Does parenting develop any skills you actively use in your career? I'm going to say YES.
One of my favorite executives +Marissa Mayer still seems to be a hot topic for articles – mainly because she is pregnant and heading up one of the giants of the Internet Yahoo!. Motherhood aside, it seems that parenting in general seems to prepare you for the challenge of being in a leadership position.
Here's my own list of parenting skills that directly transfer to my career:
1. Say NO. Often. I don't take clients that will be a bad fit just for the money, I don't let projects 'scope creep' very much, and I don't let my clients get taken advantage of by others. Some parents – and leaders – fear saying 'no' too much. I swing the other way, I say it loud and often. It's how I keep ships on the proper course. Every time you say 'yes' when you shouldn't you create a fork in the road that leads you off your target.
2. Quickly detect BS and call it out. I have an uncanny ability to sniff out all the bullsh!t and political nonsense that happens in working environments and either flush it out or stomp it down. My kids are also very fluid in their ability to constantly change up their tactics which keeps me on my toes.
3. Hear multiple conversations at the same time. Mostly because my entire family chooses to talk to me at the exact same time and I need to decipher it all simultaneously. You need to be able as someone in a leadership or professional role to keep you ear to the ground and hear what is being said (when it's not really being said). Know the ecosystem of your team, clients, and environment.
4. You become the world's best janitor. I used to tell people I was a janitor for a living – I cleaned up other people's messes. (Of course I mean that metaphorically.) Parenting gives you the same skills.
From the +The Huffington Post Parents article:
According to a recent survey of female executives conducted by my own firm [reference in article], 95 percent of female respondents believe parenting provides unique skills that are transferrable to the workplace. Interestingly, male executives feel the same — to the tune of 96 percent.
Now my question is…. do these parenting skills actually give you an edge over someone without them? And when might these parenting-acquired skills actually hold us back? (I'm not saying pro/con, just a point of discussion.)
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Motherhood Memo to Marissa Mayer: Parenting Skills Provide an Edge in the Workplace
Yahoo Inc.'s new CEO Marissa Mayer is about to add another valuable skill to her leadership toolkit: motherhood.
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Your patience evolves a lot, for sure. Also, you learn to repeat the important information you want to get across. You also learn about giving people space to try stuff for themselves 🙂
Don't really any useful skills, especially dealing with people based skills, help you actively in most careers? And parenting is a people skill largely.
Mayer will have a team of nannies working for her around the clock, before shipping the little instant millionaire off to boarding school. She won't experience parenting the way us peons do. 😉
+Lil Peck see, I don't know. +Sheryl Sandberg has said that she tries to be home by 6:30pm (not sure of the exact time) every night so she can be with her kids. Both women travel for their careers – but that's not exclusive to 'high powered' women. I travel a lot and don't have nannies – but a babysitter would rock! I also have friends that are single parents working two jobs and hand their kids off to family members & sitters to watch. I don't know if having help with your kids means you stop being a parent.
How can parenting skills hold us back?
1. Being too invested in the outcome. We can't give up on our kids, but we can and should give up on loser projects and jobs.
2. It's not my responsibility to follow after people, cleaning up the little stuff. That's QA's job.
3. I lost some of my ability to hyper-focus when I had kids. Multi-tasking is a skill, but at the expense of single focus.
Oh +Sharon DiOrio the multitasking/no focus thing is the bane of my existence right now…
Parenting skills in the workplace.
1. keep an even temper. No one wins if you blow up…even if your ego is harmed! Grace in parenting, Grace inthe workplace..is it always going to happen? No..can you try everytime? YES
2. Worry about you. This is a line I tell my 3 yr old already. Worry about Liam. Not the others.dont get caught up in gossip! Its hard because as a society we feel it brings us all together. Teach your children to walk away, and you walk away too!
3. Look at the big picture. Donating all your toys isnt fun, but if you are rewarded with one new one, its lessons the blow. In the workplace for me..sitting behind a desk all day on some days, doing autocad to layout a clients home…not so fun..but after the layout is complete, I get to let my creativity run wild as the interior decorator!
ps..im just learning this google + insanity, so if I am missing a tag..or something…pls HELP 🙂
#blog #parenting #career #
I loved this part:
"Mostly because my entire family chooses to talk to me at the exact same time and I need to decipher it all simultaneously."
So true! Happens to me all the time! 🙂
explain in detail on the rights and obligations of both emplers and employees?
Patience! Some bosses just expect everything to be done perfectly all the time. That doesn't work well with raising kids.
This is a particularly interesting topic to me as I am childfree, and I always wonder about the perceptions employers may have of that.
When it comes to the skills themselves, I think it would depend strongly on the parenting style, but I am certain there would be value in any case.
b1
🙂
Yeah but – Japanese technology could rule this olde worlde approach out sooner than we think – neh?
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If I ever had a child, I just couldn't trust another person to take care of him/her while at work especially during the formative years. After those years, I could do part time only if I had a family member or someone I really trusted to look after my child.