I came across an interesting initiative out of UC Hastings called the Project for Attorney Retention [http://www.pardc.org/ ]. This page includes observations from attorneys who have been working part-time inside DC law firms: http://www.pardc.org/LawFirm/real_life.shtml. Their comments echoed my conversations with yesterday morning's walking group that included two doctors and a career federal employee. We compared our four very different approaches to part-time work and those of others we know and were amazed by the great variety of schemes.
So many of us are trying to define this work-life balance thing and we're coming up with unique arrangements that allow us to care for our families as well as our professional responsibilities. These options aren't perfect and aren't available to everyone, but we decided that just the act of trying now will make it easier for the next generation to achieve a better balance. At least that's what we tell ourselves! What's your story?
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Career Re-Entry Program At American University
Washington's American University has launched a Lawyer Re-Entry Program for attorneys looking to return to their careers after taking time off. See this link for the press release. What a great idea! We need something like this for librarians.
The announcement prompted me to do a quick search for information on career re-entry for librarians. I did find a Yahoo group for stay-at-home librarians (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/librariansahm/) and an article by Priscilla Shontz on staying professional active while staying at home (http://www.liscareer.com/shontz_activeunemployment.htm). Any other links and information to add here are welcome!
Thanks to Billie Jo Kaufmann, Associate Dean for Library and Information and Resources at AU's law school, for sending the link to LLSDC listserv.
The announcement prompted me to do a quick search for information on career re-entry for librarians. I did find a Yahoo group for stay-at-home librarians (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/librariansahm/) and an article by Priscilla Shontz on staying professional active while staying at home (http://www.liscareer.com/shontz_activeunemployment.htm). Any other links and information to add here are welcome!
Thanks to Billie Jo Kaufmann, Associate Dean for Library and Information and Resources at AU's law school, for sending the link to LLSDC listserv.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Flexible "Weekends"
In the nearly three years since I've been consulting from home, traditional weekends have gradually disappeared from my work routine. It's now more unusual for me not to work on a weekend than it is for me to draft a section of a report or perform some other work task on a Saturday or Sunday. Kind of reminds me of my days at Crowell & Moring when I typically worked at least part of one day every weekend. There's a huge difference, of course. Back then, I was also working 10-hour days all week, which meant a few months of barely seeing my former condo in daylight. I see a lot more daylight these days. I also burn a lot more midnight oil, working on reports at night after the kids are asleep.
I'm a "shifted librarian," but not in Jenny Levine's insightful sense. Released from the constraints of a 9-to-5 (or 8-to-7) schedule and its companion time-eater, commuting in Washington, I now shift my time across all seven days and 24 hours. It's for that reason that I was intrigued by Tammy Erickson's post, Do We Need Weekends? on Harvard Business Publishing's site. Ms. Erickson is a respected researcher and the author of several books and articles on how successful organizations work.
Ms. Erickson examines the concept of "synchronous work" as a factor that fuels the need to cluster workers together in the same place at the same time. As that type of work erodes, she argues that there's less need to maintain these rigid schedules. She also comments on the role of the Gen Ys in redefining work. A lively discussion appears in the post's Comments.
I must confess to missing weekends every now and then. It does feel as if I never stop working - and the arrival of my new Treo a few minutes ago to replace my dead cell phone promises to make that feeling grow. Fortunately, it takes only a minute or so to come back to my senses and thank my lucky stars that I have this flexibility - at least for the time being. So what if I have to work on a Saturday morning? If that buys me time on Friday afternoon to run my Girl Scout troop meetings, I can live with that. I just wish I could figure out how to promote telecommuting as a benefit for other librarians.
I'm a "shifted librarian," but not in Jenny Levine's insightful sense. Released from the constraints of a 9-to-5 (or 8-to-7) schedule and its companion time-eater, commuting in Washington, I now shift my time across all seven days and 24 hours. It's for that reason that I was intrigued by Tammy Erickson's post, Do We Need Weekends? on Harvard Business Publishing's site. Ms. Erickson is a respected researcher and the author of several books and articles on how successful organizations work.
Ms. Erickson examines the concept of "synchronous work" as a factor that fuels the need to cluster workers together in the same place at the same time. As that type of work erodes, she argues that there's less need to maintain these rigid schedules. She also comments on the role of the Gen Ys in redefining work. A lively discussion appears in the post's Comments.
I must confess to missing weekends every now and then. It does feel as if I never stop working - and the arrival of my new Treo a few minutes ago to replace my dead cell phone promises to make that feeling grow. Fortunately, it takes only a minute or so to come back to my senses and thank my lucky stars that I have this flexibility - at least for the time being. So what if I have to work on a Saturday morning? If that buys me time on Friday afternoon to run my Girl Scout troop meetings, I can live with that. I just wish I could figure out how to promote telecommuting as a benefit for other librarians.
Thursday, May 08, 2008
Parenthood, Productivity and Billable Hours
Joe Hodnicki posted an abstract of an interesting article entitled Parenthood and Productivity: A Study of Demands, Resources and Family-Friendly Firms, on Law Librarian Blog a few days ago. Sociologists Jean Wallace and Marisa Young examined the impact of family friendly policies on the billable hours of 670 attorneys in Alberta law firms. It turns out that . . . just a second . . .
Here I am. No concussion. Whew!
So, to recap, the family-friendly policies ostensibly designed to give parents, particularly mothers, some breathing room to take care of their kids and other family responsibilities, seem to make fathers in Alberta law firms more productive and allow them to enjoy more leisure time.
Well, the good news is that since the policies are working they’re less likely to be scrapped. Of course, that also means attorneys who are mothers will continue to pull off the legal career equivalent of a “Ginger Rogers,” who was said to have done everything that Fred did, but backwards and in high heels. And just like Ginger, it won’t be quite as good as what Fred achieved. Yeah, they both received Kennedy Center Honors, but who got the first one, huh?
The bottom line is that one way or the other, we working mothers do fulfill our career responsibilities, but with the interruptions and distractions that grease the wheels of family life in the 21st century. We don’t multi-task because it’s efficient; we multi-task because there are only 24 hours in a day – and we cram an awful lot into our 24 hours! Not that I would trade this opportunity to “have it all”, but shouldn’t there be some way to design a family-friendly policy that recognizes the “power hours” of working mothers?
Oh, well, that will have to be in a future post. Time to frost the cupcakes!
- “Maggie? What’s wrong? [Pause] But you have viola practice on Tuesdays, not Mondays. [Pause] Oh, a special practice for the spring concert. Okay, I’ll get your viola to you. Bye, sweetie.”
- “Mr. Joseph? Thanks so much for returning my call. Listen, I know you don’t want to hear this, but the porch roof is leaking again. [Pause] Yes, I know you’ve repaired it three times, but icicles are hanging down and I’m afraid someone will get impaled. [Pause] Yes, I realize that it’s 70 degrees outside now, but there were icicles hanging down when I started calling you in March. [Pause] Yes, I know how busy roofers are, but we’d really like you to come back to try again. [Long pause] Three weeks from Thursday between 8 am and 3 pm? Could you narrow that down a bit? [Pause] No, okay then, I’ll make arrangements to get the kids to and from school so I don’t miss you. Thanks.”
- “Hi, honey. How’s your day going? [Pause] A business trip? Next Tuesday and Wednesday? No problem, I’ll get someone to stay with the kids on Tuesday night until I get home from teaching. Oh, we got the invitation for the engagement party on the 7th. I’ll RSVP and put it on the calendar? [Pause] Yeah, it’ll be fun. Any special requests for dinner? [Pause] Sounds good. See you tonight."
- “Hello? Yes, this is Mrs. Fischler. [Pause] Will banged his head on the monkey bars during recess? [Pause] You’ve had ice on his head for 20 minutes, but he’s feeling a little woozy? [Pause] Sure, I’ll be right over, but I’ll call the pediatrician first to find out when I can bring Will in. Thanks.”
Here I am. No concussion. Whew!
- "No, Will, you cannot play on the Wii until you finish your homework and write five more thank you notes for your First Communion gifts."
So, to recap, the family-friendly policies ostensibly designed to give parents, particularly mothers, some breathing room to take care of their kids and other family responsibilities, seem to make fathers in Alberta law firms more productive and allow them to enjoy more leisure time.
Well, the good news is that since the policies are working they’re less likely to be scrapped. Of course, that also means attorneys who are mothers will continue to pull off the legal career equivalent of a “Ginger Rogers,” who was said to have done everything that Fred did, but backwards and in high heels. And just like Ginger, it won’t be quite as good as what Fred achieved. Yeah, they both received Kennedy Center Honors, but who got the first one, huh?
The bottom line is that one way or the other, we working mothers do fulfill our career responsibilities, but with the interruptions and distractions that grease the wheels of family life in the 21st century. We don’t multi-task because it’s efficient; we multi-task because there are only 24 hours in a day – and we cram an awful lot into our 24 hours! Not that I would trade this opportunity to “have it all”, but shouldn’t there be some way to design a family-friendly policy that recognizes the “power hours” of working mothers?
Oh, well, that will have to be in a future post. Time to frost the cupcakes!
Monday, March 31, 2008
Career Lattice or Ladder?
The Washington Post ran a terrific article yesterday entitled, "After a Baby, Full Time or Part?" written by former Life at Work columnist Amy Joyce. (Yup, she had a baby and adjusted her career a bit.) Her article explores the choices some women in DC have made in order to balance careers and young children.
In the article, Ms. Joyce uses a phrase I hadn't heard before - career as a lattice instead of a ladder. The concept comes from Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute. Ms. Joyce writes:
"Women are "redesigning careers to be a lattice instead of a ladder," said Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute. If you view your career as a ladder and you jump off, Galinsky said, it's hard to get back on. The idea of a lattice implies more flexibility."
Hmmm - that really grabbed me! Not only is "lattice" a nice visual metaphor, it also relates to the idea that it takes a village to raise a child, something these young mothers will encounter on a larger scale when they try to coordinate soccer carpools and scouting field trips a few years from now.
It's a quick read and includes a nice list of websites for working mothers and a good "How Do I" question and answer section on some of the financial implications, both of which are accessible through the Post's free subscription.
In the article, Ms. Joyce uses a phrase I hadn't heard before - career as a lattice instead of a ladder. The concept comes from Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute. Ms. Joyce writes:
"Women are "redesigning careers to be a lattice instead of a ladder," said Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute. If you view your career as a ladder and you jump off, Galinsky said, it's hard to get back on. The idea of a lattice implies more flexibility."
Hmmm - that really grabbed me! Not only is "lattice" a nice visual metaphor, it also relates to the idea that it takes a village to raise a child, something these young mothers will encounter on a larger scale when they try to coordinate soccer carpools and scouting field trips a few years from now.
It's a quick read and includes a nice list of websites for working mothers and a good "How Do I" question and answer section on some of the financial implications, both of which are accessible through the Post's free subscription.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
New Look, New Focus
Callinan the Librarian has a new look, designed to complement the soon-to-be launched new website over at Axelroth & Associates. I joined Joan Axelroth and Mary Talley last year and have enjoyed our association enormously. Joan hired me to work at Crowell & Moring in 1985 so we go way back. Mary and I just feel like we go way back. Together we're making the world better for librarianship!
I'm enjoying our work so much that my efforts to balance life and work have taken a bit of hit. I could work all the time -- and would if I hadn't made so many other commitments. Is over-committing a valid technique to achieve work-life balance? I don't know, but this is one of the many questions I want to explore with our community. Accordingly, I'm officially shifting the focus of this blog to issues of workplace flexibility and balancing acts, how we cope now and how coping has changed in the wake of Web 2.0.
So if you're reading this post, please take a minute to answer the survey question I'm using to inaugurate this line of inquiry:
Once we have a lay of the land, we'll work through the related questions, like what works and what doesn't, what makes you crazy and what keeps you sane.
And if you do answer the survey, please spread the word to your librarian pals so they can join us in this discussion.
Off to pick up a crew of kids from basketball practice!
I'm enjoying our work so much that my efforts to balance life and work have taken a bit of hit. I could work all the time -- and would if I hadn't made so many other commitments. Is over-committing a valid technique to achieve work-life balance? I don't know, but this is one of the many questions I want to explore with our community. Accordingly, I'm officially shifting the focus of this blog to issues of workplace flexibility and balancing acts, how we cope now and how coping has changed in the wake of Web 2.0.
So if you're reading this post, please take a minute to answer the survey question I'm using to inaugurate this line of inquiry:
Does librarianship offer opportunities for work-life balance?
Once we have a lay of the land, we'll work through the related questions, like what works and what doesn't, what makes you crazy and what keeps you sane.
And if you do answer the survey, please spread the word to your librarian pals so they can join us in this discussion.
Off to pick up a crew of kids from basketball practice!
Thursday, May 03, 2007
A Whole New Take on Teleconferencing
I had such high hopes for this year’s Computers in Libraries conference. Since I’m not going to be able to attend AALL or SLA, this was to be my only conference this year. Life began to conspire to keep me from my appointed rounds.
My annual presentation at Georgetown’s summer associate program fell right in the middle of CIL this year, a new twist resulting from CIL’s move from March to April. For no sane reason, I decided to completely revamp my presentation, something I should have been able to do easily had I not experienced some unexpected family commitments that cut into my prep time the weekend before CIL. At the last minute, my husband had to travel out of town for the first two days of the conference, so I had to do some child care scrambling. As if things weren’t complicated enough, a nor’easter hit DC the morning CIL opened, closing Fairfax County schools. I still made it to the conference, but in a way I never expected. I learned a very valuable lesson in balance that I plan to apply to “attend” the SLA and AALL meetings this summer.
Day One of CIL: I’m finally out the door at 1:15 after getting the kids squared away on homework and activities in lieu of today’s religious education class, also cancelled due to power loss at the church. Miraculously, there is no traffic on the GW parkway and I find “Doris Day” parking in front of the Hyatt. Once inside, I grab my registration packet and head down to the programs. They are all so crowded that I can only stand in the hallway outside the two programs I want to hear. I squeeze into the back of the last program I want to hear, but can only stay for a little while since my meter is running out and I need to get home.
Once I get home, cook dinner, do baths, read books and get the kids to sleep, I open the CIL conference website to see if I can find downloads of the programs I couldn’t see. The programs are not on the conference site, but when I go to the CIL blog, I discover that many speakers have already posted their PowerPoints on their own blogs and wikis. Hmmmm! I can pour over these presentations from the comfort of my own kitchen at a more convenient time. It’s like Tivo for a conference!
Day Two of CIL: School is back in session so the kids are off to school. My Georgetown Law students start presenting their final projects at tonight’s class so I need to put some finishing touches on our TWEN site so they can post their PowerPoint files throughout the day. I also need to do some more work on my summer associate presentation.
The minutes turn to hours, and it’s 1:30 before I know it. I need to be at Georgetown by 5:30 and, knowing how awful the traffic is on the 14th Bridge that separates CIL from GULC, I calculate that I’ll only have about 2 hours at CIL. I check the conference program and realize that there’s a 45-minute coffee break at the start of what will be my two hours. I click over to the conference blog to check on the availability of PowerPoints for the programs I want to attend. Most are up or will be up, according to the speakers’ blogs. I could spend the next few hours at home reading the presentations and testing out some new ideas, or I could spend much of that time in traffic or standing in hallways. I decide to attend CIL virtually on Day Two.
Day Three of CIL: I am determined to get a full day in at CIL, but the Georgetown summer associate program is tonight so I can’t resist a few final touches on my PowerPoint slides. After checking out my new Facebook account, an experiment inspired by a conference presentation, I head out the door for CIL. I take a quick tour of the exhibits and stop for Frank Cervone’s Cybertour of RSS Readers, and then attend several excellent programs. As the conference winds down, I dash out to get across that nasty bridge to DC in time for my Georgetown class.
Although I was only physically present at CIL for about five hours, I got quite a bit out of the programs. I did run into a few old friends in the exhibit hall, but really didn’t enjoy the serendipitous encounters that make conferences so much fun. On the other hand, I did send a few email and blog messages to speakers whose programs I enjoyed. I’m too shy to go up to the panelists at the end of real programs so this was a beneficial new experience. I even heard back from a few!
So maybe not being able to attend SLA and AALL this summer might not be worst thing. Maybe I can get something valuable by following along virtually from my laptop at home. Since CIL is a techie conference, there may have been more coverage of the programs than I’ll find with SLA and AALL, but even half of the coverage will be better than missing them altogether. I won’t get to see my old friends in person, but I can certainly send some email greetings. Just wish there were a way to share a cocktail or two. Hmm, didn’t I read something about that Second Life thing for librarians on the CIL blog? Yup, I did: http://www.infotodayblog.com/2007/04/19/libraries-enter-second-life/. Maybe that’ll be my next experiment!
My annual presentation at Georgetown’s summer associate program fell right in the middle of CIL this year, a new twist resulting from CIL’s move from March to April. For no sane reason, I decided to completely revamp my presentation, something I should have been able to do easily had I not experienced some unexpected family commitments that cut into my prep time the weekend before CIL. At the last minute, my husband had to travel out of town for the first two days of the conference, so I had to do some child care scrambling. As if things weren’t complicated enough, a nor’easter hit DC the morning CIL opened, closing Fairfax County schools. I still made it to the conference, but in a way I never expected. I learned a very valuable lesson in balance that I plan to apply to “attend” the SLA and AALL meetings this summer.
Day One of CIL: I’m finally out the door at 1:15 after getting the kids squared away on homework and activities in lieu of today’s religious education class, also cancelled due to power loss at the church. Miraculously, there is no traffic on the GW parkway and I find “Doris Day” parking in front of the Hyatt. Once inside, I grab my registration packet and head down to the programs. They are all so crowded that I can only stand in the hallway outside the two programs I want to hear. I squeeze into the back of the last program I want to hear, but can only stay for a little while since my meter is running out and I need to get home.
Once I get home, cook dinner, do baths, read books and get the kids to sleep, I open the CIL conference website to see if I can find downloads of the programs I couldn’t see. The programs are not on the conference site, but when I go to the CIL blog, I discover that many speakers have already posted their PowerPoints on their own blogs and wikis. Hmmmm! I can pour over these presentations from the comfort of my own kitchen at a more convenient time. It’s like Tivo for a conference!
Day Two of CIL: School is back in session so the kids are off to school. My Georgetown Law students start presenting their final projects at tonight’s class so I need to put some finishing touches on our TWEN site so they can post their PowerPoint files throughout the day. I also need to do some more work on my summer associate presentation.
The minutes turn to hours, and it’s 1:30 before I know it. I need to be at Georgetown by 5:30 and, knowing how awful the traffic is on the 14th Bridge that separates CIL from GULC, I calculate that I’ll only have about 2 hours at CIL. I check the conference program and realize that there’s a 45-minute coffee break at the start of what will be my two hours. I click over to the conference blog to check on the availability of PowerPoints for the programs I want to attend. Most are up or will be up, according to the speakers’ blogs. I could spend the next few hours at home reading the presentations and testing out some new ideas, or I could spend much of that time in traffic or standing in hallways. I decide to attend CIL virtually on Day Two.
Day Three of CIL: I am determined to get a full day in at CIL, but the Georgetown summer associate program is tonight so I can’t resist a few final touches on my PowerPoint slides. After checking out my new Facebook account, an experiment inspired by a conference presentation, I head out the door for CIL. I take a quick tour of the exhibits and stop for Frank Cervone’s Cybertour of RSS Readers, and then attend several excellent programs. As the conference winds down, I dash out to get across that nasty bridge to DC in time for my Georgetown class.
Although I was only physically present at CIL for about five hours, I got quite a bit out of the programs. I did run into a few old friends in the exhibit hall, but really didn’t enjoy the serendipitous encounters that make conferences so much fun. On the other hand, I did send a few email and blog messages to speakers whose programs I enjoyed. I’m too shy to go up to the panelists at the end of real programs so this was a beneficial new experience. I even heard back from a few!
So maybe not being able to attend SLA and AALL this summer might not be worst thing. Maybe I can get something valuable by following along virtually from my laptop at home. Since CIL is a techie conference, there may have been more coverage of the programs than I’ll find with SLA and AALL, but even half of the coverage will be better than missing them altogether. I won’t get to see my old friends in person, but I can certainly send some email greetings. Just wish there were a way to share a cocktail or two. Hmm, didn’t I read something about that Second Life thing for librarians on the CIL blog? Yup, I did: http://www.infotodayblog.com/2007/04/19/libraries-enter-second-life/. Maybe that’ll be my next experiment!
Thursday, April 12, 2007
Multi-Tasking Mommy Guilt
A few weeks ago, there was a flurry of media coverage on a study released by the University of Maryland in which sociologist Suzanne Bianchi and her colleagues found that women are actually spending more time engaged in child-rearing now than did their counterparts in 1965. As I listened to the coverage on the Today Show and read stories and blog posts all over the Net, one particular aspect of the study caught my attention.
The researchers distinguished the types of time mothers spend with their children. In “primary” time, mothers focus solely on the children. Time spent multi-tasking, for example, helping with homework while cooking dinner, is considered “secondary” time. The third dimension is time just spent with children. In addition, there’s a type of time that the researchers called “accessibility” – being available for a consult while focusing on another activity; unfortunately, the researchers were not able to capture this type of time in the study.
It seems that we’re spending more time multi-tasking, so much, in fact, that this time isn’t really registering with us as time with our children. I’m not sure if this makes me feel better or worse. What I’ve learned working exclusively from home is that I never really stop working. Like my counterparts in offices, I check email all day and into the night. Unlike the office worker I once was, I don’t do that final document save until I’m in my jammies and ready for bed. I can always squeeze in that last fifteen minutes to write another paragraph for an article or tinker with a PowerPoint slide or two for that upcoming presentation. The line between work and home just isn’t.
What that means for my children is that most days, I’m there when they walk in the door from school. I can and do stop for hugs and their news of the day. I help with homework and mediate Webkinz time and host playdates, with an eye on my email and fingers on my keyboard. I couldn’t do this when I was in an office so they didn’t have the playdates they have now and homework was done while I cooked dinner. That’s a good thing, right?
I was beginning to lose faith in this arrangement. Even though I’m home more often, I started to wonder if this home time is as valuable as it was when I was there “after work.” Or am I fooling myself into thinking I was more engaged then? After all, I was cooking dinner and picking up stuff and going through junk mail and writing checks and . . . well, you get the picture.
This study has given me names to describe the time phenomenon that plagues my confidence in this working at home arrangement. I can now say that have more secondary time with my children, although I may not have more primary time. Maybe I do multi-task so much that I don’t feel as if I’m really here, but from the coverage and response to this study, that may be just fine. Time is time, right? I just wonder how much I’ll regret the time I spent answering email that I could have spent hearing about the latest Webkinz Daily Bonus Question.
The researchers distinguished the types of time mothers spend with their children. In “primary” time, mothers focus solely on the children. Time spent multi-tasking, for example, helping with homework while cooking dinner, is considered “secondary” time. The third dimension is time just spent with children. In addition, there’s a type of time that the researchers called “accessibility” – being available for a consult while focusing on another activity; unfortunately, the researchers were not able to capture this type of time in the study.
It seems that we’re spending more time multi-tasking, so much, in fact, that this time isn’t really registering with us as time with our children. I’m not sure if this makes me feel better or worse. What I’ve learned working exclusively from home is that I never really stop working. Like my counterparts in offices, I check email all day and into the night. Unlike the office worker I once was, I don’t do that final document save until I’m in my jammies and ready for bed. I can always squeeze in that last fifteen minutes to write another paragraph for an article or tinker with a PowerPoint slide or two for that upcoming presentation. The line between work and home just isn’t.
What that means for my children is that most days, I’m there when they walk in the door from school. I can and do stop for hugs and their news of the day. I help with homework and mediate Webkinz time and host playdates, with an eye on my email and fingers on my keyboard. I couldn’t do this when I was in an office so they didn’t have the playdates they have now and homework was done while I cooked dinner. That’s a good thing, right?
I was beginning to lose faith in this arrangement. Even though I’m home more often, I started to wonder if this home time is as valuable as it was when I was there “after work.” Or am I fooling myself into thinking I was more engaged then? After all, I was cooking dinner and picking up stuff and going through junk mail and writing checks and . . . well, you get the picture.
This study has given me names to describe the time phenomenon that plagues my confidence in this working at home arrangement. I can now say that have more secondary time with my children, although I may not have more primary time. Maybe I do multi-task so much that I don’t feel as if I’m really here, but from the coverage and response to this study, that may be just fine. Time is time, right? I just wonder how much I’ll regret the time I spent answering email that I could have spent hearing about the latest Webkinz Daily Bonus Question.
Wednesday, April 04, 2007
B in Balancing, D in Blogging
So . . . since my last post, I’ve been busy balancing. School started for the kids and life has been moving at warp speed ever since. I’ve:
- helped with hours of homework,
- organized class parties,
- baked countless cupcakes,
- attended soccer and basketball practices and games,
- hosted play dates and birthday parties,
- run a Brownie troop,
- rehearsed for plays,
- made spider, turkey, heart-shaped and leprechaun crafts,
- bought gift wrap and Girl Scout cookies, and
- dispensed doses of antibiotics and sympathy, to name a few things.
In the rest of my life, I’ve
- attended too many funerals of friends’ parents,
- buried my own dear aunt,
- spent too many hours in grocery stores, traffic jams and my kitchen,
- raked mountains of leaves and shoveled inches of snow,
- celebrated holidays and birthdays and reunions,
- caught up with old friends and made some new ones, and
- nearly stopped writing “to do” lists because, more often than not, they were meaningless.
In my spare time, I’ve written several professional articles, tackled a few consulting projects, delivered training programs, attended many meetings, and nearly finished my spring course at Georgetown. In all, I think I’ve earned a B in balancing.
Unfortunately, this blog was a causality of all that balancing, despite my nearly daily ideas to share on this subject. My spring (who had time in January for resolutions?) resolution is to get serious about posting, even if it’s just a few sentences every week or so. I’ve heard from a number of people who have been watching this blog and waiting patiently for posts, and their encouragement inspires me. The pediatric dentist awaits our visit so I’m off for now . . . but I will return soon.
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
The Fork in the Road
The Fork in the Road: Can Women and Wall Street Live Together? By Jenny Anderson (B1, NYT, 8/6/06)
The cover story in the Times’ Sunday Business section focused on the work-life balance dilemma playing out on Wall Street. Not surprisingly, it’s the same story, different location - successful women at the top of their game, opting out to raise families, leaving an industry willing, but unsure how, to modify a 24/7 workplace.
The protagonist, one Elizabeth Stoeber, formerly of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, is trying to carve out her own solution. In anticipation of “on-ramping” when her two sons are older, Ms. Stoeber is “absolutely determined to stay professionally attractive.” She started a consulting company, works for a boutique investment bank and is shopping around a proposal to job-share a full-time position at a major bank.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that Wall Street’s current environment doesn’t really support part-time work or flexible hours, despite good intentions to accommodate these arrangements. Countering this reality is evidence that the workforce of the future simply won’t bite at the tempting apple of huge salaries in exchange for unlimited hours of work.
The entire piece is well worth the read, but here are a few favorite quotes to whet your appetites:
“The first generation was about access of opportunity. It worked. It got us here. Now we have to learn how not to lose that talent at 35.”
Sylvia Anne Hewlett, President, Center for Work-Life Balance.
“The work force of tomorrow is at home. They are not old or retired. They are in their 40’s and 50’s.”
Patricia David, Global head of diversity and talent management of Citigroup’s investment banking unit.
“The real difference between today and 5 or 10 years ago is that now everyone recognizes that there is a true business case for having a diverse workforce. You don’t have to justify that diversity is good.”
Alice Wang, a managing director at J.P. Morgan who has enjoyed both flextime and telecommuting during her career there.
Here’s a final hopeful note. Lucia Bonilla, a superstar Princeton grad, will start her career at USB this fall because:
“ I saw pregnant women on the trading floor, three or four of them. . . . Not all women want to have children, but in the future I may want to and it was reassuring to walk around the floor and see that it was possible.”
It’s all about those precedents I mentioned in my last post, “Pay it Forward.” Those of us who can stake a small claim toward increasing flexibility in our own workplaces inspire and embolden those coming along behind us.
The cover story in the Times’ Sunday Business section focused on the work-life balance dilemma playing out on Wall Street. Not surprisingly, it’s the same story, different location - successful women at the top of their game, opting out to raise families, leaving an industry willing, but unsure how, to modify a 24/7 workplace.
The protagonist, one Elizabeth Stoeber, formerly of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, is trying to carve out her own solution. In anticipation of “on-ramping” when her two sons are older, Ms. Stoeber is “absolutely determined to stay professionally attractive.” She started a consulting company, works for a boutique investment bank and is shopping around a proposal to job-share a full-time position at a major bank.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that Wall Street’s current environment doesn’t really support part-time work or flexible hours, despite good intentions to accommodate these arrangements. Countering this reality is evidence that the workforce of the future simply won’t bite at the tempting apple of huge salaries in exchange for unlimited hours of work.
The entire piece is well worth the read, but here are a few favorite quotes to whet your appetites:
“The first generation was about access of opportunity. It worked. It got us here. Now we have to learn how not to lose that talent at 35.”
Sylvia Anne Hewlett, President, Center for Work-Life Balance.
“The work force of tomorrow is at home. They are not old or retired. They are in their 40’s and 50’s.”
Patricia David, Global head of diversity and talent management of Citigroup’s investment banking unit.
“The real difference between today and 5 or 10 years ago is that now everyone recognizes that there is a true business case for having a diverse workforce. You don’t have to justify that diversity is good.”
Alice Wang, a managing director at J.P. Morgan who has enjoyed both flextime and telecommuting during her career there.
Here’s a final hopeful note. Lucia Bonilla, a superstar Princeton grad, will start her career at USB this fall because:
“ I saw pregnant women on the trading floor, three or four of them. . . . Not all women want to have children, but in the future I may want to and it was reassuring to walk around the floor and see that it was possible.”
It’s all about those precedents I mentioned in my last post, “Pay it Forward.” Those of us who can stake a small claim toward increasing flexibility in our own workplaces inspire and embolden those coming along behind us.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Flexibility: Pay It Forward
A couple of years ago, the American Association of Law Libraries published profiles of several librarians as a recruitment tool for the profession. I was among the librarians profiled in a piece entitled, “Change is Good . . . Even if You Love What You Do”. In it, I described my decision to balance my family and career by switching from a full-time law firm career to a part-time academic one.
As a result of this profile, other librarians contact me for advice on this option. Clearly, this is a very personal decision working women need to make with their partners, but I’ve always encouraged those who call to at least consider trying meaningful part time work for one simple reason:
Whatever we do to increase flexibility in today’s workplace will make it that much easier for our daughters and sons facing these decisions in twenty years.
In last December’s American Prospect, Linda Hirshman published an article, “Homeward Bound,” in which she revealed the results of her research on couples whose weddings were announced in the “Sunday Styles” section of the New York Times in 1996. To her horror, she discovered that the vast majority of these highly educated, elite women were home raising children. She criticized this “opt-out phenomenon” and set off a firestorm that continues to play out in the media. (See Judith Stadtman Tucker’s “Everybody Hates Linda”, “A Working Girl Can Win” by Meghan O’Rourke, and Ms. Hirshman’s own account of the last few months in “Unleashing the Wrath of Stay-at-Home Moms”) The original research is now a controversial new book, Get to Work: A Manifesto for Women of the World.
I’ll be taking this book to the beach with me, but from what I’ve read so far, some of Ms. Hirshman’s real message may have been lost in the backlash. The choices educated, wealthy women make have repercussions beyond their own circles. They have the power to serve as role models for their less-privileged peers as well as for their successors. By opting out, these women diminish the contribution women can make to improve the world.
That sentiment is, in part, what motivates the advice I give the librarians who contact me. I believe that the workplace can change, but not without guidance and definition from the women with the most at stake. Those of us who reach certain professional levels have the power to negotiate for flexibility, and although it means endless juggling and constant vigilance, I feel we owe it to the past and the future to do so. These small contributions can have a profound effect over time because they set precedents in individual workplaces.
Ms. Hirshman is not enthusiastic about part-time work, stating, “If my interviewees are working, they work largely part time, and their part-time careers are not putting them in the executive suite.” However, she acknowledges that many women had become so alienated by a workplace designed by and for males, that “[n]ot surprisingly, even where employers offered them part-time work, they were not interested in taking it.”
I think that’s where librarians are lucky – and why we should work toward creating meaningful part-time library employment. We really like what we do. Yes, there are difficult bosses and colleagues, threats of downsizing, and incursions from other professionals, but most of knew we were choosing careers burdened by such problems. We did so anyway because librarianship is fulfilling, and it is that fulfillment that can support the creation of small, but satisfying, work along the entire continuum of a librarian’s career. If we embrace the notion that flexibility in the workplace is for everyone – parents of young children, children of aging parents, women, men, old and young – we can have the opportunity to do good now and in the future.
As a result of this profile, other librarians contact me for advice on this option. Clearly, this is a very personal decision working women need to make with their partners, but I’ve always encouraged those who call to at least consider trying meaningful part time work for one simple reason:
Whatever we do to increase flexibility in today’s workplace will make it that much easier for our daughters and sons facing these decisions in twenty years.
In last December’s American Prospect, Linda Hirshman published an article, “Homeward Bound,” in which she revealed the results of her research on couples whose weddings were announced in the “Sunday Styles” section of the New York Times in 1996. To her horror, she discovered that the vast majority of these highly educated, elite women were home raising children. She criticized this “opt-out phenomenon” and set off a firestorm that continues to play out in the media. (See Judith Stadtman Tucker’s “Everybody Hates Linda”, “A Working Girl Can Win” by Meghan O’Rourke, and Ms. Hirshman’s own account of the last few months in “Unleashing the Wrath of Stay-at-Home Moms”) The original research is now a controversial new book, Get to Work: A Manifesto for Women of the World.
I’ll be taking this book to the beach with me, but from what I’ve read so far, some of Ms. Hirshman’s real message may have been lost in the backlash. The choices educated, wealthy women make have repercussions beyond their own circles. They have the power to serve as role models for their less-privileged peers as well as for their successors. By opting out, these women diminish the contribution women can make to improve the world.
That sentiment is, in part, what motivates the advice I give the librarians who contact me. I believe that the workplace can change, but not without guidance and definition from the women with the most at stake. Those of us who reach certain professional levels have the power to negotiate for flexibility, and although it means endless juggling and constant vigilance, I feel we owe it to the past and the future to do so. These small contributions can have a profound effect over time because they set precedents in individual workplaces.
Ms. Hirshman is not enthusiastic about part-time work, stating, “If my interviewees are working, they work largely part time, and their part-time careers are not putting them in the executive suite.” However, she acknowledges that many women had become so alienated by a workplace designed by and for males, that “[n]ot surprisingly, even where employers offered them part-time work, they were not interested in taking it.”
I think that’s where librarians are lucky – and why we should work toward creating meaningful part-time library employment. We really like what we do. Yes, there are difficult bosses and colleagues, threats of downsizing, and incursions from other professionals, but most of knew we were choosing careers burdened by such problems. We did so anyway because librarianship is fulfilling, and it is that fulfillment that can support the creation of small, but satisfying, work along the entire continuum of a librarian’s career. If we embrace the notion that flexibility in the workplace is for everyone – parents of young children, children of aging parents, women, men, old and young – we can have the opportunity to do good now and in the future.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Less Money + More Time = Happier Working Moms
If you've watched any NBC news program in the last 24 hours, you probably saw the story by Dawn Fratangelo on what working women want - more time! The piece is based on a Career Builder survey released in May that reveals that fifty-two percent of working moms would take a pay cut to spend more time with their children. That figure stood at 38 percent last year. Dissatisfaction with the work-life balance seems to have taken a marked leap up this year!
According to the survey, more than half of the women interviewed said their companies offer flex time, but as one flex-time taker in the NBC piece pointed out, "Not a day goes by that someone's isn't saying ‘Oh, nice of you to show up today’ or something." Implementing company policies that support a more sane work-life balance is only part of the solution. It's going to take a paradigm shift in attitudes to ensure that our kids don't face the same insanity we do!
According to the survey, more than half of the women interviewed said their companies offer flex time, but as one flex-time taker in the NBC piece pointed out, "Not a day goes by that someone's isn't saying ‘Oh, nice of you to show up today’ or something." Implementing company policies that support a more sane work-life balance is only part of the solution. It's going to take a paradigm shift in attitudes to ensure that our kids don't face the same insanity we do!
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Scant Research on Work Life Balance
The Career Journal, the executive career site of the Wall Street Journal, has released its 2006 Best Careers report, which identifies eight careers that offer high job satistfaction. The top attributes of winning careers include:
- Good intellectual stimulation;
- Strong job security;
- High level of control and freedom in what to do;
- Extensive direct contact with customers/clients.
Think librarianship rates inclusion? Join a discussion on the topic.
In a subset of the report, Career Journal editors list careers by the qualities that matter most to employees, such as autonomy and work-life balance. According to the editors, there is insufficient research on careers that offer a work-life balance to recommend any one in particular, however, they do advise avoiding law firms. Carol Evans, founder and chief executive officer of Working Mother Media Inc., says few law firms have made her "Working Mother" annual list of best employers because, "They don't have the policies in place, they don't do the work, and they stop trying after a while." Ouch!
Sunday, June 25, 2006
The Balanced Life, a free ebook
I just stumbled across a great resource, Clay Nelson's free ebook The Balanced Life. It contains short, inspiring articles on finding professional and personal fulfillment and having fun at the same time. Wish I read the article entitled "Vacation Time - Don't Waste It" last Sunday! Oh, well!
Download your own copy at this link before you go on vacation!
Download your own copy at this link before you go on vacation!
Friday, June 23, 2006
Blueprints for Plugging a Brain Drain
Lisa Belkin, whose column about the intersection of jobs and personal lives appears every other week in the New York Times, recently covered the Hidden Brain Drain Summit (Blueprints for Plugging a Brain Drain, June 18, 2006). A project of Sylvia Ann Hewlett's Center for Work-Life Policy, the summit brought together representatives from major companies to discuss strategies for retaining female and minority employees and facilitating re-entry for those who left and are ready to return. The momentum for flexibility grows . . .
See this link for the article itself.
See this link for the article itself.
Friday, June 09, 2006
Flexible Work Arrangements Word Templates
If you're considering discussing a flexible work arrangement with your boss, you might want to prepare a written proposal, if for no other reason than to help clarify your own thoughts. The Microsoft website contains all sorts of sample documents for business, academic and personal writing, including this nifty Flexible Work Arrangement Proposal form at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/templates/TC012197971033.aspx?CategoryID=CT011389841033. Note: You need Word 2003 or higher to use this template.
For more information, follow the links from the template to Microsoft's Work & Family Connection page at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/EY012075431033.aspx. You'll find links to an article, another template on work-life balance and the Work & Family Connection home page.
For more information, follow the links from the template to Microsoft's Work & Family Connection page at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/EY012075431033.aspx. You'll find links to an article, another template on work-life balance and the Work & Family Connection home page.
Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Work Place Flexibility
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is supporting the Workplace Flexibility 2010 campaign to support the development of a comprehensive national policy on workplace flexibility at the federal, state and local levels. Their website contains useful information about the campaign along with links to information on work and family, including webcasts of events sponsored by the campaign. There's also a handy list of laws that impact workplace flexibility. Each law is summarized and linked to legal memos, checklists and other tools prepared by the campaign to assist companies and individuals investigating flexible options for workers.
Check out their website for inspiration. Good people are making good things happen!
Workplace Flexibility 2010:
http://www.law.georgetown.edu/workplaceflexibility2010/index.cfm
Check out their website for inspiration. Good people are making good things happen!
Workplace Flexibility 2010:
http://www.law.georgetown.edu/workplaceflexibility2010/index.cfm
Monday, June 05, 2006
Work Space Flexibility
Jenny Levine's (aka The Shifted Librarian) comments on retaining our profession's best and brightest struck a chord with me. In her post on April 10, 2006, Jenny said:
Ask yourself what your library is doing to value your top staff (all of them, not just the traditional, stereotypical functionaries), to create a collaborative environment (especially between generations and between various job roles), and to let your employees color outside the lines a little in order to draw the big picture.
Her post was in response to Rachel Singer Gordon's observation that more than a few librarians no longer actually work in libraries, yet still do library-related work. See her post Neither Fish Nor Fowl (http://www.lisjobs.com/liminal/2006/04/neither-fish-nor-fowl-nor.html) for more.
Craving order is part of our nature as librarians, but are we too wedded to organizational structure and job descriptions to nurture the work space flexibility we need to keep the creative and energetic librarians redefining their roles respected and rewarded?
Ask yourself what your library is doing to value your top staff (all of them, not just the traditional, stereotypical functionaries), to create a collaborative environment (especially between generations and between various job roles), and to let your employees color outside the lines a little in order to draw the big picture.
Her post was in response to Rachel Singer Gordon's observation that more than a few librarians no longer actually work in libraries, yet still do library-related work. See her post Neither Fish Nor Fowl (http://www.lisjobs.com/liminal/2006/04/neither-fish-nor-fowl-nor.html) for more.
Craving order is part of our nature as librarians, but are we too wedded to organizational structure and job descriptions to nurture the work space flexibility we need to keep the creative and energetic librarians redefining their roles respected and rewarded?
Thursday, June 01, 2006
Balancing Life and Librarianship
The first thing you should know about me is that I'm the daughter of a librarian. Mary Lillian Howley Callinan is the original Callinan the Librarian. She inspires me personally and professionally - and has a fan club of former colleagues across the Northeast. Growing up as the daughter of a librarian made me pretty passionate about the profession.
My mother received her undergraduate degree in librarianship from Marywood College and had a choice of positions upon graduation, unlike many of her classmates in the late 1940s. She worked in a variety of libraries for the next 12 years as a reference librarian and a library manager. She met my father at Fort Monmouth, where he was the editor of the base paper and she was the helpful librarian who tracked down the facts he needed for articles.
On the first Friday in October in the last year of the fabulous fifties, Mary Callinan closed up the lovely public library in Red Bank, NJ, went to the beauty parlor to have her hair done on Saturday, went to mass Sunday morning and to Riverview Hospital that afternoon. The future Callinan the Librarian was born shortly after midnight, arriving exactly on her due date. My brother Denis arrived two and a half years later, a few days early - show off!
Mom did not return to librarianship until I was five and Denis was three when we moved from New Jersey to New York and found ourselves a few miles from St. John's University. St. John's needed a rare books cataloger, and thanks to her solid liberal arts education, Mom had enough knowledge of Latin, French and German, combined with her library training, to convince St. John's to hire her on a part-time basis. Callinan the Librarian was back.
Now mind you, this was 1965. The women's movement was barely beginning to percolate. Many women were at home, working women were single and, to the extent that there were some women balancing work and family, they certainly weren't talking about it! Mom was no exception. Because her work was so independent by nature, she could work flexible hours and still be around when we weren't in school. Then there were Saturdays.
Mom put in a good chunk of hours on Saturdays. Some weeks that meant Daddy was Mr. Mom for the day. Other weeks, we went to work with Mom. As much as we enjoyed adventures with Daddy, the Saturdays we went to work with Mom were my favorites. We'd head to the children's literature floor in St. John's library, where Mom would deposit us in adjoining carrels, find a nice education major studying in the stacks, ask her to keep on eye on us, and then descend to the bowels of the library to catalog rare books. She'd come back up to check on us a few times and take us to lunch. The hours I spent in those carrels or sitting on the floor between the stacks, feet up on a shelf and nose in book, remain among the fondest memories of my childhood.
I understood that what Mom was doing was unusual, and as my awareness of the world grew, I realized that she was able to be a working mother, in part, because of her career choice. Librarianship offered the kind of flexibility that supported balance.
Becoming a librarian was always in the back of my mind, but I was a good student at a women's college at a time when good students were pushed into law and medical school. The week after I submitted my law school applications, I realized that I didn't want to be a lawyer - I wanted to be a librarian. The following week, after my last final, I went to my college library, found the books and journals about librarianship and discovered that I could still go to law school, quite a relief since I didn't really have a Plan B. I'd get my MLS after law school and become an academic law librarian.
Decision made, I spent the spring trying to explain my new plan. I got a lot of flak, but the winning argument was my expectation that librarianship would allow me to balance career and family in a way seemingly impossible in the law. I pursued my plan, with a lengthy, but happy, detour into private law librarianship, and spent the last eight years at Georgetown, raising children and working flexible hours.
My personal life experience serves as evidence that librarianship can be a career in which you can balance life and work. Unfortunately, I know other librarians who have not been able to achieve this balance and have been forced to chose life over librarianship. I also know a lot of librarians who are so swamped at work, they've essentially been forced to choose librarianship over life. I started my consulting company to try to address this imbalance by redistributing work and labor virtually and am optimistic that we can make a small contribution to the problem. But this is a bigger issue than a few librarians can solve.
So I pose these questions for discussion:
My mother received her undergraduate degree in librarianship from Marywood College and had a choice of positions upon graduation, unlike many of her classmates in the late 1940s. She worked in a variety of libraries for the next 12 years as a reference librarian and a library manager. She met my father at Fort Monmouth, where he was the editor of the base paper and she was the helpful librarian who tracked down the facts he needed for articles.
On the first Friday in October in the last year of the fabulous fifties, Mary Callinan closed up the lovely public library in Red Bank, NJ, went to the beauty parlor to have her hair done on Saturday, went to mass Sunday morning and to Riverview Hospital that afternoon. The future Callinan the Librarian was born shortly after midnight, arriving exactly on her due date. My brother Denis arrived two and a half years later, a few days early - show off!
Mom did not return to librarianship until I was five and Denis was three when we moved from New Jersey to New York and found ourselves a few miles from St. John's University. St. John's needed a rare books cataloger, and thanks to her solid liberal arts education, Mom had enough knowledge of Latin, French and German, combined with her library training, to convince St. John's to hire her on a part-time basis. Callinan the Librarian was back.
Now mind you, this was 1965. The women's movement was barely beginning to percolate. Many women were at home, working women were single and, to the extent that there were some women balancing work and family, they certainly weren't talking about it! Mom was no exception. Because her work was so independent by nature, she could work flexible hours and still be around when we weren't in school. Then there were Saturdays.
Mom put in a good chunk of hours on Saturdays. Some weeks that meant Daddy was Mr. Mom for the day. Other weeks, we went to work with Mom. As much as we enjoyed adventures with Daddy, the Saturdays we went to work with Mom were my favorites. We'd head to the children's literature floor in St. John's library, where Mom would deposit us in adjoining carrels, find a nice education major studying in the stacks, ask her to keep on eye on us, and then descend to the bowels of the library to catalog rare books. She'd come back up to check on us a few times and take us to lunch. The hours I spent in those carrels or sitting on the floor between the stacks, feet up on a shelf and nose in book, remain among the fondest memories of my childhood.
I understood that what Mom was doing was unusual, and as my awareness of the world grew, I realized that she was able to be a working mother, in part, because of her career choice. Librarianship offered the kind of flexibility that supported balance.
Becoming a librarian was always in the back of my mind, but I was a good student at a women's college at a time when good students were pushed into law and medical school. The week after I submitted my law school applications, I realized that I didn't want to be a lawyer - I wanted to be a librarian. The following week, after my last final, I went to my college library, found the books and journals about librarianship and discovered that I could still go to law school, quite a relief since I didn't really have a Plan B. I'd get my MLS after law school and become an academic law librarian.
Decision made, I spent the spring trying to explain my new plan. I got a lot of flak, but the winning argument was my expectation that librarianship would allow me to balance career and family in a way seemingly impossible in the law. I pursued my plan, with a lengthy, but happy, detour into private law librarianship, and spent the last eight years at Georgetown, raising children and working flexible hours.
My personal life experience serves as evidence that librarianship can be a career in which you can balance life and work. Unfortunately, I know other librarians who have not been able to achieve this balance and have been forced to chose life over librarianship. I also know a lot of librarians who are so swamped at work, they've essentially been forced to choose librarianship over life. I started my consulting company to try to address this imbalance by redistributing work and labor virtually and am optimistic that we can make a small contribution to the problem. But this is a bigger issue than a few librarians can solve.
So I pose these questions for discussion:
- Does librarianship still offer opportunities for the life-work balance we need and deserve?
- If not, how can we as a profession cultivate that balance to retain the current generation of librarians and attract the next?
- If we as a profession embrace work-life balance as a principle, how can we publicize this commitment to increase our standing in the marketplace?
Let the discussion begin!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
