Lessons for Expecting and New Parents, and Those Who Work With Them

This month’s column is a bit more personal, drawing from my experiences as a new mom. The lessons here are not only for mothers but, frankly, for everyone in the architecture and design profession as employers, employees, and colleagues of new parents.

Having a child is inevitably life changing. For most of my friends who are parents, the defining moment of change was the day their child was born or the day they brought an adopted child home. In my own professional world, the changes began to happen as soon as my belly was big enough to make it clear that I was expecting.

Even though I had an incredible amount of support from my family throughout my pregnancy, I found those months to be isolating within my professional career. Long-standing mentors of mine, both male and female, often asked, “What are you going to give up?” The conversations with other mothers proved to be the most difficult, mainly because all of them had some career disruption occur while on maternity leave or after they returned.

Near the end of my pregnancy, when I was asked by friends who were also working mothers about my plans for maternity leave, the bleak tone of the conversation remained the same. When I responded that I wanted to get back to work as soon as I could—initially part time from home— because I love what I do, those same friends suggested that I should spend more time being a mother. It felt like a no-win situation.

Overall, those discussions painted a discouraging picture of the profession relative to parenthood. I also felt discouraged as I reviewed findings from the American Institute of Architects (AIA) San Francisco Equity by Design committee’s Equity in Architecture Survey 2016. The survey results show that women with no children reported higher salaries compared with mothers at every level of experience. Mothers reported being more likely than women without children to make professional trade-offs—to leave a position, as well as turn down a job, a new project, or even a promotion—in the face of work-life challenges.

Suggestions from my experience
I have had more than 14 months to reflect on the life changes brought about by the arrival of my son. I am a better person for having become a mother, and my professional life is still moving ahead at the speed that I want it to. It has not been without its struggles, though, and maintaining a true work-life balance is impossible. Instead, I do my best to manage the blend of family, work, and self that makes me the happiest at any given moment without sacrificing too much.

I encourage soon-to-be parents not to be afraid to make the commitment to parenthood, to push for what you need in life and work, and to ask an employer to develop a flexible schedule that works for everyone. Ask all of the necessary questions to make the best decisions. And while it may be challenging to make a job change, it may be necessary to make a move to a firm with a culture that aligns with your own personal belief in family.

With technology and online capabilities, the expectations for what we do in our work, and where and when we do it, have drastically shifted. In my position as a strategist at MKThink, my principal has always preferred me to visit clients rather than solely be in the office, and this tempered any expectations from colleagues that I would always be at my desk. As long as I get my work done on time, it can be completed outside of standard business hours. At MKThink, for example, we utilize software to keep in touch while on the go, including Slack, Google Hangouts, and Skype. We also place a lot of our work on Box so it is easily accessible when our VPN is running slow.

The best advice that I have for those who are working with and/or mentoring new or expecting parents is to lend them encouragement and help them find their own unique blend of self, work, and family. My hope is that the next generation of expectant mothers in architecture and design does not have to feel isolated from their profession, and that each of them has the necessary support from their peers, mentors, and employers to succeed. 

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This article was originally published on Contract Magazine.