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How working parents can survive the summer holidays

It’s the time of year that working parents dread – the summer holidays. While kids up and down the country are celebrating, the parents and caregivers usually let out a collective groan. As it means almost seven weeks of juggling childcare around work. 

We’d all love to spend the LOOOONG summer weeks enjoying lazy days on the beach. Picnics in the park and days out at zoos and theme parks but the reality for most is quite different. With over 60% of both parents working in the UK, flexibility is key to managing this extensive time of childcare.

Here are our top tips to survive the summer – with and without the coveted flex.

Talk to your boss early

It’s easy to say this in July, but explaining your situation to your manager early, may be key to negotiating time off. Working from home might help if your little ones need to be picked up or dropped off at awkward times. If working isn’t feasible, discussing with your employers early may allow you to carry over or pay for extra annual leave. Or come up with a temporary flexible solution where you can make up the hours in the evenings or weekends.

Partner up with friends

Everyone says it and it’s so true – mum friends are the best! Issues will pop up in the summer holidays for even the most organised of parents. You might find that the holiday club you woke up at 5am to get a coveted spot on actually runs 12 – 3. Or the two hour gymnastics class you were relying on is cancelled during summer. For those occasions, you need your pals. Try and book the same holiday club as friends so that you can take turns dropping off the kids. Coordinate days off so your weeks are covered and remember to treat yourselves to a glass of wine and a whine when it’s all over! 

Wake up early for maximum flex power

If you’re lucky enough to get flexible hours at work (we know we all should have this but it’s not always the case) make sure you use your time extra efficiently. This means early starts before the kids wake up and later nights. If you can get in a good stint in the morning from 6 – 9, you’ll have cleared your inbox and made a good start to the day before your little cherub has demanded her cornflakes. 

Buy ALL the crafts

If all else fails, and you need to work around your precious poppets at home, stock up on ALL the crafts and activities that will allow you to have some desk time while they’re occupied. Yes, there will be days when you’ll have to stick them in front of Disney Plus for the day and that’s ok but make yourself feel better by dumping some paints, glue and glitter on them and relax while they do something ‘educational’…at least for five minutes.

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Child Care Dads Flexible Careers Gender Pay Gap Parental Coaching Parenting and Work Professional Mums Work Journeys

Management- Where is the female talent?

A third of organisations globally have no female talent in senior management roles (market-inspector.co.uk).  This was reported before Covid, it has been reported Covid has had a disproportionate impact on the careers of women. A LinkedIn study found that women were less likely to be hired than men during peak lockdown periods. Despite more women being made redundant or leaving jobs. 

There are so many things that may be contributing to these damaging statistics. Are women not applying to roles due to prioritisation of the overwhelming childcare and home-schooling plunged upon them? Are men not doing enough to support women and so they feel they can’t apply for a new job? Do organisations discourage their male employees requesting the flexibility that would allow their female partners to re-engage into the workforce? Or are organisations not considering female talent in the same volume as those from men? And therefore, even if unintentionally, contributing to these statistics?

Given the data recently shared by Find Your Flex, it is clear, that application clicks are 79% female. 47% of their audience is male, this demonstrates there is a wealth of female talent actively seeking high value jobs. 

Sssshhhh… Daddy’s working

Sadly still live in a time where, in many households, women are seen as the parent. That they should do the lions share of childcare and household chores. Even when the playing field of working hours and the impact of the pandemic is equal. I hear endless comments from working mums across the country saying things like “it’s so hard trying to get it all done – the home-schooling and working plus trying to keep them from interrupting daddy all day”. Why can’t daddy be interrupted?! 

Of course it is not my place to judge how households decide to cope during this totally dire time. But if it has just been assumed the responsibility of the kids falls to mum then, please, for the sake of women across the land have a conversation. Plot out what needs to be done – all the home-schooling, chores – everything – and decide who does what. If this impacts daddy’s work schedule then, just like mummy, he needs to find ways to accommodate. (I should say here I know this isn’t the case in all households. Many dads are brilliant at sharing the load. But many just haven’t realised it’s a shared responsibility, or see their job as not flexible… Did they ask?).

It is okay to let go you know.

Women also need to let go. We cannot control everything. I had a word with myself at the start of this home-school period. I couldn’t be the gate-keeper – being the only one that can log onto Google Classroom and hand in work. The only one that remembers to look for supermarket deliveries and figures out what to eat every day. I sat and gave my husband a Google Classroom lesson on day two as day one almost broke me.

I don’t check the work hubby now does with the kids. He and the kids enjoy him engaging with them and seeing their learning. I don’t walk around in a passive aggressive mumbling rage so much as last time. Winning all round! The kids don’t get their iPads if their beds aren’t made and the playroom isn’t tidy. Mums need to relinquish responsibility and trust someone else to do some of what they see as their load. If not we will never have time or headspace to find that career opportunity which is waiting there for us.

Scared to say the ‘F’ word

But back to this 79% of females applying to roles on Find Your Flex. The talent is clearly there. Ready, willing and able to be hired and contribute to organisations. To bring the female perspective and skill set that all organisations need. It is known the roles advertised on Find Your Flex are open and ready to be flexible. I fear this isn’t the case across other sites and those organisations not showing up on this site. I still have conversations with coaching clients about approaching an organisation and asking for flexibility – like it’s a dirty word. Applying through Find Your Flex removes anxiety for those who need to have “the chat” during the recruitment process. 

In my opinion, shifting the balance begins with organisations showing the men of the world Flex is for all. Showing men to see working flexibly or part-time isn’t a negative reflection on their masculinity. Allowing men to be available in their families. Allowing them to grow stronger bonds as equal caregivers to their children. To make room for females to work equally – to not have working gender equality set back 50 years plus.

The job market is tough, but jobs are there and female talent most definitely is. The crisis could be an opportunity. An opportunity for organisations to invest and build more empathetic and flexible workplaces. To retain and attract those most impacted by this pandemic. Nurturing a work environment where women have equal opportunity to develop their careers. And men have equal opportunity to be present in their families.

Rebecca Amin is a Career Coach helping parents feeling stuck in their careers, find their paths back to career happiness. Rebecca can be found via her website www.rebeccaamincoaching.co.uk; Facebook Page and Facebook Group, Career Happy Mums. 

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Parental Coaching

Coaching Skills for Parents from Positive Parenting

How many of us went to the University of Parenting?

How many of us were given a manual when we had our first babies?

Where is that rulebook, the one that tells us what to do, when & how, the one that tells us how to deal with teenagers?

There’s plenty of advice out there, but no definitive answers, not really. I never did I go to that University, never was I given the manual or the rulebook – yet I raised 4 boys to be fine young men. I had a career, a hard-working and successful one too, good money, great benefits and a wonderful business, long hours and working away a lot, yet still I managed to balance being a Mum with that career.

Or did I balance it? Sometimes I have wondered what effect my career has had on my kids?

Then I discovered a relatively new programme called Coaching Skills for Parents and was offered a place on the pilot programme.

This was and is a totally immersive programme aimed at parents & guardians – in fact anyone with responsibility for children (of any age). A programme that doesn’t give any rules (it’s most definitely not super nanny!) – but what it does is provide a safe environment for parents to explore what children really need, and how to meet those needs. The programme gives parents the skills & techniques to take back into the family environment and coach their own children using the same techniques.

Essential needs of children

The programme centres on the 4 essential developmental needs of children – those of love & security, responsibility, new experiences and praise & recognition.

It follows the writings of many influential people, including Nancy Kline (listening skills), Mia Keller Pringle (4 essential needs) and Stephen Covey (habits of highly effective families).

My own experience of Coaching Skills for Parents

There were 8 other delegates, and we quickly built a high trust environment, becoming very close friends (and we’ve stayed in touch) as we shared many personal memories of our own upbringings and experiences of being parents & guardians.

There were many times when the emotion in the room spilled over, when we had some very personal realisations about our own upbringings, how our parents did this for us, how we could improve our own parenting, and for some of us how we wished we had parented differently.

For me personally, there was one powerful technique that was particularly poignant, where we looked at the life of a relationship (I picked mine with my eldest son) – right back to birth and then up to today it looked at my highs and lows in my relationship with him, and really helped me feel the whole relationship not just the most recent event, or the most outstanding ones (or worst ones). This was a visual exercise, using flip-chart & coloured pens – a powerful medium for me to use as the visual nature of it made it more personal and meaningful. It also helped me celebrate the highs, because I could see just how many there had been.

On this programme I learnt a lot about the needs of children, and about my own needs as a parent! There are many techniques shared with us that help us understand our own upbringings and those of the children we are responsible for.

Examples of some techniques covered:

• The Emotional Needs of Children (and Parents!)
• How Children Make Sense of the World
• Praise – the Magic Ingredient
• Labels and seeing things with fresh eyes
• How our own early experiences affect our parenting style
• Position in the Family
• Dealing with Feelings
• The Family Emotional Bank Account
• Family Meetings
• Developing responsibility and critical thinking

I learnt a lot about where I had possibly gone wrong as a parent (although there is no rule book), and certainly where I could be a better parent going forward. I recently became a first-time grandma, and my efforts will now also be focussed on what I can do to help guide my son & his partner as brand-new parents, and the role I play as a grandparent – a vital role model in many children’s lives.

How I use what I learnt for others

As an accredited coach, I am now delivering this same programme to groups of parents & guardians, in many settings & locations, sometimes offering affordable taster sessions to give people a feel of what coaching skills might offer them and their family, then a structured programme through regular sessions for consecutive weeks.

I also deliver a new version of the programme to separating & divorcing parents, helping them to build strong stable relationships with their children in a new home environment.

There are preparations now under way for launching an online interactive version of this programme during Summer 2018, and a franchise opportunity during 2019.

What people say

“The whole course has changed my home and work life completely. My whole attitude has changed for both & will always be improving everyday from now”

“There is more structure in my life. More focused on how I want things to be. A better relationship with my husband. All this stops one from crossing over into another which gives me a happier work life”

“I have learned more about myself & how I can influence my child. The course has helped me take a different perspective on things & this has helped me deal with the relationship strains that occur when you get a new addition to the family. I have learnt a lot that can’t help much at present but is going to be of massive benefit as Olly gets older”

“I’ve become a lot more patient; I take more time with the kids”

“I’ve gained an appreciation of the workings of a child’s mind & how their beliefs are formed. I can take this into all my relationships as it helps me to better understand adults as well as children”

Want to find out more?

Steph Durbin-Wood is an internationally accredited coach, a member of the International Coaching Federation, providing personal, executive & business coaching, consulting, and now parent & family coaching through the Coaching Skills for Parents programme.

www.prospectcoaching.co.uk
www.positiveparenting.coach

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