From baby to boardroom

A recent poll by workingmums.co.uk found that only 4 per cent of working mums were happy in their jobs. Only 4 per cent? That’s a thoroughly depressing statistic.

I’m not a mum, nor do I plan on being one in the foreseeable future, but the thought of a 4 per cent chance of job satisfaction really isn’t going to jump start anyone’s return from maternity leave.

Flexibility is the real issue here. 44 per cent of respondents were currently seeking flexible jobs following maternity leave or a career break. When you’ve got a young child or newborn baby, working a rigid 9-5 just isn’t going to work if you’re the one expected to care for your child. Until they hit pre-school or nursery age, there’s little option other than to put them into private childcare if you want to continue earning. If companies were more lenient about flexible hours and working from home, then it’s likely that many more mothers would have found suitable employment.

Of course, the current job market doesn’t aid the situation. Jobs are scarce already, so maybe people should be making the most of what they can get. But having to choose between not earning and spending time with your child, or working and being dependent on childcare isn’t much of a choice for many mothers.

One of the mum’s surveyed expressed her anger that you can’t have a career and be there for your children.

She said: “No one is prepared to give talented mums a chance because of the need for flexible working”.

Workingmums.co.uklists jobs for professional working mothers that allow for this flexible work/children balance. There are currently 99 jobs listed in the Greater Manchester area but many are market research and only offer 1-5 hours of work each week.

Sainsbury’s appear to be offering more attractive jobs with competitive salaries and management positions, but for every vacancy there’s sure to be countless applicants who won’t hear back and will slump back into the cycle of searching for flexible work.

65 per cent of the public workforce is currently female, but with the job cuts in the public sector, it’s thought that working mums will be heavily impacted. One mum, who’d recently lost her public sector job, said that she’d been to lots of interviews, only to have always been “too experienced” for the role.

If mums keep finding themselves in these positions, then more and more women will have to find new ways to try and maintain a balance between working and childcare. And the way things are going, that is unlikely to be an easy task.