Over my years as a parent, it’s been inspiring to meet families with lives of all sorts of rhythms. This third post in our “Career-Family Connection” series explores how families coordinate their work and family lives.

Some parents work jobs with traditional 9-5 schedules. However, the lives of families rarely if ever align with those hours. For example, school-age children usually get out of school in the early afternoon – parents working 9-5 may enroll them in an afterschool program, or may have the flexibility to leave work early and put in extra hours at night.

Child care is expensive, especially for infants. Families may not have the care they can afford or family around to help, so working beyond the 9-5 shift is not uncommon. They may face challenges as they juggle rotating shifts, multiple jobs, and nontraditional work hours – this can reshape family routines, complicate communication, and demand extra creativity in managing daily life. 

This blog post provides a glimpse into the lives of several families — from maintaining stability at home to finding ways to stay connected as a family — while offering insights,  understanding, and practical strategies for making it all work. Each family has a different type of schedule. These are real families living in Massachusetts and Maine, with their names changed for confidentiality.

Per Diem Work

In the per diem work format, work is done in 12- or 24-hour shifts. Due to the long duration of the shift, full-time workers have more than 2 days off per week. If both parents work per diem, they switch off entire days: one works and the other is off, with the “off” parent responsible for all things child-related (preparing lunch, picking up from school, etc.).

Freddie is a firefighter and Beth is a nurse. They are raising three elementary school-aged children by coordinating per diem work.

Freddie’s work schedule is mapped out for the entire year – it specifies which group is assigned to work at any given time. His shifts at the fire station last for 24 hours. Throughout the year, he follows a pattern: he works 1 day, then has 2 days off, works another day, and then has 3 days off. Sometimes, Freddie does details when he isn’t working his regular shifts. Details are special shifts for buildings under construction – they need someone there in case a fire starts.

Beth has some flexibility in booking her nurse shifts. She makes her schedule around Freddie’s, so there is always someone around to take the kids to and from school and to be there in case they are sick or have other emergencies. Beth’s shifts are usually 8 hours, though she has also worked at a hospital with 12-hour shifts. 

On rare occasions when both parents are working, Beth’s sister picks up her nieces and nephew from school. However, for the most part, the family’s per diem schedule allows them to run smoothly without needing babysitters or after-school care.

Opposite Shifts

Parents can work on opposite shifts, covering some or all of their family’s needs. Some work (e.g. schools) often occurs during the day, whereas other work (e.g. restaurant operations) can occur in the evening.

Teresa is a reading specialist at a high school, and Danny works as a chef at a country club. They have a daughter in sixth grade, whose transportation and care are coordinated between the parents throughout the day.

Teresa arrives at the high school in the early morning, before the school day starts, and leaves around 2:30pm. Danny leaves for work after lunch and returns home around 10pm. Danny walks their daughter off to her middle school, and Teresa picks her up.

Teresa often packs her daughter’s lunch and has a chance to say goodbye before leaving for work. Danny’s evening work shift means that he does not have dinner with his family on workdays. His daughter is excited about his return home and sometimes stays up late to say goodnight to him.

It is helpful to the family that Teresa has summers off. Sometimes their daughter attends dance or theatre programs, but there is no need for a full-time camp.

Hybrid Work – Single Parent Household

Single parents in particular benefit from flexible work arrangements and remote work, as they need to be able to transport children to daycare/school and also become available if children are home sick.

May is a social worker with a fifth-grade child and a toddler who attends daycare full-time. May meets with clients in person, but is in control of her schedule so that she can take those meetings during school hours. Much of the other work she does can be done remotely and on her own terms, giving her flexibility to care for her family.

Sometimes, May needs to work from home while children are sick or have a day off from school. It is not easy to do this, but she appreciates that she has the flexibility – she calls it a “life saver”!

Hybrid Work – Two-Parent Household

Our last example looks at the routine of a set of parents who both work roughly 9-5 jobs. As in the previous example, there is some flexibility regarding remote work and hours.

Zoe (bench scientist) and Gerald (research faculty) have a toddler who is in daycare full-time. They knew that after he was born, they would both continue to work full-time with similar schedules.

Zoe’s work is 80-100% in the office, especially for laboratory work. Even though some work can be done remotely, it’s encouraged for staff to work on-site.

Gerald has a lab, but his role is mostly computer-based (e.g. grant and manuscript writing), so he goes on-site roughly 50% of the time. He takes care of most of the family’s cooking.

With Zoe’s lab-based work, it’s common to need to start early or stay later, since the experiment determines the timing. This has been more difficult since adding a child to the mix. Zoe’s morning schedule is usually more fixed, so Gerald typically drops their son off in the morning and works at different times of the day. However, it can certainly vary day to day.

There are undoubtedly many other arrangements not covered in this blog post — for example, active-duty military members who go on months-long deployments, or entrepreneurs who may have a lot of control over their schedule yet work many more hours than a salaried employee.

We hope this glimpse into the lives of different families honors the commitment and care of the many wonderful parents in our communities. 

Our fourth and final post in this series will focus on a type of work not featured above: full-time parenting and homemaking. We will explore reasons parents decide to come home, what the rhythm of the day (and week) can look like, and how to thoughtfully weave in part-time work, entrepreneurship, and other endeavors.

This second post in “The Career-Family Connection: Finding Your Perfect Balance” series discusses communities soon-to-be parents might explore as they prepare to welcome a new baby (biological or adopted) into their family.

To start, let’s provide some context for this period of life:

Personal Transformation

Becoming a parent is an enormous shift on many levels: emotional, biological, social, financial, and logistical. This article about how pregnancy changes the brain shows a visualization of the brain of the parent giving birth through the three trimesters of pregnancy, as well as following delivery. Early in my journey, it was a relief to me to learn that how different I felt was not all in my imagination. Parents who do not give birth also undergo changes in the brain, optimizing their ability to nurture young children (see examples in this article).

Parental Leave Policy

Parental leave – the period in which a parent takes time away from work following birth or adoption – is different all around the world. In the United States, there is much variation across states (this article provides more information, including a visualization of the status of states’ paid family leave (PFL) laws). Other countries have programs at the federal level. For example, Sweden’s parental leave policy provides 480 days (240 days, or 34 weeks per parent).

Navigating these aspects of life and more is something we cannot do alone. The following forms of community can help provide that support in this season:

Workplace Community

Announcing a pregnancy or adoption can be delicate – how and when it is done in the professional context is to some degree a matter of personal preference. Different companies and organizations have different policies (e.g., who to contact, how much notice needs to be given, how to begin the paperwork, if leave can be taken intermittently or must be taken all at once, etc.). The process looks different if you are self-employed. An employee handbook and/or state-paid family medical leave (PFML) website are good places to start the process of planning parental leave.

Assuming a supportive workplace, this can be a valuable time to cultivate connections with colleagues. Some workplaces have affinity groups for parents. In the months leading up to my own parental leave, I found that opportunities to chat with other parents came up pretty naturally. Some had recently gone on parental leave, others had children in grade school, and adults. Connecting with parents in different seasons was very valuable and also new to me.

I found the connections I grew leading up to parental leave were helpful for many reasons:

• They provided a natural starting point to check in about timing for projects and transitioning work over (if applicable).
• I received valuable encouragement during an uncertain time and big life transition.
• When I returned to work from parental leave, those connections reached out and asked how I was doing. Years later, I no longer work at that organization but am still in touch with many former coworkers. Having conversations about our families helped grow those relationships.
• Observing how others supported me, I have a good sense of what kind of support someone in this season might need, and am excited to pay it forward whenever I have the chance.

Town/City Community

The months and weeks leading up to a parental leave period are an excellent time to connect with local parenting groups. Some programs may be held at local physical venues such as libraries, and many connections can be found through social media. For example, in Massachusetts, the Moms of Cambridge communities on Facebook serve Cambridge, Somerville, Arlington, and other nearby towns and cities. 

Because parental leave policies vary so much, a local network can be a valuable resource. Soon-to-be parents can connect with others who are also planning their parental leaves. For example, they may be part of the same industry (e.g., higher education) or be delivering at the same hospital.

On a personal level, families with similar backgrounds (e.g., same-sex parents, bilingual families) can find each other to plan meetups or share resources.

Chatting with others who are not in this season, but recently were, can be very useful, as well. For example, you might find conversations by families who have recently returned to work and are discussing logistics such as their daycare dropoff and work commute routine, or pondering whether to shift to part-time work or step away from the workforce for a season (topics of future posts in this series).

A great feature of many social networks is the ability to post questions anonymously. This is useful if you do not want to disclose your pregnancy, employer, and other personal details. There are many sensitive topics (e.g., layoffs, medical diagnoses) that may be tricky to navigate. Often, folks are eager to be supportive, especially if they have navigated specific situations themselves.

When I joined a local group, I discovered that someone from my organization was due with a baby a few months after me. We met briefly at work, but I didn’t know her well as a coworker. She turned out to be a great support, and it was nice to know someone at work was going through the same steps. In my situation, I ended up having my baby early. I unexpectedly needed preemie-sized clothes – this parent had gone through something similar for her older child, and let us borrow several items of clothing. 

Worldwide Community 

Something I discovered well after I became a parent, but wish I did before I went on leave, is that there are organizations that publish statistics, policy news, and takeaways from studies related to parents in the workplace. Several years later, I discovered these via LinkedIn. Here are a few:

• Parentaly
• Moms First
• The Mom Project

By following conversations at a greater scope, I’ve found it valuable to see my experience as part of something much bigger. Even though I felt alone in some ways leading up to the birth of my child, and preparing to go on parental leave, there are so many people who have been through it, and many who will soon go through the process. It’s inspiring to see the people who are so passionate about making parental leave and the career-family connection in general stronger and more nurturing for future generations.

In our next post, we will continue on this journey and explore how life may look (at home and work) for families as they settle into their new chapter as parents. We will highlight a variety of work and caregiving setups – made increasingly diverse by technology, and highly variable by field.

Women Accelerators is excited to begin our four-part blog series “The Career-Family Connection: Finding Your Perfect Balance.”

My name is Leah, and I first connected with Women Accelerators at an event in 2016. I was working full-time and volunteered with this fantastic group. Returning later as a new parent, I’m honored to share perspectives (and many open-ended questions) on parenthood and careers in this collaboration with Women Accelerators.   

When I became a parent, I was emotionally ready to care for a baby, but I knew little about how to balance parenthood and my career. There is no way I could have prepared for this transformation — there is no one-size-fits-all roadmap to follow — but I wish I had more guidance.

While by no means comprehensive, we hope that this blog series is a good starting point for anybody curious about parenthood and careers. 

The world is changing rapidly, and children are changing quickly, too. As our children evolve, we adapt in turn (e.g. a baby dropping a nap might mean a family can participate in an activity happening at a certain time of day). Learning more about children and families has enriched me and encouraged me to become more flexible and compassionate. Parenthood has shaped me into a better professional, friend, and neighbor.

Raising the next generation is an incredibly meaningful task. Parents should have all the resources they need, but in today’s world, they find themselves stretched for time and juggling different schedules. For example, the 9am – 5pm workday does not align with the school day. The ability for some to work remotely can be helpful for flexibility, but could also quickly blur the lines of professional and home life.

At the time of this writing (autumn 2024), the US surgeon general recently released a report about the overwhelm of parents. While this blog series will not address every issue, we hope it is useful at a time when we as a society are reflecting on what the ideal balance of parenthood and career development could look like.

At Women Accelerators, our goal is to support women’s choices. For one parent, that might look like returning to work full-time and another that may be staying home with their child. Yet another might hope for something in between (my own situation). Ideally, parents should also have the freedom to choose throughout the lives of their children and the evolution of their family needs, to choose again and again — perhaps building a patchwork of different seasons where the balance of parenthood and career looks a bit different.

This series will continue with the following topics:

• Insights on pregnancy, how to plan  for parental leave, and return to work after the baby is born.
• A look at full-time parenting at home versus working outside the home, including diverse setups such as daycare, per diem work, and hybrid/remote work.
• Review strategies for re-entering the workforce after a career break.

These topics impact many of us in the Women Accelerators community, whether directly as parents, coworkers of parents, neighbors to parents, and so forth. We hope that you will follow along as we explore these topics with compassion and curiosity. Sign up for our email for the next blog series.