Women at Work - Welcome Back to Remote Work, New Moms

Episode Date: December 14, 2020

Coming back to work after parental leave, after having a baby during a pandemic, when you and your colleagues are still working remotely — is complicated. Our colleague describes how she’s approaching remote reentry, and we turn to an expert on all things career and motherhood for guidance on handling childcare, boundaries, and professional relationships during this transition.

Over 40,000 businesses have future-proofed their business with NetSuite by Oracle, the number one cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, and HR into one platform. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at Work. I mean, at the end of the day, like, moms only have so much they can give, you know? Like, we're giving at work, we're giving at home, and there's also just added layer of having your babies and not being able to be with your babies for the first time. You know, this is the first time I'm not with Mark by my side, really, since he's been born. And I know I'm in the same house, so in some ways I'm very lucky for that. But this is going to be the first day where I'm not like, the minute he starts whimpering,

I can't feed him right away. So there's definitely emotions. Coming back to work is an emotional time. You add on this extra layer of, you know, COVID and the health risks and all of that that goes with it and the financial stress of it all. It's really a lot. You're listening to Women at Work from Harvard Business Review.

I'm Emily Caulfield. I'm Amy Gallo. And I'm Amy Bernstein. Our colleague Erica Truxler, whose voice you just heard, recently returned to her job as an editor at HBR. She'd been on maternity leave for the past five months. Because of the pandemic, Erica had spent her third trimester working from home. She remembers it as a chaotic time. Her husband's industry was collapsing.

Their toddler Claire's daycare was closed. And Claire needed and wanted her parents constantly. They negotiated a new schedule. Erica would work in the morning, sign off for Claire duty in the afternoon, and pick back up in the evening. A long day under normal circumstances, but especially exhausting when you're nearly nine months pregnant. And then, in late June, Erica went into labor. Barely made it to the hospital, actually, and delivered baby Mark. Since then, she's kept up with the challenges COVID has thrown at mothers

and the impossible situations the pandemic has put them in. On Erica's first day back at work, she was game to talk with me about her time away, how she prepared to return, and what she's most concerned about now. A dear friend of the show, Dana Greenberg, joined the conversation. Dana is a professor at Babson College, the co-author of the book Maternal Optimism, and she appeared in our season three episode, The Upside of Working Motherhood. Erica, welcome back. Oh my gosh, I'm so glad you're back at work. Thank you. It is great to see you, Erica. I can't believe the last time I saw you, you had one little one at home and now you've got two. Yes.

I've been busy the last five months taking care of both of them. Yeah. Well, congratulations. Thank you. And it's good to see people's faces. I feel like it's a strange way to come back for sure, but I'm excited to catch up and see everybody. Yeah. So tell Dana and me where you are right now.

So yes, where am I? Good question. So we normally live just outside of Boston, but right now I am down in New Jersey at my parents' house trying to figure out child care. So I'm actually reporting live from my childhood bedroom with its purple walls. I feel like I'm 13 again, but now I have two kids. So it's a weird time. We came down basically because I'm ramping up back to full time and we have a nanny scheduled to start in January. But as with everything, I couldn't find a nanny that was willing to kind of go two days, three days and kind of ramp up. So this is what we've decided to do. So my mom and dad are stealing themselves for an exciting day with both kiddos. And yeah, I am here trying this out.

Dana, it's making me think you have kiddos at home too, but they're just at such a different age, right? They are at such a different age. Yes, I have three adult children. My 22-year-old is in New York. I have a 19-year-old in college, and then my youngest is actually in high school. But I actually do have my own pandemic child in our midst. I was really fortunate when my three were young to have second cousins in the area because like Erica, I didn't have family here. And so my cousin Rachel was instrumental in our childcare and she had her first child a week into the pandemic. And so similar to Erica, her mother, her mother-in-law and I are all part of their family's childcare infrastructure because she and her partner both went back to work. So everyone's piecing it together in different ways.

Absolutely. So Erica, I have to share the memory of you coming back the first time with your daughter, Claire, three and a half years ago or two and a half years ago. You didn't even make it back on your first official day because Claire had a fever and couldn't go to daycare. Yes. I thought that was just such an apt welcome to working motherhood. It was brutal. It was brutal. So brutal. How was your return this time different than last time, other than the lack of a fever? Yes, exactly. So the last time around, you know, I did kind of what you were supposed to do, which is have a trial run at daycare before you start your first day of work. So I sent Claire

to daycare the Thursday and Friday before I started work on Monday. And of course, she went in for one minute, got sick, and then she was sick. You know, she actually spiked a fever the night before my first day back. So that was hard. So all of that was kind of my first experience coming back to work. So this time around, it's just, the best I can describe it is just very strange. It's so strange. Like I kind of came into the, you know, came into this room where I feel like I'm 13, like I mentioned, and I signed on and I just kind of slacked my team like I'm back where, you know, half the people didn't even know I was coming back because it's kind of weird to kind of have this just remote re-entry. And I found myself just slacking people conversations and trying to set up check-ins with people. But you don't have that moment of kind of coming into the office and seeing everybody right away.

And I have to say, like, that was really heartwarming the last time I came in. I remember everybody turned around and gave me like a big applause. Not that I needed an applause, but it was nice to get an applause, you know. And so this is just like me in this room trying to get back into this, you know, swing of things. So it's totally different. It sounds like it's lonelier. Yes, yes. All of this, being pregnant, maternity leave, all through COVID has been, I mean, the best way of putting it is just the level of uncertainty and isolation is just,

I could never have imagined it. You know, with Claire, my first, we had mom groups, I had playdates, I had friends come over, I had my sister come over, I had people. I'm an extrovert, I can pretty much say that confidently. I'm a people person. And I didn't see people this leave, I really didn't. My parents came up a few times to help me out. But otherwise, it really was me and these two kiddos and Claire, my three-year-old, being a very demanding toddler. It wasn't the leave I expected or envisioned in my head. Claire would still have been in daycare, but we did pull her out in March when everything closed down and haven't sent her back. So it's been something.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, and I have to say the loneliness, you both know I have a 13-year-old, so my maternity leave was a long time ago. But I remember just feeling, because I wasn't working, because I didn't have the normal interaction with people, regular interaction with other people, I was desperate. I even saw a stroller outside a neighbor's house who I'd never met and knocked on their door and said, I see you have a stroller. Do you have a baby in there? And we actually became friends. Interestingly, her daughter was born a week before mine. So it turned out really well. But without that interaction, I'm not sure what I would have done.

Yes. Like my heart goes out to all the first time moms, because like all of those resources, everything that you have and you take for granted, that you can just go to the pediatrician if you're just nervous about a little rash or like now everything is like do i what's the risk of seeing a lactation consultant versus not figuring out how to nurse like all of these things and i will say that since i'm a second time mom like you know at least i know something so my heart does go out to you know all the first time moms who are going through this period, learning it all without that network because it's hard. I'm finding it hard, and I've done it before. And when you think about it, all those supports help you start to feel more comfortable. I wouldn't say confident, right?

None of us ever really feel confident on maternity leave. But they start to help you feel comfortable as a mom. And when you think about sort of that process of gearing up for return to work, getting comfortable a little bit as a mom is really important to do before you return to work. When I've been talking to new working mothers, I often talk about it like, think of it like a race. You're gearing up to start that race and part of it is really being comfortable as a mom and you're starting behind the start line, right? Because you don't have the lactation consultant, you don't have the friend you picked up behind the start line, right? Because you don't have the lactation consultant. You don't have the friend you picked up at the playground. You don't have the mother or sibling or family member to stop in and say, oh, my God, I'll take the baby for a half hour because you're just exhausted.

And it's really important for women's mental health at home as well as for their health and well-being of this return to work. When I think about, we had Katherine Goldstein, who is the host of the Double Shift podcast on earlier this season, and she really talked about how the system is not set up for working moms to succeed. And that was before the pandemic, and it's just been, you know, worsened by COVID. Listening to what you've been through, Erica, and listening to what you're finding in your research, Dana, I can't help but feel like that is just so acutely felt, especially by new moms who are doing this for the first time. I think the issue with the system is, at best, it's not set up to support working mothers, right, or working families. And at worst, it really works against them. Yeah.

And that system happens both at work and at home in our lives, right? So for example, Erica's talking about all these pieces of childcare she's dealing with, right? You talked about the idea that your childcare for your daughter, Claire, is closed down. Now you're having to alternate. What does the childcare system look like? We don't have universal childcare in this country. And thanks to Nixon in the 1970s and vetoing that one attempt to have universal child care, this becomes really a parent responsibility and we don't take it on. And so that really works against families in general. And now we're seeing that problem exposed. Yes.

And we're seeing similar problems in the workplace, right? People are expected to take on more work right now. We're afraid of the economic downturn and the recession that's in front of us. And that's also working against parents as well as we try to do more at work with less support at home. Yes. The lesson I learned really quickly from my first day going back with Claire was the unpredictability of children, like parenthood. Everything is a curve ball. It's one curve ball after another. And this time period is like the definition of just uncertainty. And I know so many parents out there are struggling with, there's a case in the school, the school starts down, you have no notice, you were supposed to go to work that day. And now

the class is closed and your child's home, or, you know, you've been in contact with someone, all the quarantining, all of that that's going on right now. And the extreme uncertainty is just, it's too much. And I think that to your point, Dana, it's like the system is not set up to support it. And we're all learning as we go in terms of figuring out how to actually make this work. But it's at a breaking point. I think every working parent can say that probably around the world right now. It's hard. Yeah. When I had a friend who gave me advice, she had children a few years before me, and she said, have more childcare than you need. Have extra babysitters. If you have a nanny, have her for more hours than you need her for. I remember thinking, that is such a privileged perspective. Childcare is so expensive.

It's tough to coordinate. And now with COVID, just the wiggle room is really gone for so many people, either because of finances or logistics or health concerns. cannot do 10 more hours by myself downstairs with both kids was as my husband started the new job during this he was interviewing for a new job right when Mark was born so like the two weeks he was interviewing and that was stressful because he worked in the travel industry and obviously that was hit hard so that was all very stressful at the beginning and I'm downstairs and I just had these moments where I was like I just need two hours to rest. But you can't call a babysitter with COVID with potential exposure. So 100%. Dana, what do you see in your research about the best ways that women can navigate the uncertainty, having a child and certainly the pandemic brings about?

I think the best way of navigating we're seeing is speaks to what Erica was saying before about this issue of uncertainty, right? I think the best way of navigating we're seeing is speaks to what Erica was saying before about this issue of uncertainty, right? One of the things we have to remember about ourselves as human beings is we really actually crave some semblance of routines, right? The routines enable us to sort of decompress. They take away a little bit of that stress. They enable us to focus. And what Erica points out is our inability to create routines, right? So one of the things I advocate a lot is I tell women to come up with your childcare bench strength. What's your layers of childcare? And as Erica points out, you can't have layers of childcare right now. So those

conversations, one thing is you really got to talk to your partner. I've seen couples be really creative about creating some semblance of routine so that if the child care breaks down, they know that they have sacred time. For example, like, okay, I know nine to 11 is always going to be time I will have at work. So I know those are places where I can schedule my most important calls and my partner can do the same at other times. So if whatever child care system you have breaks down, at least the most important aspects of your day you can maintain. And that can ease some of the anxiety and be really helpful. Yeah. Erica, have you and Rob talked about that at all? At this point, I'll be honest. It's like a day by day, let's see how things go. Because I feel

like we're not going to really stabilize until our nanny starts in January. And then hopefully we'll be able to kind of see how that goes. But even that as a whole, like we met her once with masks, who knows how it's all going to work. But in terms of sharing responsibility with my husband and figuring out hours, that is something we need to do. We need to figure that out. And those conversations take a lot of time, right? So that we do them in a way, because I know sometimes my husband and I, when we would have those conversations, right, with three little children, we come at it from a place of like urgency. Oh my God, I have to do this today, right?

And so there's a lot of emotional intensity. And how do you figure out a way to build those in regularly, which becomes even harder in the pandemic, right? Because as you point out, you can't even get two hours for the nap or the rest. How are you going to get the hour to have the conversation with your partner about how do we manage this? Even though you know in your head, like you know really well, I've got to have my partner involved because if he's not involved at home, that won't enable me to be successful on the return to work. But finding that time to do that's really hard

right now to navigate. Yes, yes, and HR into one platform. With real-time insights and forecasting, you're able to peer into the future and seize new opportunities. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at work. That's netsuite.com slash women at work? Or how do I claim my leadership power? Then you should listen to TED Business, hosted by Columbia Business School professor Madhupe Akinnola.

The show features TED Talks about everything from setting smart goals to the latest on DEI in business, followed up with a mini lesson from Madhupe on how to apply these lessons in your own life. Listen to TED Business wherever you get your podcasts. Well, and Erica, you are starting remotely, but there's some people who are having to go back to work, to a physical office. We got a voicemail from a listener named Kara who

said that her office is open. She's had to go back. She has no flexibility in terms of working from home. So her husband and child are at home and they have a nanny who's been helping but occasionally has had to quarantine and a mother-in-law who's helping. And she's feeling she described herself as feeling helpless and feeling a lot of pressure to be at home when she knows she can't for her job. Dana, what does Kara's experience tell you about what's going on for women right now? You know, we hear so many of these statistics about women's experiences right now. We've all heard the McKinsey study that one in four women

is thinking about leaving the workforce. And I think Kara's story really talks about the emotional angst behind that aspect of this, right? That we were talking before, the system is against women. It's also challenging in the workplace. So Kara sounds like she's in a place that has a lot of norms or expectations about needing to be in the office, or she's got a job that requires her to physically be present. And so that can really exacerbate feelings of guilt, maternal guilt right now that's going on. And so, you know, on one hand, I'd look at Kara and say, okay, when you think about the stress you're feeling at home, is it real stress or is it stress about what you're not doing that you expect yourself to doing? And how can you let up there sometimes, right?

Kara mentioned she's got a nanny. It sounds like she has a partner at home and she's got a mother-in-law. Those are lots of pieces to a child care story that may be working well for now. And they may need to change down the road. But how do you start to embrace the reality of what's your experience versus evaluating yourself against some mythical creature of a mom at home who's balancing a happy baby on her knee while taking really important work calls, which we all know is not our realities. And so sometimes those feelings of guilt are about what our expectations are of ourselves

versus the realities of what's really going on. And is our story working for ourselves? Yeah. Erica, I know we've talked over the last three years since Claire was born about work and motherhood. And I think you and I have often asked the question, like, is it worth it? And that's what I hear in Kara's story. And I think it's a matter of asking yourself, what are your priorities? What do you want? And what's realistic? Like you said, Dana, what rather than the ideal, like what can actually be achieved in this circumstance? The other thing, and I've heard you talk about it, Amy, is this idea of

lessening the expectations of ourselves at home, right? And how do we allow the kitchen to be a mess and not let that distract us and get us upset or the house quite isn't as clean as it normally is. The other place I think we need to lessen our expectations on ourselves right now is at work as well, right? So do I need to be chasing that big promotion right now? Do I need to constantly be increasing my visibility in my career? How do we lessen our expectations of ourselves at work with the idea that we can get more engaged and pursue those bigger opportunities at a point when we have more of the bandwidth to do that? And this pandemic space, just like I'm letting go of my messy

kitchen, maybe I need to let go of pursuing that new job opportunity right now and be okay with what I've got at this very moment. I mean, what's so hard about that too is that we've, our whole lives led to this kind of idea of being a working mom. And so you had this idea of what it would look like. And so quickly that just falls apart. And I think it's one of those things where I think for many people listening too, they don't want to let up. Like I don't want to let up.

I don't want people to know that being a mom has made it harder for me to edit a really hard piece at like, you know, 5pm or something, you know, that it really is something that you are almost ashamed to admit. Everybody has these feelings. And yet you often feel like you're the only one having those feelings. And that's why these conversations are so important, because you do feel this sense of, am I the only one that is feeling this, this frustrated by my inability to do everything as well as I'd like to? Absolutely. I think the other thing that can be helpful is think to yourself, what are the consequences if I don't loosen up on myself right now? And it may not be, to Erica's point before, that I'm not doing as good a job at everything I've got right

on my plate, but am I not taking on those additional responsibilities? And if you don't lessen up on yourself a little bit, the consequences are both emotional and potentially financial, right? Because when people don't lessen up for themselves, that's often when like we're hearing Kara's story a little bit, you get to potentially a breaking point. And the breaking point may be that you take time out of the workplace and the implications both on then future career opportunities, as well as wage earning, as well as your family's income are really significant. And so sometimes asking yourself that, what are the potential consequences here for my career, for my family's stability, for our mental health, if I don't let it up. It can be empowering, right? Don't look at it as a fear, but that empowers me to say,

you know what, I've got to let up because this is actually going to be the better way to pursue my career in the long run. Yes. I mean, the consequences of choosing to leave the workforce are huge for an individual personally, but they're also important and significant for organizations and society, right, Dana? Absolutely. And I think that's the part we're so not thinking about right now.

The research is heartbreaking. We are back now to 1988 levels of women's participation in the workforce. And the implications for the organization are huge, right? We have been working so hard over the last number of years to increase diversity in the workforce. And we know how important diversity is to organizational overall productivity, innovation, getting women into senior leadership roles. Women in senior leadership roles more so than men serve as role models, mentors, and sponsors. And they champion really important initiatives like work family support and inclusion efforts. And with women leaving the workforce, we lose those champions. And it has really significant implications for retention, recruiting for organizations, and for really

building that pipeline back up and how we're going to move back to even where we were pre-pandemic. There's also the societal effects, right? We know that if women are leaving the workforce, families have less income. So there's decreased spending, the decreased impact on GDP, gender inequality. So the ripple effect on the first, the individual woman, and then the family, and then the organization and society makes me really concerned for our next generation, for Erica's Claire. Yeah, I think about all those individual decisions, like the listener, Kara, who called us, or even, you know, Erica, you're back at work, but it's not easy. And you know, you're going in eyes wide open, that there will be challenges and those individual decisions of like, is this worth it? Like you said, Dana, the ripple effects are so scary. Yeah. Erica, as you hear these stories and this information, how is it impacting how you're thinking about your own return to work

right now or even just today? So yes, when I hear those numbers, I mean, I can't help but feel like those are, they're heartbreaking and I can completely understand why it's happening. I mean, at the end of the day, moms only have so much they can give. We're giving at work. We're giving at home. And there's also just added layer of having your babies and not being able to be with your babies. This is the first time I'm not with Mark by my side, really, since he's been born.

And I know I'm in the same house. So in some ways, I'm very lucky for that. But this is going to be the first day where I'm not like the minute he starts whimpering and he does the cutest little whimper. He sounds like a little puppy dog. But anyway, he starts whimpering. I can't feed him right away. So there's definitely emotions. It's an emotional coming back to work is an emotional time. And you add on this extra layer of the health risks and all of that that goes with it and the financial stress of it all. It's really a lot. So in some ways, I understand those numbers.

I really do. Yeah. I have to say hearing those statistics makes me resolved to reach out to my working mom friends and remind them that it's okay to let up a little and that for almost all of them 75 of their effort or even 60 of their effort is probably better than most people's 100 so just if you want to be at work just stay yeah and not to pressure anyone but to just give them the support that it's okay right now none none of us are giving 110%. And, you know, we're going to get through all of this if we have each other's back. Otherwise, those statistics are just going to get worse. And Amy, I think you bring up a really important point for those of us who have older children,

right? The importance of us being proactive and reaching out so that it's not Erica coming and saying and asking for the support, but proactively recognizing what they're going through. Relationships are so important to women's adjustment and return to work. Women really need those, whether it be new relationships that get established because all of a sudden you have something in common or you strengthen relationships and they can really be affirming to your sense of confidence, both at home and at work. And it's much harder to have those right now in this COVID time. And so it puts a lot more pressure on those of us who maybe have been through it to be able to say, we recognize what you're doing. We recognize the challenges, but we know you are good in both

places of your life. And that 60% isn't 60%. It is about being a good, solid, strong professional and about being the kind of mother that you want to be at home in your personal life. And so I think that's a great reminder for myself about reaching out to a lot of the working mothers who are working with me right now. Especially because we won't see them walk back into the office. I mean, the invisibility piece of it is really hard, too. Yeah, and the lack of those informal conversations, right? When you're going to grab a cup of coffee or you run into somebody in and out and they say, oh, you're back from maternity leave. And all of a sudden you have a conversation.

That's just not happening. And Slack channels are helpful, but there's only so much they can do and substitute for. What does the future hold for business? but there's only so much they can do and substitute for. cloud ERP, bringing accounting, financial management, inventory, and HR into one platform. With real-time insights and forecasting, you're able to peer into the future and seize new opportunities. Download the CFO's Guide to AI and Machine Learning for free at netsuite.com slash women at work. That's netsuite.com slash women at work. Erica, when you think about the next few months, what are you most concerned about in terms of navigating? There's a lot. I'm concerned about just all of us being, you know, when we go back home, like in our house, figuring out the boundaries. How is this going to actually work?

This poor nanny, my heart, like, I don't know how she's going to do it because my parents can hardly keep my three-year-old Claire from coming in, storming into my room. So I don't know how this new person is going to keep her from coming in every three minutes. And Claire's at the age where she breathes less often than she says mama. Like it's literally like her default mama, mama, so like it is a lot. So I don't know how that's going to work. We're in terms of setup. You know, my husband's in our spare bedroom and he's on calls literally from like 830 to six every day. So he's on calls all day. So we can't share a workspace. I'm sure people are feeling that it's like you might have

a room, but everybody needs their own room now with all these calls. So I'm going to be setting up in my bedroom. So that's going to be interesting. You know, I'm looking for little desks now to set up in there. And I'm worried about not fully being able to kind of transition out of work mode, you know, coming downstairs for lunch and then having Claire wanting me to play right away and then having to break away and guaranteed the tears that will follow. Because I mean, tears would follow when I went up for a shower during leave. So I can't even imagine like I'm doing work time. You know, she understood work time. My husband and I were doing shifts back from March until July. So I would do morning shift and he would do afternoon shift. So she knew what work time was. You know, at that point, I was like eight, nine months pregnant

doing that too. So that was a rough period now that I think about it. So was. You know, at that point, I was like, eight, nine months pregnant doing that too. So that was that was a rough period, now that I think about it. So hopefully, you know, I've learned some things from that. But the boundaries, it's, it's not easy right now, for sure. I'm anticipating seeing Mark and Claire a lot. I think they'll pop up, whether we like it or not. And I think Erica, you point out, every family is different. And every child arrangement is really different, right? And so a lot of times managers will be like, you know, well, don't you have someone taking care of your children? But as you point out, your kids are slightly different.

Claire is slightly different. Yes. I never worked from home when my children were young for that very reason. I had children who just really couldn't cognitively understand and separate. And so when I did, I would literally hide away in this tiny little sort of bigger than a closet room we had. And I would starve myself because I would be afraid to actually come out for lunch, right? Like I was being hostage up there sneaking off to the bathroom. And I think that speaks to because on one hand, it's like, you want to respond to your child, you hear them, like you said, Mark's whimper or cry. And at the same time, you want to be doing your work. And it becomes this challenge of how do

you maintain both like that sort of cognitive focus, some cognitive boundaries for yourself, as well as these physical boundaries, which are equally hard. And the lack of the workspace to really come back to, right? Because we know a workspace helps us reestablish ourselves in that identity as a professional. You have a place to go. You have colleagues to interact with. You get to get dressed, right? There's this sort of self-presentation of, oh, yes, this is a part of me that maybe I didn't have as much as I enjoyed maternity leave. And I'm really excited to come back to. I really like this professional aspect. And so you've got to figure out ways to recreate that at home with none of those boundaries. And that's a real challenge to the situation. It's a challenge for anyone who's

always worked from home. But in the pandemic, with everybody working from home, it's just heightened. Dana, you talked about the cognitive distraction, obviously, of having kids around. But there's also this concept of the motherhood penalty. And, you know, Erica works in a really supportive work environment and we have a lot of working parents. So it's not uncommon to see children show up in a screen. But there are moms who work in places where that's not acceptable, right? I think there are two parts of it. I think there's places where it's not acceptable. And I think for some women, they really vary in the extent to which they're comfortable revealing that aspect of themselves,

right? It's a place of privilege to be able to think about revealing your child on a call and not thinking that other people are going to judge me differently. And if you are a black woman, a woman of color, if you are in a non-traditional family structure, whether that be a lesbian couple, whether that be you work and live in an extended family environment, people can be much less comfortable about revealing their identities and about that potential motherhood penalty and being seen as less than or not as effective as at work. And so I think even in environments where we think we're work family and we're supportive and we absolutely are, that doesn't mean everybody's equally

comfortable with the reveal of identity. And I think that's a really important piece for us to remember as well. It's a really important thing for our male colleagues to remember as well. I was on a all faculty call the other day and it started out with a male colleague who's coming back from maternity leave next semester, and his child was on his lap. And for me, it was a piece of, oh, my gosh, here's the fatherhood bonus right in front of me. And again, as a senior woman, what's my responsibility to those returning working mothers who I knew all had their video cameras off because their children were around. And so in fact, this afternoon, I'm going to have a conversation with him. Because I think that's about how do we empower people in the workforce to understand showing our cameras, revealing our lives is really about a place of privilege. And not everyone feels as comfortable with that reveal because they're not operating from that place of privilege.

Yeah, this year has really driven home that point for me that authenticity at work is a privilege, especially since we have all these cameras on in our home. It does make me more aware of what I get to choose to show and then also what do I choose to show to help normalize for others. So I think a lot about this issue of visibility right now in my own family situation, right? Because I said before that I'm involved in caregiving for my little cousin. And I'm working really hard as a senior leader on our campus to model much greater visibility that I did earlier in my career. I think when I was early in my career, I was much more concerned about these things and afraid of being judged. And I find one of my responsibilities of trying to change that

dynamic is to be more visible with people. So I am really clear, oh, no, I can't meet then because I have childcare responsibilities. And that's a set thing on my calendar on my schedule. I'm part of this extended family structure. And that doesn't make me any less capable as your division chair or as a new associate dean. And so I'm hoping by modeling some of that behavior, maybe I can help people start to change that dynamic and feel less uncomfortable about revealing more of themselves in the workplace. And so how do I, so Amy pointed before about the privilege, I'm aware of my privilege. And so I'm thinking about how do I use that privilege now? What's my responsibility in using that? And that is in a way like a silver lining that's

hopefully coming out of this, you know, instead of so many times people would pretend it was another reason that they had to duck off from work and they weren't going to see their kid's soccer game. They were pretending that they had a dentist appointment or something. And you just hope that now people can be honest about it. And that, you know, the curtain has been lifted behind all the time and commitments that it does take to raise children. Dan, I do have a question for you just about my re-entry. And if you have any advice for me in terms of what I should be focusing on as I do return. I'm already noticing only one hour in how much harder it's going to be just to be honestly just visible. I'm going to have to be far more proactive about who I meet with and what projects I take on. And I was just wondering if you have any advice

as I start this next chapter. I think that issue of proactivity is the most important, right? So you're already down the road of taking the first piece of advice I would give you, which is to start to think about how do you proactively reach out to people when it's not specifically about getting your work done, right? Obviously, you're going to be proactively probably reaching out to Amy. Okay, let's sit down. What are my next projects? What do I need to work on?

But we forget that we need to also proactively reach out to people about building and maintaining the relationships that are important to us, whether it be coaching or mentoring or just general social support. And so how do you figure out ways to weave and integrate those in, right? So a lot of people have a quote unquote best work friend who's really important to their emotional stability and well-being, well, maybe you can have a quick glass of wine or a tea or something that involves, and Claire or Mark would be around because you don't have that sense of, oh my gosh, I have to have a boundary. I have to self-present and be fully focused because that's a different kind of interaction, right? So how do you think about weaving some of those relational pieces into your day in really different ways? And that can be really helpful. And not to forget them. You're going to be proactive about the work, but be proactive about the social support too. Because as you said, that cheer kept you going in the beginning. And there are lots of people out there who had those cheers for you. You may need to remind them you're here. Yeah.

Okay, thank you. I was cheering for you at home this morning. I promise. Thank you all. This was so helpful. And I just, I think this goes without saying, Erica, but you know, as your colleague, I have your back and we've helped each other through so much at work and I look forward to navigating this new chapter for you together. Thank you so much. Thank you both. This was wonderful. Dana, thank you so much for talking with us. I always love having you on the show. Thank you so much. This has been a great conversation.

That's our show and our final episode of the season. All right, guys, how should we say goodbye? Maybe we can go around and each say one thing that we learned this season and one thing that we're grateful for. I like that. Interestingly, I keep going back to our very first episode of the season where Heidi Grant talked to us about how to ask for help. And I use her advice weekly in terms of thinking about what is it I need, who's qualified to help me, and how do I ask in a way that makes it beneficial for them and for me to say yes. Nice.

Yeah, I love that. Yeah, that was a great episode. You know, I'm thinking about that episode where three of our listeners talked to us about how COVID affected them and their careers. You know, they had all in one form or another lost work. And what really moved me about their stories was how resilient they were. And the different ways of resilience and reinvention. That really sat with me.

It still sits with me. For me, the episode that sticks out most right now is the episode on shyness. I feel like there was such a response to that. Like I had like multiple messages from people saying that they had similar experiences at work. And so there was something really reassuring about that. And it felt like such a great topic to cover because of the response. I love that episode too. Yeah, a lot of people needed that advice. All right. So what are we grateful for? Yeah, I'm really grateful to be part of this new community and to engage with the listeners and with you guys.

It's been an experience that has made me feel reassured. It made me feel supported and motivated. So I'm really, really happy to be here with you guys. And I'm so grateful you joined us. This has been so nice to have your perspective. And it is this community is amazing. I feel really fortunate that we have a space where we get to process and talk about what's happening to women's careers right now. All of the statistics and news stories are really alarming. And I just feel lucky that we get to bring in experts to help us think it through and to think it through ourselves together. What about you, Amy B?

Oh my God, you two stole the meat right off my fork. What am I grateful for? I'm grateful for exactly what you two were saying, but I'm grateful that we were able to process the horror of 2020 together in a way that, you know, allowed for us to feel our feelings, but also to bring facts and research and rational thinking into the conversation so that we could get a kind of a longer view and strip away at least some of, for me at least, the fear, the rampant anxiety. It really, it helped me sleep a little bit better at night to talk to you about all that's been going on. Yeah, it makes you feel a little less alone in this horrible time.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. I'm also I also want to thank, you know, we don't do this alone. And we have an amazing editorial and production team behind us. Without them, we wouldn't be here. And I want to thank Amanda Kersey, our producer. Amanda puts these shows together week in, week out. She structures them. She brings us the guests whom we talk to, and she makes us sound better for sure and i want to thank maureen hoke our supervising

editor who just lent her expertise and advice to the show from its very beginning and this season appeared twice on the show was really a major contributor to those conversations really just always grateful for her and her insights. And I want to say thank you to Tina Tobey-Mack, our engineer, who also works on editing the audio for the show. She helped me learn some speaking skills into the mic. She taught me how to talk with a pencil in my mouth. And special thanks to her daughter, Maddie, who has made any video call I've had with Tina so much more fun and I want to thank Adam Buchholz the audio product manager who oversees all of our podcasts and keeps us connected to our business side and makes us possible. And last but not least, thank you to Rob Eckert,

who handles the production for the episode on the back end and basically takes what we create here and makes it so that it's available to all of you. And in addition to our editorial and production team, we want to give a very special thank you to all of our listeners and the many women who contributed questions and ideas. You really enriched our show this season with your voices. So thank you.

Women at Work has been going for six seasons now, nearly three years, and we want to know how well our stories, interviews, and advice are serving you. Which episodes this season were most insightful and useful? Which ones did you skip? In what direction would you like the show to go next? Send us your thoughts. Email us at womenatworkathbr.org. We'll read every email and keep all that feedback top of mind as we plan for the future.