Mumsnet Workfest - advice for women returners

For those of you who were not at the Mumsnet Workfest last Saturday, these are some of the advice highlights we picked out for women returning after a career break.

Developing your confidence

Businesses value you for what you give to them. Be clear what you can offer and know your value and your USP. Fake the confidence if you don't have it yet. Lorraine Candy, ELLE Magazine

Have confidence in yourself and believe that you have something to offer in the workplace. Know your skills and know what you bring. Karen Mattison, Timewise

Organisations to target

SME's are more likely to be open to flexible working than the largest companies which use this option mostly to retain someone they don't want to lose. Karen Mattison 

Some of the larger financial institutions and consultancies are leading the way in designing programmes for returners.  A recent example is Bank of America. Others include RBS, UBS, Citi, HSBC as well as KPMG and Centrica

Making contacts

Surround yourself with people who want to help you. Articulate what you want help with. Be specific. Nothing is stronger than personal recommendation. Karen Lynch CEO Belu Water

Applying for jobs

Don't be put off applying for an advertised role because it states that it is full time.  If the employer wants you, you have an opportunity to negotiate for flexibility which can come in many forms.  Before you launch into negotiation, check out the culture of the firm and how it views flexible working and develop the business case. Karen Mattison

In your covering letter directly address any concerns about your career break, including how you have kept your skills and knowledge up-to-date and are the perfect candidate. Justine Roberts, Mumsnet

Testimonials are powerful - include with your CV. Amanda Mackenzie, Aviva

And generally ...

Focus on your thing, the thing you are best at, and don't get distracted by what others are doing. Thomasina Myers, Founder Wahaca

Posted by Katerina & Julianne

7 tips for your return to work after a career break

Did you miss Gaby Hinsliff's inspiring article about 'alpha-returners' in Times2 on Tuesday 11th June: "Welcome to the World of the MumBack?" Lots of great  stories of women who have worked their way back up to senior positions in politics, academia and business after career breaks (it's never too late - Professor Margaret Rayman had a 17 year break). The article featured my 'Tips for getting back to the top" which I thought would be a useful to include here, with a bit more detail than was possible in the original.

Tips for getting back to work after a long break

1. Value your skills. For each of your past paid and unpaid roles, write down all the skills you used and make sure these come across clearly on your CV. If you remind yourself of your strengths and achievements you'll start to feel more confident. And you’ll be surprised how quickly your confidence comes back once you get back into work. 

2. Don’t limit your search to advertised jobs. Start with a clear idea of what you want to do, then work out how you can do it flexibly, as this will give you more options and is more likely to lead to a satisfying job.

3. Spread the word. Women returning after a long break are most likely to find a job through their networks. Start with telling your friends, family and acquaintances what you would like to do. Get back in touch with old colleagues and student friends (LinkedIn alumni groups can be very useful here). Make new contacts by joining industry groups, attending seminars and conferences, or volunteering. Tips on telling your story here

4. Update your industry knowledge and find out about current issues by reading articles, checking company websites and LinkedIn sites and talking to people in your sector.

5. Make sure you are ready to go back. There’s no point trying to find a job while worrying whether you are doing the right thing.

6. Don’t be intimidated by technological change; a quick IT course, or any teenager, can get you up to speed.

7. Remember that you are the same capable professional you were before your break - you're just out of practice!

And there are many other tips if you look around this blog, such as coping with lost confidence and guilt, and deciding what to do next. And if you look at our Women Returners website, you can read the stories of women who have successfully returned to work to find more about the different routes back. Do you have any other tips you'd like to share?

Posted by Julianne

Telling your story

"I struggle to view myself as anything more than a mother any more"

Ex- investment analyst after a 10 year career break

If you're planning your return to work after a long career break, one of the hardest questions to answer can be "What do you do?". You're not sure whether to talk about your time at home or what you used to do all those years ago. When my children were small and most of the people I was meeting were other parents, I introduced myself more often as someone's Mum than as Julianne. It's not surprising that as our career break goes on, our independent working selves feel so far in the past that they're not really part of our story any more (see previous post "Who am I anyway?").

If your old professional life feels like distant history, then it's harder to believe in yourself and feel positive about your return to work. This not only knocks your confidence but also makes your job search much less effective. Many women returning to work after a break find a new job through old and new contacts rather than through advertised roles, so you need to have a ready reply rather than a stumbled mumble when an ex-colleague asks "What are you doing now?" And when you do make it to an interview, if your response to the classic "Tell me about yourself" interview question is to spend the majority of the time describing and explaining your career break, you are underselling your past experience and are unlikely to come across as a credible candidate for the job.

When you're putting together your story, don't start or end with your career break. We suggest you use a structure we call the "Career Break Sandwich".

• Talk first about what you did before in your working life, then talk about your career break and finish with where you want to go now. 
• Explain why you've taken time out of the workplace, but avoid apologising for or justifying your break or spending too much time talking about what you've been doing. However do include any study, voluntary work, time spent abroad, unusual/challenging activities or anything else that might be interesting in terms of skills development or updating to a possible employer. 

Herminia Ibarra, in her career transition book Working Identity, suggests that a coherent story helps us to make sense of the changes we are making, so building our inner self-confidence. It also makes us more likely to get other people's support: "Until we have a story, others view us as unfocused. It is harder to get their help". 

Aim to draw out links between your past and future, particularly if you have a varied work history or are planning a career change: Have you always enjoyed helping people develop? Or solving difficult problems in a team? You're always bringing the benefit of your past experiences, at work and at home, as a foundation for what you want to do now.

Telling your story does take practice. Try out your narrative first with family and friends and get their feedback. Telling and retelling allows you to rework your story until you feel comfortable and convincing. Aim for a longer version to answer "Tell me about yourself" or "What are you looking for?" and a short version so you no longer hesitate when someone asks "So, what do you do?" 

Posted by Julianne (updated June 2018)

Women's Business Council - good news for women returners?

The barriers to women’s career progression are back in the news with the publication of a report by the Women’s Business Council (WBC), looking at ways of maximising women's contribution to economic growth and assessing priorities in removing the barriers that women face in playing a full part in business and the workplace.  But does it say anything new and interesting for women returners?  And will anything change as a result?

What's new?

The headline of the report is that there are 2.4 million women who are not working and who want to work.  So this is a report seems to be about women returners, the first time this topic has been approached so comprehensively.  It probably helps that Ruby McGregor-Smith CBE, the Chair of the WBC herself took an 18 month career break and is now CEO of a FTSE-250 company.

As you might expect, the report addresses barriers to our careers from start to finish.  It breaks its recommendations down into four areas: broadening girls’ aspirations at school (Starting Out); flexible working and other support for working parents (Getting On); women in the ‘third part’ of their working lives (Staying On); and female entrepreneurship (Enterprise). 

Two aspects are new and of note:

·         The needs of women wishing to return to work after a break are highlighted, along with support for parents who continue to work;

·         It is significant, I think, that there is not yet a recognised term for the ‘third part’ of our lives: it is a symptom of how invisible older women can feel.

So the WBC must be applauded for bringing these dimensions into public debate and to the attention of the Government.

Will anything change?

It is hard to see how in these difficult economic times, the Government will do more than it is already.  Indeed its response to the report does little more than reiterate the actions it has already taken.  What the Government does promise, however, is to:

·         Lead by example in incorporating the WBC’s message and approach in flexible working, as a major employer;

·         Appoint a business champion for older workers and to work with existing bodies to develop new approaches for this group;

·         Provide better web-based support for women entrepreneurs and tackle the belief that they are less likely to obtain banking finance than men

For its part, the WBC will meet every six months to monitor progress and will report in one year on what has been achieved.

So, while the Government and business will be looking anew at women’s careers and how to support them, the focus is mostly on continuing to do what they are already doing for working women.  I fear It might, therefore, take some time for the effects to trickle out into the world of women returners.

What do you think of the WBC’s report and the Government’s response? What measures do you think would make a difference to you returning to work?

Posted by Katerina

Too few choices: advice on identifying post-break options

I’ve already talked about how we can get stuck when we see too many options. You may be experiencing the opposite problem – not being able to think of any exciting and realistic options at all. Are you still searching for your (elusive) passion? Or are you not quite ready to let go of your old work identity and create a new one? 

Maybe with time away from the workplace, you have realised that you drifted into your career but never really enjoyed it that much, and now you want to find a role you love. One client said to me recently “After working for many years without much fulfilment I’d like to follow my passion now … but I just don’t know what my passion is!” Career change advice to find your passion or your 'dream job' can be more harmful than helpful.  The reality is that we all have a number of possible paths we can take that could lead to satisfying and fulfilling work. Herminia Ibarra*, a professor at INSEAD who has studied many professionals and managers in career transition, suggests that the biggest mistake we can make is to delay taking a first step until we have settled on a destination.  She advises that the best way to move towards a satisfying new career is to learn by doing: try out a variety of things that appeal to you to any extent and say yes to opportunities that come your way to find out about new areas and create new networks (a project for an ex-colleague or a friend, volunteer work, a short course, ...). See it as a journey of exploration, be open-minded, and you may well find a role that inspires you along the way.

Or maybe you did enjoy your pre-break career but it was in an area where you can't see any interesting possibilities that could fit with your life today. You might have been an investment banker or a brand marketing director and loved the excitement of the job but can’t contemplate the 60+ hour weeks you’d need to sign up for if you went back. However your work identity is so entwined with your old role that it’s hard to think of any interesting alternatives.

In this situation, a useful exercise is to create your ‘Ideal Work Day’. Think of all the activities you did in your previous roles, regular and occasional. These might include meeting with clients, developing new ideas, analysing data, recruiting, coaching, writing, researching, presenting, etc. Now choose the activities you most enjoyed and would include in your ideal day. This gives you a starting point to think creatively about where you could find these aspects in another more flexible role, either employed or self-employed. For example Marian recognised that she’d most enjoyed the relationship building and presenting aspects of her consumer goods marketing roles which eventually led her into corporate fundraising. Acknowledge the sadness you may feel in letting go of your old professional identity and then focus on what aspects you can take forward into your new working life.

* Ibarra has written an excellent book for career changers "Working Identity"

Posted by Julianne

Who am I anyway?

Many clients arrive at our first meeting with the same concern: they have lost touch with their professional identity and are only able to view themselves as partners or mothers.  Thoughts such as ‘I can’t do those things anymore’, ‘I don’t recognise my old self’, and ‘I’m not the person I used to be’ are regularly voiced.  For some women, the loss of identity is compounded by not having felt fully themselves in their professional life.  If your previous working identity has felt ‘fake’, then it is even harder to work out how you might wish to express yourself professionally in the future.  Other women recognise that their former working identity doesn’t fit with the life they now want to lead and are unclear how to create the new self.

According to findings from Dr Lynne Millward Purvis, women – particularly working women – undergo three ‘identity shifts’ when they become mothers. Before giving birth, we begin to feel increasingly invisible and undervalued as we prepare to go on maternity leave. After giving birth, we are forced to acquire a ‘mother identity’, which causes our goalposts to move. And if we return to work, we find we need to redouble our efforts as we seek to revalidate ourselves, both as employees and as mothers.  (Dr Lynne Millward Purvis, The Transition to Motherhood in an Organizational Context). Those of us who take an extended career break miss this opportunity to revalidate ourselves as professionals and as mothers within the familiar context of our former role.

Often the loss of the professional identity is expressed as a loss of confidence.  Indeed, recent research of 2000 women by the Association of Accounting Technicians (The Times, April 17, 2013) has indicated that women on maternity leave lose confidence after eleven months absence from the workplace.  So is it really surprising that women who take an extended break will lose their confidence?  (See post Where’s my confidence gone? for ideas on how to regain confidence). 

My own experience of identity and confidence loss occurred when I arrived in my office after my honeymoon, to learn that my position had been made redundant.  Suddenly, I found myself with no professional identity, an unfamiliar surname and living in a new home that didn't feel like mine.  It took me some months to find myself again and re-create my new, married, professional identity.

The process for regaining or re-crafting your professional identity involves reconnecting with your real interests and your values and articulating your skills and experience (even from long ago).  It is ultimately a rewarding experience as the emergence of a new professional identity is inextricably accompanied by a growing self-confidence.  Remember that you have already successfully changed identity at other points in your life (eg when you first started work or when took your break) even though that might have felt daunting at the time.  You will be able to do it again if you allow yourself time to adjust.

Posted by Katerina - co-founder of Women Returners

Is it worth working if I'm not earning much money?

Money, or the lack of it, can be a major stumbling block when considering going back to work. If you're looking for a more flexible job, with shorter hours, the salary can be considerably lower than the one you earned in your pre-break professional role and that can be hard to accept. If you're changing career and starting again in a new field, the contrast is likely to be be even more extreme. And if you're a working mother, childcare costs take a huge chunk of your income if you don’t have a local grandparent happy to do the childminding (and most of us don’t nowadays). 

Working for a fraction of your old salary not only has a practical impact. It can also hit your professional pride and your sense of being valued, as we have a tendency to link what we're paid with what we're worth.

“I’m not sure if I’m prepared to work for peanuts”, was the reaction of one of my clients recently when she calculated her expected after-work pay if she switched sector.

If you're finding that low financial returns is a barrier to your relaunch, try looking at all the benefits for you of working, including those that are harder to quantify. When I discuss motivations with women returners, I hear many other reasons than just the money: “I want to use my brain again”; “I want to stop apologising when people say ‘what do you do?’”; “I miss the social side, having colleagues, talking about other things than kids and schools”; “ I want to be a role model for my children”; “I want to be on a more equal footing with my partner”.

Peter Warr, a Professor at the Institute of Work Psychology, has studied what it is about working that gives us fulfilment and confirms that money is only one factor. In “The Joy of Work”, he identified the ‘Needed Nine’ – the nine main sources of happiness in any situation or role: 1. Personal influence 2. Using your abilities 3. Goals 4. Variety 5. Clear role requirements and outlook 6. Social contacts 7. Money 8. Adequate physical setting 9. A valued role.

Warr found that studies comparing women working at home and outside the home typically find that average levels of happiness do not differ much between the two groups. The difference depends both on your preferences (staying at home or paid work) and your current situation. If you feel that you have high levels of the ‘needed nine’ – using your abilities, with good social contacts, daily variety, enough money and feeling your role is valued – then unsurprisingly you will be happier than someone with lower levels, whether you are working or not.

When I was a full-time mother, what got to me from the ‘needed nine’ was the lack of variety (the Groundhog Day cycle of washing, shopping, cooking, feeding) and the feeling that I was not really using my strengths; I was never going to be the mum who made a wonderful fancy dress costume or an awe-inspiring birthday cake. The joy of working again was not so much in the pay (as a fledgling psychologist there wasn’t much of that after childcare and travel costs), it was more about regaining my professional identity and having the satisfaction of doing something where I could feel a real sense of achievement and growth.

So if you’re wondering if it’s worth returning to work if you barely break-even, think of whether working means more to you than the money. Will it make you a more fulfilled person in other ways? And remember that you're investing for the longer term: whether you’re starting on a new career track or re-establishing yourself in your old field, you are building the foundation for a satisfying and profitable working role in the future.

Further thoughts

See Carol Fishman Cohen’s of iRelaunch’s advice on investing for the future and weighing household rather than personal income against expenses here 

Posted by Julianne

Is "having it all" a myth?

A quick ‘PS’ to Katerina’s post on Sheryl Sandberg et al…

Sandberg has dismissed “having it all” as a myth: "Having it all is the worst. No matter how much we all have and how grateful we are for what we have, no one has it all, because we all make trade-offs every single day, every single minute". This echoes the theme of Anne-Marie Slaughter's 2012 article "Why women still can't have it all".

It's easy to become disheartened as a woman returner, thinking that if these high-achieving women can't make it work, who can? In fact these comments say more about our confused definitions of 'having it all' than about whether anyone can be a fulfilled working parent. 

‘Having it all’ originally meant motherhood + career. Now we’re equating it to being at the top of the career ladder and the perfect hands-on parent (and not making trade-offs!).  Who set this impossible bar?

In fact, Anne-Marie Slaughter continued to work after she left her senior government job, returning to her academic job at Princeton University to have more time for her two teenage sons, and she has recently become President of the New America Foundation. In the UK, Penny Hughes who resigned as president of Coca-Cola when she started a family has developed a successful portfolio career as a non-executive director. And away from the headlines, I know many professional women (and men) who feel they have fulfilling careers and family lives. Most are not working at the highest level (only a few exceptional people like Sandberg can manage that), but they are happy with the trade-offs they have made, seeing them as positive choices to have time and energy for their personal life. This sounds close to ‘having it all’ to me.

Posted by Julianne

Leaning In or Hanging On?

There has been a lot of comment in recent months by senior women on how they balance a high pressure, big-responsibility role with the rest of their life.  It is a common, often internal debate, which professional women experience whether they are already working or thinking about returning.  Julianne posted about this previously and I’d like to add my own perspective.

Sheryl Sandberg’s new book, exhorting women to Lean In to their careers, has currently reignited this debate following Anne-Marie Slaughter’s contribution last summer (see links below).  Both Sandberg, COO of Facebook, and her counterpart at Yahoo, Melissa Mayer, profess to be able to have both a high profile career as well as a satisfying personal life. Sandberg’s book sets out what women need to do to follow her path.  She believes that women need to have more confidence to put themselves forward and push ahead with their careers.  She is also refreshingly candid about her own experiences and times of self-doubt.  Her response to her self-doubt seems to be to push herself even harder and achieve even more.  In the opposing camp are Erin Callan, former CFO of Lehman Brothers, and Anne-Marie Slaughter, Princeton professor and former first female Director of Policy Planning for Obama, who found that a high profile career did not suit the rest of the life they wished to lead.  It is of note that all these examples come from the USA, where perhaps there are more women in senior roles than here in the UK.

In any event, how is this debate relevant to women wishing to return after a career break who have nothing, as yet, to lean in to?  Returners can often believe that it will not be possible to combine their career with their other interests.   In my view, the question underlying the debate is how we define our success.  For women like Sandberg and Meyer, their sense of success is defined precisely as combining being a leader of a major international business and an influencer in their industry with being a wife and mother.  Callan and Slaughter, on the other hand, discovered that no amount of power, income and position compensated for the lack of balance they experienced in their lives.

For women thinking about returning to work, it is essential to be clear about how you will define your success.  Will it be getting back, as quickly as possible, to the senior level you previously occupied?  Will it be creating a portfolio of diverse activities?  Will it be working for certain defined periods of time?  Will it be turning a hobby or passion into a business?   The options are limitless while the choice of how to define your success is totally up to you: it is not for your peers, your social circle or your family to define success for you.  Getting the right the balance – for you - between work and the rest of your life is likely to be more important than your title or status.  Gaining a sense of control over your future career is a key factor in how satisfying you will find it.

For further reading:

Anne-Marie Slaughter

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/07/why-women-still-cant-have-it-all/309020/#

Erin Callan

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/10/opinion/sunday/is-there-life-after-work.html?ref=opinion&_r=3&

Posted by Katerina

Thinking small: an alternative route back to work

“I’m worried about being sucked back into working too hard and feeling like I’m back on the ‘treadmill’ … stressed, guilty and no time for anything”.

Carol*, an ex-marketing director, had quit her demanding job 8 years before to be a full-time mother and admitted that she was afraid of work taking over her life again if she went back to a corporate job. A career to Carol was all about 50+ hour weeks and high pressure.

I often come across this ‘all-or-nothing’ thinking among professional women returners - seeing only the extremes rather than any middle ground.  The thinking goes: either I have a full-on demanding job or I don’t work and have time and energy for my family/personal life.  Seeing this as a black-and-white choice between work and family leads many mothers to wait for the ‘right’ time to return to work:

“I’ll go back when the kids are at full-time school … when they’ve got through their exams … when they need me less …”

But there is never a perfect time to return to work - there will always be multiple demands on your time and energy. Even when your children are at school, the days can easily be filled with numerous small tasks for the home, the family or the school, plus visiting ageing parents, staying fit and so on. 

If you think that you may want to return to corporate life at some point in the future, the consistent advice from successful returners is to ‘keep your hand in’ with some form of skilled work, no matter how small-scale. This helps to keep up your confidence and maintain your 'professional self'. I found that starting small was also a good way to ease back into work after a break as a full-time mother. Taking on a series of one-off consulting and training projects rather than leaping into a larger employed role helped me to regain my professional identity in a manageable way with a young family.

Other returners have found many ways to adopt this ‘small steps’ approach. Carol* got back in touch with some old colleagues and was offered a six-week brand consultancy project that she worked on in school hours. Janet* took on a freelance role as a sub-editor two mornings a week, Maria* took on a non-exec role for a few days a month and Justine* became an occasional lecturer in legal education. Katerina found skilled volunteering to be just as effective (for ideas see www.reachskills.org.uk). Some of these women, like us, have since ramped up to make work a larger part of their lives; others have chosen to stick with small-scale work as it continues to give them the life balance they are looking for at this stage of their lives. 

*names & some details altered to maintain confidentiality

Posted by Julianne

What about the gap in my CV?

Susan* a former accountancy firm partner who stopped working when her family relocated for her husband’s job, consulted me when preparing for her first job interview in 14 years.  She feared that she had been out of the workforce for too long to be of interest and we talked through the kinds of questions she might encounter.  A few days later, Susan emailed me ‘…. he did ask "why now?" and when I started with "I have been a stay at home mum for 14 years..."  he cut me off and said, "And I think that is wonderful!  My wife is a doctor and she made the same decision when our children came along and you can see it in the quality of our children".   It was such an unexpected vote of support -- not what we read will likely occur when interviewers see the CV gap -- that I thought I should share it with you.  It might help others to realise that there are interviewers who understand the choices we have made because they share the same values.’

It is so easy to believe, looking at the world of employment from the outside, that we are the only person who has a significant gap in our CV.  We tend to focus on all the things that we haven’t done to build our career while we were not working: we forget about all the skills and experience we built up before our break and those we might have acquired since we left employment.  While some employers will still be most interested in what you did before your career break and might not even ask about the gap, recent research has shown that unpaid work can improve your employment prospects.  The study, (Wilkin, C., & Connelly, C. (2012). Do I Look Like Someone Who Cares? Recruiters’ Ratings of Applicants’ Paid and Volunteer Experience International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 20 (3), 308-318) concluded that voluntary work is valued by recruiters where it is relevant to the application and that even if it is less relevant, it can complement relevant paid experience by demonstrating altruism, co-operation and a work ethic. 

Think about all the activities you've engaged in as part of your communitiy responsibilities or volunteering and consider how they have provided opportunities to refresh, enhance and add to your experience and skills.  These endeavours are equally as relevant to your CV as roles for which you were paid - and can adequately fill the apparent gap.  One client, researched, created and managed a home education programme for her severely disabled child, co-ordinating nine different professional advisers while on a break from marketing and selling technology.  Another contirbuted her previous media experience and her organisational skills to an election campaign.  I filled my gap by becoming a trustee of an international humanitarian aid charity and Treasurer of a school PTA.  Whether we get involved in local politics, a religious community or a charity role, we are doing something of value, for ourselves, the cause, and for any future employer.

Posted by Katerina

Too many choices: how to focus

When I was on a career break after stepping out of my first career in strategy/marketing, I realised after a while that being a full-time mother was not for me. I knew that I wanted to do something enjoyable and flexible and spent many hours dreaming and chatting with friends about what this might be. One month a friend and I got excited about importing baby equipment from Australia … then a few months later I was inspired to set up a family-focused travel agency … then it was a flexible childcare business ... then studying psychology. I was never short of ideas but the interesting thing was that the more options I thought of, and the more I talked about them and researched them on the internet, the more problems I could see and the further I became from actually doing them. Eventually I was reluctant to share my next great idea with my friends as I had stopped believing myself that I was actually going to make any of them happen. Somehow having too many choices was stopping me pursuing any one option more seriously.

When I went on to study psychology, I found that my experience is so common that it has a label: the Paradox of Choice. Too much choice in everyday life can make us confused and paralysed. The psychologist Barry Schwartz in his book and TED talk on this topic explained "with so many options to choose from, people find it difficult to choose at all". As no choice is perfect, we can always imagine that we will find a better alternative. And the effect can be stronger with more complex choices, such as career decisions. We are less likely to hit “choice overload” if we are clear on our preferences or have a simple way to compare between options.

What got me out of the choice paralysis was realising that first of all I needed to develop some decision criteria to work out what I wanted from my life so that I could weigh up my alternatives. While all options were appealing, with some positives and some negatives, I was unable to prioritise. When I became clearer on what was most important to me and where I could compromise, I was able to discount many of my ideas and to focus on the one that seemed the best fit. Then I needed to push myself to stop thinking/talking and start taking action. I dipped an exploratory toe in the water by enrolling on an introduction to psychology course and that was the first step on the road to retraining as a psychologist.

Some of the women returners I meet also see too many possibilities and may have been thinking and talking about all the things they could do for years without making any concrete progress. One of my clients brought a list of the 16 options she had been considering to the first meeting - unsurprisingly she felt very confused about where to go next! If you too are hitting choice overload, aim to narrow your focus to get down to a manageable number of choices to investigate:

• Work out what is most important to you in your future job. Fine to start with 1) flexible 2) pays enough, but then go beyond that. What are you missing about work (is it using your brain, the achievement, the social aspect, ...), what are you really interested in, what are you good at and love doing?  If you’re wondering where to start with this process, look at  Windmills online or Build your Own Rainbow.
• Use this to work out what you want from work, decide what are 'must-haves' and where you can compromise. You can then choose a few possibilities that really appeal and seem like they could be a good fit for you. And don't fall into the trap of looking for the perfect job as all jobs involve trade-offs (see my last post!).
• Critically don't spend more time thinking - practically reality test your short-list: talk to people in the area, maybe take a short course, go to a conference, work shadow, do an internship … test your ideas and learn along the way. (We’ll talk more about how to go about these steps in future posts).

Having choices and being open to possibilities is a great thing – don’t let it keep you stuck!

Posted by Julianne

Are there any senior level flexible jobs?

Do you think that all the possible flexible jobs are low paid and menial?  Do you believe that the kind of role you’d be interested in cannot be done part time?  You might want to think again.  There are more and more examples of senior and professional women who have found – and often created – satisfying, stimulating and, yet, flexible positions.

Take Julie, a City litigation lawyer who left her role during IVF treatment.  After being away from the office for 8 years, she offered to return as an adviser to her firm’s trainees.  The role did not exist but the firm thought it was such a good idea that they expanded Julie’s original proposal.  She has been working 2.5 days per week (including half a day at home) for 8 years and has continued to develop her role according to further needs that she has identified.

Or consider Dalla, a taxation lawyer in the City who negotiated 4 days per week term-time only working when she returned to work, in a new firm. Or the A&E consultant at King’s College Hospital, featured in Channel 4’s series 24 hours in A & E, who currently works one day per week. 

But it is not only doctors and lawyers who have this luxury!  A recent publication of the Power Part Time Top 50 highlighted CEO’s, CFO’s and many other senior people who are successfully operating on 2-4 days per week.  This list was compiled by TimeWise, an employment agency which specialises in senior part-time roles.  The founder of TimeWise, Karen Mattison MBE, who herself works flexibly, suggests that the weak economic environment is encouraging more organisations to consider part-time roles as a way to be able to afford someone first rate who is unwilling or unable to work full-time.   

There are also enlightened companies, such as Proctor & Gamble, which see their family friendly policies as a key feature in attracting talent.  All P&G employees are eligible to apply for flexible working and in May 2011, 11% of its UK workforce worked a formalised reduced work schedule.

Some women find a way to work flexibly by creating a portfolio of different roles.  Penny Hughes, formerly President of Coca-Cola in the UK and Ireland who left her role when she became pregnant, has spent the last twenty years accumulating a series of board positions with companies such as RBS, Morrison and Cable & Wireless.  She works on average 2-3 days per week.  Similarly, Elizabeth* who built a career in investment banking over 25 years, is sharing her expertise in a variety of non-Executive board roles.

Other ways of finding flexibility in your working life include becoming self-employed (my choice), taking interim or project-based roles or starting your own business.  The reality is that you have many ways to find a flexible role: you might just need to find or create it yourself, rather than waiting for it to be advertised.

 Posted by Katerina

Tackling perfectionism: Is ‘good-enough’ not good enough for you?

“I can’t be happy with being ‘good-enough’ as a mother and at work.  It feels like failure to me”

Many of the women returners I talk to hit a barrier when we start to discuss the compromises they will have to make when going back to work. 

Emma* had a high-achieving accounting career before having children. Describing herself as a perfectionist, she told me how in her 20s she had worked long hours and “given 100%”. Soon after returning to work after her second child, she became overwhelmed and exhausted: “I felt like a poor mother and was frustrated that I could not give as much to work as I used to”. After one particularly stressful month, she decided to give up work and become a full-time mother. Six years later Emma is discussing her options with me. She wants to return to work now the children are at school as she wants to 'use her brain more'. However she is finding it hard to compromise on her family life.

Like many previously high-achieving mothers, Emma’s perfectionist focus had switched to "Supermum": being the best mother, finding the best schools & classes for her children and creating a perfect home. All her time and energy had been put into bringing up her family and she could not see how to cut back.

Perfectionism can be a major barrier to returning to work - the reality is that we have to make trade-offs.  If we set impossibly high standards for ourselves, looking to be both the perfect employee and the perfect mother/partner/daughter, we are at risk of continually feeling inadequate. Do we want to always feel like a failure? We can make this worse by the classic perfectionist's reluctance to delegate - we have to do everything as no-one can do things as well as us.

If you find yourself falling into this trap, spend some time thinking about your priorities and what is most important to you. Is it necessary to dedicate yourself totally to your children to meet your own view of what a good parent is? Are you spending too much time and energy on things which really don’t matter that much? If you are really motivated to work, how can you free up the necessary time and energy? For example, does the house need to be tidy all the time? Will your children really suffer if they don't have homemade food at every meal or homemade cakes for their school cake sale? What can you give up? What can you delegate to your partner, a child-minder, a cleaner, etc.? Exploring your job options, consider whether you are making life harder for yourself by looking for the ‘perfect job’. Work out your key motivations for wanting to return to work, what is essential for you in a job and what you can compromise on.

Aim towards viewing compromising as a good thing - it means we’re making positive choices.  As Rosabeth Moss Kanter said in a recent Harvard Business Review blog: “You can have it all. It just won’t all be perfect.”

Try out a new perspective on success. Success is typically seen as high achievement in one activity, feeding the myth of the perfect mother or the perfect lawyer/doctor/teacher/manager. Consider instead that personal success can be about creating a full, rich and satisfying life by doing just enough and being ‘good-enough’ in a variety of roles rather than outstanding in just one. We don’t have to give up our high aspirations, just to redirect them towards a more reachable objective.

*names and some details have been altered for confidentiality

Posted by Julianne

Re-establishing your confidence

Loss of confidence is a key factor inhibiting women from returning to work after a career break. Often, we express this loss of confidence in different ways such as ‘I’m too old’ or ‘My work can’t be done flexibly’ or ‘There aren’t any jobs in my field ‘: this blog will be addressing these specific potential barriers in other posts.

It is natural for confidence to disappear after a break from an activity which formed a large part of our identity previously and also provided status, goals, income and positive feedback from colleagues, customers and suppliers.  Without anything to replace these key aspects of a working life it is hard work to maintain confidence levels.  Moreover, in the absence of regular positive messages from those around us, it is easy to create a negative picture of ourselves and be overly self-critical.  This harsh internal voice has the most damaging effect on our confidence.  Despite all this, it is possible to regain our confidence: there is a list of suggestions later.

My Harvard Business School classmate, Claire Perry MP, a former investment banker and McKinsey consultant, expressed the experience of many in a Sunday Times interview (The Sunday Times, March 25 2012)

‘I was basically unemployed for seven years [at home with my children] and going back, even voluntarily, was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  Once you’re out of the workplace you lose your confidence’

Claire’s return to work began with offering to do work experience as a volunteer for a few months, on a Government economic committee.  And this route is a model that works well for many women.  Working as a volunteer whether for a charity, a school board or a community group gives us an opportunity to be reminded of our skills and value without the time commitment and pressures of employment.  We remember the things we used to do before and realise that all we need is some practice.

Other activities which also help us to regain confidence include:

• Finding activities that express us as an individual, rather than as a carer or partner
• Enhancing our knowledge and skills.  It is possible to find out about interesting and useful courses through the internet, a local library and adult education colleges.  Talking to previous work colleagues can be reassuring: they can suggest relevant literature to read
• Becoming more familiar with new technology.  Computer shops, community centres and colleges all run courses or a young, tech-savvy neighbour might offer tutorials for a small fee
• Asking for feedback, on our strengths and things we are good at, from the people who care about us.  It is easy for them to assume that we don’t need feedback because we appear to be managing everything very well
• Acting confident.  Sometimes, our thoughts and feelings can follow from our actions, so by acting confident we start to feel it
•  Spending time with people who support us and help us to feel good about ourselves
• Ignoring that critical voice.  This can be easier to say than to do, but it is important to recognise how unkind this voice can be.  Would we allow a friend talk to us this way?  If they did, would they remain a friend?  Learn to be kinder.

However we go about rebuilding our confidence it is essential to remember that it can be a slow process, but every small step that we take will accumulate over time until we are ready – and eager – to return to work.

Posted by Katerina - co-founder of Women Returners.

Am I too old to be employable?

I’ve spoken at a number of conferences directed towards women returners and one of the common questions, especially from those who’ve taken a long career gap, is ‘Am I too old to be employable?’

When I returned to work after my career break, I chose to become self-employed, but it is a common view among women hoping to return to employment that organisations are only looking for younger people or those who have worked their way up a career ladder.  It is easy for us to fear that we are too old and too out of touch, to be considered employable.  We worry that we won’t fit in to the office environment and that our prior experience, expertise and qualifications are no longer relevant. 

Instead of looking at what is missing from our CVs, it is much more helpful to notice what our years of experience, both in and out of the workforce, have given us.  As Michele (who found full-time work in her 50s, following a divorce) says:

‘I was attractive to my new employer because at my age I was reliable, I brought a wealth of different experiences which meant I could talk to anybody and I was serious about my work.  At the same time, I wasn’t going to take his clients and set up on my own.  And, I wasn’t going to get pregnant which made a big difference in a small company’

A recent Harvard Business Review article, which highlighted the concept of internships for returners mention that such internships ‘… allow [companies] to hire people who have a level of maturity and experience not found in younger recruits and who are at a life stage where parental leaves and spousal relocations are most likely behind them.  In short, these applicants are an excellent investment’.  (HBR November 2012 ‘The 40-year-old intern’). 

It is not just in the US that internships exist for returning mid-career women.  In the UK, the financial services industry was one of the first to offer these types of opportunities and since 2010 Red Magazine has arranged month long paid internships at a number of UK companies and with an MP

http://www.redonline.co.uk/red-women/internships

The internship route is only one of many ways to return to work and we will discuss other ways in later articles.  However we plan to return, we can help ourselves by remembering all the qualities mentioned and we also know that we offer future employers commitment and stability.  We will stay a long time if we enjoy our work and are valued for what we bring to the organisation.

Posted by Katerina