma.
Anon
You must not have kids. Someone who is home with an infant or toddler is not working in any meaningful way. I’m not blaming the associate, just saying it’s incredibly naive to frame this as a “face time” issue.
The original Scarlett
I think you should consider reframing how you think about work and where it can be done. Perhaps the associate won’t pump out a brief while tending to a sick toddler, but she certainly can monitor emails, call a client back or email, and keep an eye on things during that time. It is absolutely a face time issue – they aren’t giving her work because they can’t see her doing it. And we all know how much procrastination happens, and that a few days of nonproductive time doesn’t mean the job won’t ultimately get done. The focus is happening here because she’s a mom, and it’s childcare.
Anon
No, the problem is that she is not doing the work assigned. Others are having to complete her assignments. She was unprepared for a client meeting. She is missing deadlines. That is not a face time issue
The original Scarlett
You’re missing my point, which is help her. You know why she’s struggling and it’s a common issue. When you help her instead of criticizing her, you end up with an ally in the long run. This is why women aren’t in the c-suite with regularity, we are too busy imposing the rules instead of rethinking them.
Anonymous
Odds are she knows she’s not fooling anyone. I would just leave it.
Basically this is not an easy win situation. I have a special needs four year old. Now, nothing in life prepares us for this and obviously it’s more complicated than having a kid who isn’t special needs. It’s not anyone’s fault, it’s just a fact of life.
Not everyone is going to be able to do everything or reach everywhere. My husband currently is working a reduced schedule on certain days because of programming our son is in. Sometimes opportunities come up last minute and we have to turn them down because there is no easy way to get childcare for a special needs kid on short notice.
This is just life. If she could do better or more she probably would.
LaurenB
It is unusual to me that an ER attending physician has this problem. Typically, an ER attending physician has very specific hours that are known / planned in advance, as they are employed by a hospital. Sure, they are immovable, but it’s nothing like, say, an obstetrician who has to drop everything and run to the hospital if a woman is in labor and who is therefore not “predictable” to pick up a kid from daycare because he or she had to leave the house at 3 am or gets called to the hospital at 5:30 pm. In any case, many doctors who have spouses in also-high careers use nannies, not daycare.