Hitting the "Mommy Wall"
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| Mon, 10-24-2005 - 11:19am |
I am surprised that this actually comes as a surprise to women trying to re-enter the workforce after taking time off to SAH. *Anyone* taking a not-so-brief hiatus from their career should expect the same treatment IMO . . . you're not going to be able to pick up right where you left off.
BTW - "hi" everyone! I've missed it here! :)
Women raise kids, lose careers
By TENISHA MERCER
THE DETROIT NEWS
Veronica Golubovic spent more than 20 years on the runways of Paris, Italy and New York as a designer for some of the most powerful names in fashion -- Yves Saint Laurent, Donna Karan and Perry Ellis.
But it was a three-year gap on her resume -- the hiatus she took after the births of her two children -- that garnered the most attention from prospective employers four years ago when Golubovic tried to resume her career.
She hasn't forgotten one recruiter's look of discomfort when she explained she was a stay-at-home mom. Or the way a top official at a retailer dismissed her during an interview with, "Oh, so now you don't know if you want to be a stay-at-home mommy."
"I came here thinking I've done so much, but it was very difficult," said Golubovic, 45, who eventually opened a designer clothing store in Birmingham, Mich., earlier this year. "I didn't think people would be hung up on it, but it was shocking and surprising. I couldn't believe their reactions."
Thirty years after women began joining the work force in large numbers, many are hitting the "mommy wall" when they try to return to work after having children.
They find it difficult -- if not impossible -- to return to the same positions they left, according to a recent study by the Forte Foundation in New York and the Wharton Center for Leadership and Change at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.
Unprepared for the obstacles they face on their return, many opt out of traditional corporate jobs and move to smaller companies. Experts dub the trend the "female brain drain" and say the exodus is coming just as businesses need talented, experienced workers to fill the gap as baby boomers prepare to retire en masse, leaving the biggest labor shortage in history in their wake.
"This is a defining issue for women," said Monica McGrath, an assistant professor at Wharton, who spearheaded the study. "Women who leave as vice presidents are not coming back as vice presidents. Now is not the time for corporations to squander billions of dollars in talent and enthusiasm at their fingertips. This is a talent pool that organizations need. We have a voice at the table, and I would hate to see us lose that."
The study found that half of working mothers who returned to work felt discouraged by their employer. Eighty-three percent ended up accepting a comparable or lower-level position, while 61 percent changed industries. About 45 percent of the women surveyed started their own businesses, and 59 percent went to work at smaller companies. The study is based on interviews with 200 women, most of them with MBA degrees.
The results add more fuel to the debate about whether and how women can blend careers and family. Even as women are graduating from law, business and medical schools at almost the same rates as men, they find their careers shifting in very different directions from their male colleagues once they have children.
"They want to spend time with their children, and it can be very time-consuming," said New York-based Cindy Swensen, who coaches executive women on how to return to work after having children. "Volunteering at the bake sale is probably not going to help you re-enter the work force."
It's a strange phenomenon for a generation of women who were raised to break down barriers while "having it all" -- even if that meant delaying or postponing plans to have children to focus on their careers.
"We hear very few stories of people just stepping back in where they left off," said Joanne Brundage, executive director of Mothers & More, a Chicago-area support group for working women who postpone their careers to have children.
"Clearly, there is a price to be paid for not staying full-time, full-force in most professions," Brundage said. "I think women who are becoming mothers now have a different set of priorities than women did 15 to 20 years ago. Unfortunately, the message may change, but the environment stays the same."
It's a message Cynthia Aks wasn't prepared for. The first female surgeon to graduate from the residency program at Oakland General Hospital in Madison Heights, Mich., in 1990, Aks battled her share of discrimination from colleagues who didn't care to work with women surgeons, she said.
But after Aks, an emergency room surgeon, decided to have a family in her late 30s, she found it tough to regain the solid career footing she had before her triplets were born nearly 13 years ago. Forced to take seven months off for pregnancy complications, her contract was not renewed, she said, because the hospital didn't know how to deal with a female surgeon with children.
Aks resumed her career as a specialty surgeon, but at a huge cost: Her salary plummeted 60 percent.
"The perception is that you cannot juggle multiple hats effectively," said Aks, 49, who now owns a medical practice in Southgate, Mich. "I believe it's challenging, but you can. You can have high aspirations, be successful, have a family and still be involved. It's not equal for women, and I don't think it ever will be."
Southfield, Mich.-based accounting firm Plante & Moran offers tailored work arrangements such as seasonal work, telecommuting and contract employment to retain working mothers. The firm offers the options to management only.
"We want to accommodate people and their schedules," said Bill Bufe, partner and human resources director at the accounting firm. "We've had people who wanted to leave, but we wouldn't let them. We made things much more flexible for them and allowed them to continue to keep their toe in the water here and do what they needed to do in their family."
CHANGING FOCUS WHAT WOMEN CAN DO
WHAT WOMEN CAN DO
Tips for preparing to return to work:
Create a "re-entry" plan with specific goals
Foster a network for support while away from the work force
Volunteer while away and make sure that experience can be framed in business terms when you want to go back to work
Stay connected to colleagues
Maintain professional licenses and memberships and attend continuing education courses
Take classes to refresh knowledge and skills
Stay informed about the business implications of global and economic changes in your field
Secure contract work while away
Be realistic about how long it will take to re-enter the work force
Sources: Wharton Center for Leadership and Change, the Forte Foundation
CHANGING FOCUS
A survey of women returning to work after raising families found many shifted professional roles:
Accepted comparable or lower-level job: 83 percent
Changed industries: 61 percent
Changed functional role: 54 percent
Became self-employed: 45 percent

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"I thought you did get paid, just not enough for the IRS to know about."
I help my mom roughly 10 days out of the year (between April 1 and April 15), to get all of her final tax returns/filing/extensions done on time. Do I get paid, yes. Am I a WOHM, or I a member of the workforce, no.
What does that have to do with it? Why does billing more hours make you more committed? Did you somehow do a better job when you billed more hours, or did you simply get more work done?
I can't speak for your office, but as I mentioned, most of the lawyers I know who tried to work pt in law firms ended up working more hours than they were paid for. It's because that's the nature of the job. If you work 65 hrs/wk some weeks, why do you do it?
I work pt, and I'm very committed to my job. It requires that I work 4-6 weekends a semester in addition to working late two evenings a week. I'm salaried, and I don't have any "stated" hours. I have busy times of the semester when I need to work more hours, and I do. I keep track of my hours so that I can use that info to renegotiate my salary for the following year. I wouldn't be any more committed to my job--or do a better job at it--if I worked ft; I'd just be doing it for more hours.
And once again, is there more commitment to parenting when you're a ft sahm?
I've got a budding marine bioloist as well. She is into dolphins and whales. She was an orca for Halloween a couple of years ago. Some people thought she was a shark, but DD said to me "How can they think I'm a shark? Didn't they see my flukes?" (Because, obviously, orca flukes are horizontal while shark flukes are vertical. Duh.)
Did you take DS to "March of the Penguins?" When my 7yo DS, who loves his creature comforts, saw the movie, he turned to me and whispered "Mom, NEVER take me there!" No Antarctic adventures for this kid. He'd rather go to a warm beach.
"Are you ambitious, and why does working ft make you ambitious?"
Yes.
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"Better" in what sense?
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"How so? Where did I say that both parents should work? I said both parents should be willing and able to provide for their families. Do you not see the difference?"
What exactly do you mean by *both* parents being "willing and able to provide for their families" then? Aren't you specifically referring to *both* parents providing financial support via paid work? I have already stated that I am willing and able to provide for my family in the event that I was forced/no longer have a choice in the matter. But until that day, it is neither necessary nor a necessity for my family to have two WOHP's.
<<"capable is up for grabs" Come now must we resort to insults :)>>
"Come now, I have 2 friends here who are fulltime tenured teachers. Neither can support their families."
Do you mean sole support, or through having two WOHP's?
"The COL here is too much. THankfully, one is married to a doctor and another to a guy with a successful business."
And this is relevent to me and my situation how...?
"I have no idea if you can support your family. I suspect you don't either."
Yes, I would be wiiling and able/could support my family if the need arose. BTW, Can you support your family soley on your income? Can your dh support your family soley on his income? If so, why do you have two WOHP's if each of you can soley support your family on one of your respective incomes? Also, just for the record, what is your status? Are you married, single, two WOHP's, one WOHM (if you're single), etc? Do tell?
I'm always interested in achievement. I'm always interested in doing a good job at whatever I do, whether it's paid work or not. I apply my time and energy in different ways at different times of my life.
"Ambition" for you seems to be mostly about money and promotions. Just a difference in values, I guess.
Hee! Here's an illustration of my total inability to see anything in black and white. In one of the innumerable threads where "working fo extras" came up, I posted that I saw nothing wrong with working for extras. Then I went back and added "in general," because I immediatly thought of extras one might work for that I would classify as harmful. A cocaine habit, an extra-marital affair...
>>I can't judge people's qualifications in a vacuum. The same person who wanted to SAH for six years isn't going to want to start working 50 or 60 hours a week all of a sudden.<<
The problem with this is, you don't know that. You don't know what circumstances a person SAH under. Maybe he/she had sick children, or couldn't find acceptable childcare for one reason or another. Maybe this person was planning on going back to work right after he/she had kids, but there was a death in the family. Maybe they had to move a lot. You don't *know* why a person SAH. You never know if they really would have rather worked 50-60 hrs a week that entire 6 years, but couldn't.
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